Nissan Wants to Sell Electric Car in U.S. by 2010

Nissan recently announced that it plans to sell an all-electric vehicle in the U.S. by 2010. This makes it the first automaker to promise an all-electric vehicle by a specific date.

Chevy's Volt and Toyota's plug-in Prius hybrids both have a 2010 debut date, but neither vehicle will be all-electric. Nissan, it seems, plans to leapfrog the technological hurdles posed by a vehicle that doesn’t rely on a combustible fuel at all. All the old questions remain: What kind of range will it have? How long will it take to recharge the battery? How much will the vehicle cost?

Nissan envisions the car being purchased mostly by city-dwellers at first — and city dwellers who can plug in to an outlet at that — with the market expanding to suburban and rural areas as the lithium-ion battery technology improves. We remain skeptical simply because of the disadvantage inherent in electric vehicles, namely, no extended trips. Still, if Nissan manages to be the first out of the gate with an all-electric vehicle, it could give it a strong foothold in the burgeoning market for more fuel-efficient, low emission vehicles.

Nissan Plans Electric Car in U.S. by '10 (The New York Times)

Hybrids Taking Fewer Years to Pay Off

The Department of Energy recently announced that it expects gas prices to peak sometime in early June at a national average of $3.73 per gallon. This would be good news — at least drivers could see a light at the end of the tunnel — were it not May 12 with the national average already at $3.71 per gallon.

Given that the price of gas has risen a penny a day (35 cents total) over the past month, a peak of $3.73 sounds, shall we say, optimistic?

As the cost of fuel increases, the benefits of buying a hybrid vehicle become more immediate. It used to take as long as five years for a hybrid to pay for itself in fuel savings, but with the price of gas spiking, that time has been cut drastically. According to USA Today, versus similarly equipped gasoline models the higher cost of a Toyota Prius would now pay for itself in 2.6 years, while a Toyota Camry Hybrid would earn back the extra dough in just 1.7.

Other hybrids, like the Nissan Altima, Mercury Mariner and GMC Yukon, can take between three and five years to recoup their higher cost, while the extravagant Lexus LS 600h, with a sticker price just north of $100,000, would take 102 years.

Hybrids Recoup Higher Cost in Less Time (USA Today)

Cars.com Offsets Test-Fleet Carbon

Here at Cars.com we have a revolving fleet of new cars for our editorial department’s use. We drive these cars extensively so we can craft informed reviews, film video and produce various other content, including blog posts. Logically, we know that the fuel used and carbon dioxide produced during these tests is a necessary evil to provide the best car coverage possible.

Today, we’re announcing that Cars.com will contribute to TerraPass to offset all the fuel used and the resulting pollution emitted by our test fleet.

Cars.com Hybrid Mileage Challenge: Part 5

In Cars.com’s latest Mileage Challenge, we relied mostly on each car’s onboard mileage readout, a feature integrated into the trip computer on many cars these days. Ultimately we chose to use the readouts over our own at-the-pump calculations. In our final installment, we’ve decided to look at just how those readouts work — and more specifically, how accurate they are compared to calculations made at the pump.

Experts were split: Some defended the onboard displays as significantly more accurate than at-the-pump calculations. Another said that the differences tend to even out over time, while another warned that mileage readouts have their own set of potential inaccuracies.

So what makes these things tick?

Government Takes on Hybrid Reliability

For about 10 years, the long-term reliability of hybrid-electric vehicles has remained relatively unknown and constantly in question, even though current hybrids’ track records and reliability ratings are positive. People fear having to replace a hybrid’s expensive battery pack, and are generally concerned about high-dollar repairs because of the advanced technology in hybrids. Surprisingly, these concerns have been directly confronted by the U.S. government.

Cars.com Hybrid Mileage Challenge: Part 4

We’ve been blogging all week about Cars.com’s latest Mileage Challenge, in which we took four hybrids through a day of Chicago traffic. Along the way we logged more than enough seat time to size up the competing drivetrains. Though different in many ways, all of them build on the same formula: a gasoline engine aided by one or more electric motors, which draw power from a high-voltage battery that’s recharged by the brakes. (Got all that? Next up: quantum physics 101.)

Read on for our thoughts.

