GM annouces Volt, a new electric car ... and a Video that illustrates carbon pollution

January 7, 2007 -
Last month, Bob Lutz, General
Motors' renowned car czar, stood before a room
full of reporters and offered a stunning mea
culpa. "A few years ago," he said,"we made a bad
decision." That decision: GM failed to green
light a hybrid car, even though it had the
know-how and the technology left over from its
failed EV1 electric car.

Toyota, of course, made
the opposite decision and today its Prius hybrid
is the envy of the automotive world. "The value
Toyota got out of the Prius, in terms of
positioning themselves as the world technology
leader, was incredible," bemoans Lutz. "Now we're
in a position to play catch-up."

This week at the Detroit Auto Show, GM hopes to
shock the car-buying public by unveiling its
catch-up vehicle: The Chevy Volt, a plug-in
hybrid that GM says can go 150mpg or more.

When will the Volt arrive? GM won't say.
If the Volt does hits the streets, here's how it
will work: You'd plug your car into a regular
110-volt outlet in your garage every night. When
you head off for work in the morning, you could
go for 40 miles on pure electricity, without that
little engine kicking in to recharge the
batteries. So if your daily commute is under 40
miles, as is the case for most Americans, you'd never burn a drop of gas.

If you have a longer commute, the Volt then
becomes the ultimate gas miser. Let's say you
live 30 miles from your job, so your daily
round-trip is 60 miles. That means the Volt will
run 40 miles on pure electricity and 20 miles on
kilowatts generated by its little gasoline
engine. The net mileage: 150mpg. That is, unless
you have some place to plug in while you're at
work. That lithium-ion battery gets fully powered
up in about six hours. So if you recharge while
you work, you'll never burn any gas.

GM was stung—and spurred on—by the drubbing it
took in last summer's documentary "Who Killed the
Electric Car?" The film laid the blame at GM's
doorstep, saying it never supported its fledgling
EV1 that became a darling of Left Coast enviros
in the '90s. But the tiny two-seater never caught
on with the general public because after driving
it for 60 to 90 miles, you had to stop and
recharge it for eight hours. By contrast, even if
you forgot to plug-in the Volt, you could go 640
miles between fill-ups and get 50mpg with the
engine charging the batteries, GM says. This
technology sounds so tantalizing, GM's biggest
risk is not delivering on it. Says Becker, "Then
the sequel to the movie is 'Who Didn't Build the Volt?'"

The U.K independent
US car giants launch green drive
By Stephen Foley in Detroit
Published: 08 January 2007
http://news.independent.co.uk/business/news/article2134926.ece


http://current.com/items/87610321_ecospot_grand_prize_winner_sky_is_fallingJan.