Cars.com Hybrid Mileage Challenge: Video

In the first two installments of Cars.com’s Mileage Challenge, we took you through our daylong city drive to see what sort of real-world gas mileage various hybrid cars serve up. Each hybrid in our challenge had a battery of displays to convey instant and cumulative fuel economy. Some also had power flow displays or mileage history readouts, while others had meters showing the amount of electric boost or how much braking energy was recharging the battery. That’s a lot of information, and each car had a different take on how to convey it. Naturally, some did better than others.

Check out our video to learn more.

Cars.com Hybrid Mileage Challenge: Part 2

Yesterday, we introduced the four fuel-sippers — a Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid, Ford Escape Hybrid, Honda Civic Hybrid and Toyota Prius — we schlepped through Chicago traffic early this month. We took pains to drive as we normally would: No nursing the gas pedal to stay in electric mode or purposely coasting to regenerate more braking energy. Just ordinary stop-and-go driving. Faced with some wonky fill-up numbers at a gas pump on the fritz, we took our results from each vehicle’s onboard mileage readout, which we reset at the beginning of each new leg. Read below for the numbers, along with some postgame analysis.

Audi, Hyundai Promise Increased Fuel Economy

As automakers look to meet the 2015 deadline for the increased CAFE standards, two non-American companies have outlined how they intend to achieve those goals and compete in the U.S. market.

Audi will look to take a familiar route, pinning much of their fortunes on the development of lithium-ion batteries and eventually an electric car with zero tailpipe emissions. The company already sells plenty of diesel cars in Europe and plans to introduce more diesels to the U.S. However, it sees the bulk of its research and development being geared toward the plug-in. It hopes to be selling an all-electric car within ten years.

Meanwhile, Hyundai has not committed to building an electric vehicle. Instead, the Korean automaker wants to up its fleet average with small improvements. It thinks it can raise its car average from 32.4 to 37.5 mpg and its truck average from 25.5 to 31 mpg. Some of the changes include increasing the use of lightweight materials, aerodynamic improvements, low-rolling resistance tires, direct-injection engines, and electric power steering systems.

We’ve already seen Chevy add some of these changes and eek out a few more mpg from its economy car, the Cobalt. Maybe this will become a trend.

Hyundai Aiming to Lose Weight, Increase Efficiency by 2015 (Autoblog)
Audi to Offer Electric Cars in 5-10 Years (Reuters)

Tesla Dealership Opens With Nothing To Sell

Silicon-Valley electric car company Tesla opened its first dealership last week at one of the busiest intersections in Los Angeles. It’s too bad none of that foot traffic will turn into sales, at least for a while. The first 600 Tesla Roadsters have already been sold, but only four have actually been produced. A transmission glitch which forced the company to completely change the type of transmission used has led to a delay which will keep the first 300 cars from production until at least December.

With another 400 folks on the waiting list for the $109,000, all-electric sports car, we’re not sure why the company would waste the rent check on a 10,000 square-foot store that cost $2 million to build.

There is an interesting aspect to the store though. It is a company store, not a true dealership, and salesmen are employees of Tesla and don’t work on commission. The company says it’s basing all of its dealerships on Apple’s successful stores.

Tesla opens first dealership in Los Angeles (AutoWeek)

Cars.com Hybrid Mileage Challenge: Part 1

It’s official: At $4.20 a gallon in some areas, gas costs more than a cup of the fancy stuff at Starbucks. That's why Cars.com has revisited its ongoing look at the real-world gas mileage today’s cars are getting. In our last mileage challenge, we took an SUV, a minivan and two sedans on a highway trip around Illinois and Wisconsin, and we concluded that the cars’ EPA highway ratings were easy to achieve. This time around, we wrangled four hybrids — two SUVs, one sedan and one hatchback — and their renowned ability to return extraordinary city mileage numbers to see if they could handle everything Chicago could throw at them.

The Second City certainly obliged. You might call it the route from pothole hell: Drive north 140-plus blocks, east eight blocks, south 115 blocks. Repeat. All told, we spent more than nine hours behind the wheel — 12 hours if you count stops for lunch and Mother Nature — and, thanks to a Cubs game and enough rush-hour traffic to discourage even the Californians among us, we averaged speeds of only about 20 mph.

Details on the cars below.

Jon Stewart's Kind of Hybrid

Tackling a dreary topic like politics is hard — we know we don’t like to do it — but Jon Stewart’s renowned “Daily Show” is perhaps the wittiest commentary on the air. That’s why when we saw this clip on car blog Jalopnik of Stewart discussing the type of hybrid he drives, we just had to share. Check it out at the link.

Jon Stewart Shows Us His Kind Of Hybrid, We Ask Which Comedian Is More Jalopnik (Jalopnik)

Start-Stop Technology Shows Potential

Carmakers are looking into every possibility to increase fuel efficiency in light of the upcoming 2015 CAFE increases. One fuel-saving technique that looks promising is start-stop technology, commonly found in today’s hybrid cars and SUVs.

How many gallons of gas and pounds of greenhouse gas emissions are wasted and emitted each year when vehicles are sitting in traffic or at stop lights and signs? The Department of Transportation estimates that 17 billion gallons of fuel are spent each year while cars sit motionless.

A German transmission company, ZF Friedrichshafen AG, has introduced a technique called hydraulic impulse oil storage that stops fuel consumption when a non-hybrid car comes to a halt and restarts it within 350 milliseconds of the brake being disengaged. This reduces fuel consumption on starts by 5%.

The advantage of start-stop technology is that it’s relatively cheap to manufacture, and if implemented widely it could cut the use of millions of barrels of oil and reduce greenhouse emissions. Some people in the automotive industry think that one in five cars will use start-stop technology by 2015.

Start-Stop Technology Gets Another Boost—and Some Efficiency as Well (Autopia)

Can Hybrids Pose Health Risk?

As hybrids become increasingly popular in a world on the brink of finding out the true limits of petroleum, there has yet to be any significant calculation of a health risk posed by hybrids. As with any electronic device — from cell phones to microwaves — the electric motor and other components of a hybrid car produce electromagnetic fields. Exposure to large doses of such fields for long durations has been linked to severe health concerns, like leukemia in children.

The problem is there hasn’t been a true attempt to quantify the kind of exposure a driver or passenger has when sitting in a hybrid. Electromagnetic fields exist everywhere, but concerned scientists are wondering if prolonged exposure to those generated by hybrid motors can have an especially detrimental effect. Agencies like the National Institutes of Health and the National Cancer Institute have linked EMFs to health problems based on studies done on cancer patients living next to high-voltage utility lines. There is no federal standard for acceptable exposure levels.

Furthermore, there is no scientific consensus on what constitutes an acceptable level of exposure. The two largest hybrid-car makers, Toyota and Honda, say their internal checks of EMFs don’t suggest they pose any risk whatsoever.

There isn’t enough known about either hybrids or EMFs to jump to conclusions about EMF danger, which wouldn’t help anything anyway. It’s simply an issue that deserves further study by disinterested parties.

Fear, but Few Facts, on Hybrid Risk (The New York Times)

Watch Out Plug-In Fans, Electric Rates are Going Up

The big potential of plug-in hybrid cars is that they’ll operate for long distances on electricity drawn from the home. That will save consumers pain at the pump, where prices are at record highs. But what happens when electric power sources see a price hike too?

That’s what’s predicted. The Energy Department says rates could rise 15% in 2008, the most in history. In contrast, last year they rose 2.3%. The price hike is due to the high price of coal, which fuels a majority of electric plants in the U.S. The high prices come from new international demand for the fossil fuel, even though it’s fairly abundant in North America. Other factors, like bad weather in coal-producing countries like Australia and China, are also fueling the spike for 2008, which may subside once those issues are resolved.

Some of the areas that will be hit hardest are places where electricity is derived almost exclusively from coal, including West Virginia and Kentucky. 

It looks like we’ll all have to get our calculators out once plug-in hybrids go on sale to see if we’re spending more at the pump or at the outlet.

Coal price hikes boost electric rates, more increases coming (ChicagoTribune)

We'll Take That Alternative Fuel Now, Thanks

Not to get all Chicken Little here, but even a cursory glance at today's news about rising gas prices makes for an ominous read.

At a record $3.60 national average, the price of gasoline is squeezing everyone, and there’s no sign of respite on the horizon. In Washington, D.C., truck drivers are staging a protest today, driving from Harrisburg, Penn., to RFK stadium, then assembling outside the White House. Truckers have to contend with the price of diesel, which has hit $4.24 nationally.

In Chicago, cab drivers have been forced to add a $1 gasoline surcharge regardless of the distance driven. This means a short jaunt in a cab will cost a disproportionate amount more, and may lead to more people choosing to walk.

A Plug-In Hybrid Minus the Plug

One of the contradictions of plug-in hybrid vehicles is that the place they are most useful — the city — is the place you'll likely have to park somewhere where you won’t have access to an electrical outlet.

Yet every once in a while an idea comes along that seems so perfect and self-evident, you almost can't believe someone hasn't thought of it already. That's the way we feel about MIRA's plugless plug-in hybrid vehicle system, H4V.

For city drivers with no garage and no access to a socket when they park their car at night, this is perfect. It works like so: The vehicle has three removable lithium ion phosphate battery packs in the trunk that you can pull out and take with you. Once charged, you simply slip them back in and you're good to go. MIRA estimates the cost of retrofitting a vehicle at about $3,950.

This presents the possibility that the true future of electric vehicles involves exchangeable batteries. Imagine pulling into a gas station and exchanging your vehicle's spent battery for a new one. As our senior editor David Thomas puts it, it’s "kind of like a propane exchange at Home Depot."

No Plug? No Problem. MIRA Debuts the "Plugless Plug-In Hybrid" (AutoblogGreen)

Are New Diesel Cars DOA?

We here at Cars.com have been covering the alleged entry into the U.S. market of a number of new clean-diesel cars and SUVs for the past few years. 2008 seems like the year that we’ll finally see these more efficient, torque-happy models on sale at local dealers. Some examples include the VW Jetta TDI and BMW 335d.

There’s just one little problem — well, one new little problem: Diesel prices are sky high, currently at a national average — and record high — of $4.21 a gallon compared to an also-record-high $3.55 per gallon for regular gas. That’s almost a 20% premium for diesel. High octane gas isn’t even that expensive, coming in at $3.91 a gallon.

So, will this hurdle hurt the new diesels?

Norway Dispatches Think Electric Cars to U.S.

The Norwegian company Think Global plans to ship 50,000 of its bite-sized electric cars to the U.S. The vehicles are all electric plug-ins that achieve a top speed of just 65 mph and cost $30,000.

Other than very basic urban driving, we have to call the utility of the Think Global electric car into question. At its size and speed, it would be obnoxious, if not dangerously undersized and slow, on any highway. Not to mention, if you're going to pay $30,000 for a green vehicle, you might as well wait two years and shell out another $5,000 for a Chevy Volt (at least, we hope two years and an extra $5,000 is all it will take).

Also keep in mind that, as with all plug-in vehicles, most of that energy is still coming directly from a coal-fired, carbon-dioxide-happy power plant. We do, however, like the Ox Concept that Think showed earlier this year. If they build that we’ll definitely take it for a test drive.

Think Electric Cars Coming to America (Valleywag)

Cars.com Survey: Mileage Matters Part II

In Part I, we tackled what car owners thought of high gas prices and hybrid technology. The rest of the responses were equally intriguing and focused on what will folks sacrifice for fuel efficiency? The answers to that question are below.

Chicago Restaurant First to Use Solar-Electric Car for Deliveries

Everyone’s going green, or trying to, and with gas prices soaring, consumer awareness of environmentally friendly vehicles has never been higher. It’s not just the Regular Joe car buyer that needs to cut down on gas purchases. Shipping and catering businesses can increase their profit margins if they can harness fuel-efficient technology as well.

We should probably applaud Sopraffina Café in Chicago for being the first business that we know of to do so. Today, on Earth Day, the restaurant and electric car company Zap are launching a 100 percent solar-electric catering truck, the first of its kind — according to the two — designed to make deliveries in the downtown Chicago area where traffic congestion and tight roads make the notion of a tiny electric truck — it looks like some sort of abandoned futuristic rickshaw, or a mini-pizza delivery truck — viable. Unfortunately for Sopraffina, we too live in Chicago, and we’ll be the first to remind them that our winter — of the dreary, grey, overcast kind — lasts, oh, seven months. How that little truck will handle such little sunlight and the effects of bitterly cold weather could be fun to watch.

Cars.com Survey: Mileage Matters Part I

Gas prices are getting to consumers, we’ve found in a new survey, and even we cynical automotive journalists, found the other results pretty enlightening. 

Cars.com surveyed 1033 men and women to find out how high gas prices are impacting how they live with their car and how it will influence the next car they buy. The surveyed group was split evenly among men and women as well as location. Nearly half (48%) considered themselves suburban, while 29% said they were urban residents and 23% said they lived in a rural area. Twenty-eight percent said they drove more than 16,000 miles per year – 9% drove more than 24,000 miles per year — which greatly overwhelms the 15% who say they drive 8,000 miles per year.   

What did these folks say about sky high gas prices and what it means to them? Keep reading to find out.

Cars.com's New Green/Hybrid Buying Guide

Happy Earth Day! In a terrific bit of coordination, Cars.com launched its first Green/Hybrid Buying Guide today in an effort to help car shoppers better sort through all the new hybrid, high-mileage, E-85 and diesel vehicles automakers are now producing.

Check out the buying guide where we break down all the latest models, stories that can help you decide how to go green if you’d like, as well as the latest green news from KickingTires, Ask.cars.com and MotherProof.com and our most recent green-car videos.

An Electric Muscle Car?

Talk about a contradiction in terms.

Imagine hammering down on the pedal of your Ford Mustang and roaring from 0-60 in 3.9 seconds like you're Steve McQueen on steroids … all with a silent, environmentally-friendly electric engine emitting zero rude, unruly carbon emissions.

That's the idea behind the Tjaarda EVX Mustang and the HST Shelby Cobra EVX, both zero-emissions vehicles based on their gasoline-powered muscle car counterparts. It's important to note that both of these are custom cars (the Mustang runs at $80,000 and the Cobra will cost you $120,000), so don't get too excited. Still, an 8-hour charge to a lithium-ion battery pack that will cost you roughly three cents per mile seems like a decent price.

I have only one concern: Isn't a car that can accelerate from 0-60 in under four seconds without making a peep—I don't know—fairly freaking dangerous?

HST International All-Electric Mustang and Shelby Cobra (Motor Authority via Jalopnik)

Photo Proves Volt is Not a Doorstop

After much hemming and hawing, we are relieved to see that the Chevy Volt can at least move. The photo above was provided by GM to AutoblogGreen and shows the body of a last-generation Malibu. According to Autoblog the engine under the lopsided hood is the Volt's E-Flex powertrain, proving, at the very least, the Volt will be able to drive around a test track a few times.

Many unknowns remain for GM, including the lithium-ion battery, the automaker's own 2010 deadline, and the final sticker price. The battery — still in development by two different companies — must be able to get the car 40 miles on a single charge. Whether or not GM can accomplish this before the quickly approaching deadline is up for debate. In the meantime, the price has floated up to $35,000, and may even go beyond that as designers struggle with various technological issues.

Still, we have proof the Volt is a driveable vehicle. That's a start.

Clarification of the Chevy Volt mule spy shots (AutoblogGreen)

75 mpg Looms in Car Makers' Future

For automakers who complained about a 35 mpg fleetwide average by 2020, we've got some bad news: According to an EPA official who spoke this week at the SAE International World Congress, cars and light trucks may have to average 75 mpg by the 2030s. That's if the country wants to meet the scientific community’s proposal to cut greenhouse gases by 50 to 80 percent by 2050.

The problem? Currently, all the trends are going in the wrong direction. The world consumes 85 million barrels of oil each day, but that will probably reach 120 million barrels per day by 2030. There are 820 million vehicles on the roads worldwide right now, but that could easily hit one billion by 2030.

In the U.S., transportation remains the primary target of those concerned with climate change and oil consumption, as it accounts for two-thirds of oil use and a third of greenhouse emissions.

The key for automakers will be to plan for the long-term. Whether anyone can predict what a “mpg” will even mean in 2030 — especially if the fuel itself changes to something like hydrogen — is yet another unresolved wrinkle.

Car Makers Could Face 75 mpg Rules by 2030s, EPA Says (Detroit News)

High Schoolers Get 2,843 Miles Per Gallon

A team of high school students from Mater Dei High School of Evansville, Ind. built a small vehicle capable of traveling 2,843 miles on a single gallon of gas. As part of the 2008 Shell Eco-marathon, the oil company invited 32 high schools and 23 universities from the U.S., Canada and Mexico to compete in building the most fuel-efficient vehicle.

The cars look more like bobsleds, and the results were extrapolated from data gathered at the racetrack (the kids did not actually drive 2,843 miles), but nevertheless many involved in the competition saw this as an opportunity for innovation. With automakers trying to figure out how to get their fleets to 35 mpg by 2020 and the rest of the world concerned about rising fuel prices and climate change, the competition drives the urge to think outside the box and beyond petroleum.

Still, one has to maintain a healthy dose of skepticism when an oil company sponsors any event with the word "eco" in it. What do you think: honest attempt at spurring invention, or heavy-handed PR stunt? Check out the YouTube video after the jump.

High School Students Set New Fuel Economy Record (World Car Fans)

Sugar: The Next Hydrogen Car Hope

Hydrogen-powered cars are here already. BMW, Honda and GM have all made them. The problem is — besides their extreme cost — that there’s no cheap and abundant source of hydrogen production out there. Scientists from Virginia Tech have developed a process that can convert sugar from plants — cellulose — into hydrogen.

They combine the sugar with water and a batch of enzymes and tah-dah: hydrogen. Of course, it’s not really that easy. The resulting amount of hydrogen is too low for commercial use, the group says, but it could be the first step into developing a realistic way to produce consumable hydrogen.

New system makes hydrogen from plant sugar (UPI.com)

Friday Fleet Notes: 4.11.08

This week's fleet notes takes on two competing hybrids, the Honda Civic Hybrid and the current champ, the Toyota Prius. In addition the Ford Focus makes an appearance, so if you're interested in how our staff felt about the Sync system, this might be a Friday fleet note you don't want to miss.

Toyota Prius

• Having driven a rental Prius in Denver a few months back, I was dreading the worst: an uncomfortable ride, a whiny engine at freeway speeds, a brake pedal that felt like a steel rod pressing up against the tires. Boy, was I surprised. This non-rental Prius could not have been more different. It was a much smoother ride. The engine, even at 70 mph, purred quietly. The brakes still felt a little funky, but I wasn’t in any doubt about their abilities and I still managed to get around 50 mpg. This experience gets the Prius off my hit list. — Patrick Olsen, Editor-in-Chief

Ford Pledges to Cut Emissions

Shareholders and activists applauded Ford's announcement Wednesday to cut its global-warming gas emissions from all of its vehicles by 30%. They set a target date of 2020 to achieve that goal.

This plan closely follows the new fleetwide fuel economy increase passed by Congress that requires automakers to average 35 mpg in their fleets by the same date. In effect, Ford has simply outlined how they plan to hit the government's target.

On the other hand, Ford has minor history of back-tracking on lofty environmental pledges.

In 2000, the company announced it would raise the fuel economy of its SUVs by 25%. It recanted that promise three years later. In 2005 it swore it would be churning out 250,000 hybrid vehicles by 2010. Right now, they sell about 21,000 Mariner and Escape hybrids annually.

Ford Vows to Reduce Auto Emissions 30% (Detroit Free Press)

Plug-In Volt Hitting the Road

GM is ready to test the much-hyped Chevy Volt plug-in hybrid that everyone in the automotive media can’t seem to stop talking about. The Volt’s propulsion system — the parts that make it go — will be put to the test in a mule vehicle. A mule is an industry term that describes a new car being tested under the guise of an older one. In this case, the Volt will look like a last-generation Chevy Malibu.

A number of journalists checked out the Volt program in Michigan last week, and AutoWeek came away with some tidbits about the interior resembling the new Malibu’s dual cockpit setup. It even went so far as to call the styling reminiscent of 1960s Corvettes.

These road tests are important, but GM still doesn’t expect to have a fully drivable version until 2009. The on-sale date is still projected as 2010. A GM spokesperson said the Volt is the company’s “No. 1 priority.”

GM to road-test Volt propulsion systems this month (AutoWeek) 

Driving the Nissan Cube

The Nissan Cube has the distinction of being the Japanese box on wheels that didn't come to the U.S. first and become a surprise hit. That honor goes to the Scion xB, which appeared in 2004 and unexpectedly outsold its more conventionally shaped stablemate, the xA, thereby launching a whole new brand.

Nissan has committed to selling the Cube here starting in the spring of 2009. Now, to be clear, that model will be a whole new generation, not the version Nissan let us play with for a day. All the same, I thought you'd like to get a feel for the Cube, and I never miss an opportunity to wipe the windshield every time I make a turn. You see, this is a Japanese-spec model, which means the steering wheel's on the opposite side of the car and the turn signal stalk is on the opposite side of the steering column. If you've ever switched to a right-hand-drive car, you know exactly what I mean. Fortunately, it was raining when the Cube came, which gave me a day of "I meant to do that”s.

Other aspects were decidedly Japanese — most notably the engine, a 1.4-liter four-cylinder that comes admirably close to producing 100 horsepower.

Hybrid Demand Staying Strong

Are you willing to play tug of war to get a Toyota Highlander Hybrid? How about rock, paper, scissors for a Ford Escape Hybrid?

It might come down to that; Cars.com statistics on unsold new-car inventory within a 30 mile radius of Chicago show only a pair of Highlander Hybrids on lots. There are just nine Escape Hybrids, 79 Honda Civic Hybrids and 248 Toyota Prius hybrids.

"When gas prices go up, so does demand for hybrids, and hybrids are in big demand," said Jeff Foltz, president of Auto Outlook, which tracks Chicago-area sales for local dealers. "In just the first two months of this year, hybrid sales in Chicagoland rose 40% to 1,514 units, from 1,084 a year ago."

Reader Review of the Week: 2008 Toyota Highlander Hybrid

This week's reviewer hails from the Virginia portion of the Washington, D.C., area, which means that as a hybrid owner he can take advantage of those HOV lanes and avoid at least some of the infamous D.C. congestion. Although he wasn’t pleased with the minimal options on the base Toyota Highlander Hybrid he bought, Hybrid Believer remains satisfied with his purchase. His review is below and you can write your own car review here.

It's Good to Be the Prince

We’ve seen celebrities like Brad Pitt drive the new BMW Hydrogen 7 to Hollywood shindigs, but now BMW is loaning one of the 100 test vehicles to Prince Albert II of Monaco for an extended loan. The prince claims to be into cars, and while he can afford probably anything on the market, there’s no way to buy a Hydrogen 7 quite yet.

Also interesting was BMW letting loose the names of other celebs who are “using” the Hydrogen 7. They include Cameron Diaz, Will Ferrell, Jay Leno, Placido Domingo and various foreign politicians. BMW doesn’t say how long the loan is for, but the Prince mentioned “weeks” of testing.

California Ruling to Revive the (Hybrid) Electric Car

California may have relaxed its ruling about how many zero-emission cars it would mandate by 2014, but by doing so it upped the ante on plug-in hybrids. The California Air Resources Board voted to alter its previous demand for 25,000 zero-emission cars — meaning vehicles powered by hydrogen fuel cells — to 7,500, including cars that automakers use in test fleets, like Honda, GM and others are currently testing, not just those sold to the public.

The reasoning for the change of heart is that California doesn’t expect to have a big enough hydrogen infrastructure to support that many vehicles.

What will actually affect car shoppers across the country, however, is that the ruling allows automakers to substitute 58,000 plug-in hybrids in place of the hydrogen cars it omitted.

Saturn, Honda Draw Green Shoppers Online

Compete.com — a free web tracking website — had an interesting blog post today about which car-brand websites green-conscious web surfers go to the most. Naturally, you would think Toyota would be No. 1, seeing as it sells more hybrids than anyone else, but as it turns out Saturn attracts green-conscious buyers in larger percentages than any other site. Based on Saturn’s overall traffic, it had the highest percentage of visitors who classify as environmentally conscious, as defined by Compete. Honda’s website gets the most green consumers overall, though. Toyota and Ford come in a close second and third, respectively.

So what does this say about the brands? For one, it doesn’t seem green sales equal green interest on the web, or Toyota would dominate. What do you think? Check out the full blog post and let us know in the comments below.

Can Going Green Include Your Choice of Automobiles? (Compete)

Eco Towns to Limit Cars, Speed

Those crazy Brits are at it again. In a sweeping new plan to help with future residential development, the government is looking to makes areas of towns car-free zones, or post meager 15-mph speed limits. The move isn’t really an anti-car one; the country is experiencing overcrowding issues and hopes these eco-towns will make the best use of space. Multi-laned roads, we guess, take up a lot of space that could be used for other things, like skateboard parks.

The parks are one feature these eco-towns will feature. Also, homes there will be built no farther than 400 meters from public transportation. All is not lost for cars, though: The government is considering car-share concepts instead of car ownership. The loss of cars will cause significant issues for travel, of course, so each town will have to staff an office to help residents figure out how to get around.

New eco-towns to make it hard going for cars with 15mph limit (The Guardian)

Greenest Car-Shoppers Gather on West Coast

We know that judging a city's eco-consciousness strictly by the number of times its residents search for hybrids on Cars.com's website will never encapsulate the “feeling” of a city. But the results still say a lot about where you live. We looked at new-car searches in every major American city and calculated what percentage of those searches were for hybrids. True to stereotype, we found that the top five cities interested in hybrids were all on the West Coast.

California’s Bay Area led the way with 5.62% of its searches being for hybrid vehicles. Portland, Ore., and Seattle rounded out the top three. Does this mean our friends in the West are the most eco-conscious?

Well, yeah, probably. Still, the numbers here don't count searches for clean diesels or fuel-efficient cars with regular gasoline engines, like the Toyota Corolla. We’re a bit surprised that notoriously congested urban areas like New York City, Chicago and Atlanta — where hybrids would return the best mileage in a long, slow commute — didn’t make the list. Check out the top 10 hybrid cities after the jump.

First Drive: Ford Escape Plug-In Hybrid

In connection with the New York International Auto Show, in a city where Ford Escape Hybrid taxicabs are an increasingly common sight, Ford offered me a test drive in an experimental plug-in version of its compact SUV.

The philosophy behind this vehicle is similar to that of the Toyota Prius plug-in, on which I reported from Detroit: to increase the battery capacity and to charge that battery in the home with a common extension cord before hitting the road. This supplements the normal hybrid with power that's comparatively cheap and potentially cleaner than gasoline, and that comes from North American sources such as coal, natural gas, nuclear, and, in regrettably rare cases, renewable energy like hydroelectric and solar. All current hybrids generate their own electricity with their gas engines and through recapturing the energy of motion during braking, which improves efficiency over that of a larger gas engine alone but doesn't meet the full potential of electric power.

2008 New York Auto Show: Subaru R1e

• Competes with: Smart ForTwo
• Looks like: Less of an oddity now that the ForTwo is puttering around the U.S.
• Drivetrain: 40-kW electric motor and lithium-ion battery pack
• Hits dealerships: Fleet testing in the U.S. in summer 2008; consumer testing in Japan in late 2009

The Subaru R1e is an all-electric two-seat micro-car that can travel up to 50 miles on a charge at speeds up to 65 mph. A nearly full charge can take as little as 15 minutes to achieve when using a special quick charger, but it takes a lot longer — 8 hours — to achieve a full charge using a regular household power outlet. Subaru says the R1e's lithium-ion battery pack should last for 10 years/130,000 miles and cost less than $2 to charge.

During Subaru's press conference at the New York auto show, the automaker announced it will provide two of the cars to the New York Power Authority this summer for testing in New York City. The New York test is in addition to ones that have already been conducted in London and Tokyo, according to Subaru chief marketing officer Tim Mahoney.

An all-electric city car would make a lot of sense in a number of U.S. metropolitan areas if drivers had charging stations available for use. A test program like the one Subaru's entered into is a step in that direction, but don't look for a tangle of extension cords along the sidewalks of New York anytime soon.