Guangzhou Honda Automobile Co.(GHAC), a joint venture between Honda and Guangzhou Auto Group, is building a new plant with an annual capacity of 120,000 units, due to be operational in the latter half of 2006. After its start in 1999 with an annual capacity of 30,000 units, GHAC has grown... Read more →

Westport Innovations has signed a new agreement with BMW to continue to develop and to supply hydrogen gas injection components to support BMW’s work on H2 combustion engines (H2ICE). This is the latest in a series of development agreements between Westport and BMW that began in 2002. Westport’s hydrogen system... Read more →

Honda has delivered a Honda FCX hydrogen fuel cell car to the city of Chula Vista, CA. This brings the total of FCX vehicles in service in California to 10. The city will lease the vehicle for two years and operate the FCX on a regular daily basis. Refueling will... Read more →

AP. Two North Dakota Democratic state lawmakers want to use money from the state-owned Bank of North Dakota for ethanol, biodiesel and wind energy projects. The proposal, announced Wednesday by the two Democratic representatives, would create a renewable energy fund supported each year with either 30% of the bank profits... Read more →

RailPower Technologies has signed a letter of intent with a North American Class 1 railroad for the sale of 35 of its Green Goat hybrid switch locomotives over a four-year period. This is a bit larger vehicle than we usually discuss, but...how could I resist a name like that? Switching... Read more →

The Island Packet. Hilton Head is replacing two of its fleet Crown Victoria sedans with Priuses in a pilot project to test the reliability of the hybrids. The hope, town officials say, is for a fleet that eventually consists largely of vehicles that emit little, if any, pollutants. The fact... Read more →

The Lexus RX 400h hybrid SUV will go on sale April 15, 2005. Lexus has more than 9,500 confirmed pre-sold orders for the 2006 RX 400h with more than 46,000 consumers registering online for more information. We’ve received significantly more pre-launch consumer interest for the 400h than any vehicle in... Read more →

A new report from the World Resources Institute outlines the impact the new Chinese fuel efficiency standards (earlier post) will have on automakers. Overall, the Chinese fuel economy standards are slightly more stringent than the current regulations in the U.S. To meet Chinese standards, the US fleet average fuel economy... Read more →

Two major reports assessing climate change and its current and future effects on the US and the world have been published in the last few days. The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment is a comprehensively researched, fully referenced and independently reviewed evaluation of arctic climate change and its impacts. Commissioned by... Read more →

Shell and GM are opening the first gasoline and hydrogen integrated fueling station in North America tomorrow. A retrofit of an existing Shell retail station in Washington, DC, the Benning Road Shell Hydrogen Station will be used to fuel GM vehicles participating in the DOE Learning Demonstration, part of a... Read more →

The Minnesota Farmers Union Marketing and Processing Association (FUMPA) is opening a 2.8-million gallon per year biodiesel refinery early next month at its Central Bi-Products rendering plant in North Redwood, MN. FUMPA has also developed a patented process for blending feather meal (a byproduct of rendering) and glycerin (a byproduct... Read more →

Dynetek Industries, a leading manufacturer of fuel storage cylinders and systems for CNG (compressed natural gas) and hydrogen, is on a bit of a roll. The success of a key component supplier (in this case, gas storage) is a good indication of momentum in a particular sector (in this case,... Read more →

Dongfeng Honda Automobile (Wuhan) (WDHAC), the joint venture of Honda and Dongfeng Motor in China, is quadrupling its annual production capacity from the current 30,000 units to 120,000 units by early 2006. WDHAC was established as a new joint venture company in July 2003 and began production of the Honda... Read more →

Linde AG, an international technology group, is sponsoring research into the biological production of hydrogen by microalgae. Linde Gas and Engineering, one of the group’s two primary lines of business, is focusing strongly on hydrogen production. The research team at the Christian-Albrecht-Universität (CAU) in Kiel is studying the ability of... Read more →

BSST, a subsidiary of Amerigon, has signed a long-term agreement with Visteon Corporation to develop an array of heating and cooling products for the automotive industry featuring BSST’s thermoelectric device (TED) technology. Visteon is one of the world’s leading automotive Tier I suppliers. (Earlier post on thermoelectrics here.) The formal... Read more →

A study completed earlier this year by the French environment and energy agency Ademe and the World Energy Council indicates that over nearly 30 years, the average fuel consumption of European cars has dropped by more than 20% to around 6.5 l/100km, or 43 mpg. By contrast, average fuel economy... Read more →

Broin Companies has announced a new patent-pending ethanol production process that reportedly eliminates a costly energy-consuming step in the usual process while increasing the efficiency of the conversion. The “Broin Project X” (BPX) process releases additional starch content for conversion to ethanol, increases protein content and quality of byproducts, potentially... Read more →

The FT reports that Land Rover is beginning work on gasoline electric hybrids and is in discussions with Ford—which owns Land Rover—over the Escape Hybrid technology. The work on hybrid engines comes as attacks on SUVs by governments and pressure groups are increasing sharply. London, Paris, Italy and Sweden have... Read more →

Stinker Stations (no jokes, please) has opened Idaho’s first E85 fueling station in Boise. GM and the National Ethanol Vehicle Coaltion supported the grand opening. GM and the NEVC are trying to build public awareness of Flexible Fuel Vehicles and E85. GM produces more than a third of the some... Read more →

Thermoelectric materials—materials that exploit a phenomenon in which the application of heat to combinations of certain metals induces an electric current—are emerging as potentially important systems for increasing fuel efficiency and decreasing emissions...and maybe even as a wildcard solution for propulsion in the future. Thomas Seebeck, a German physicist, first... Read more →

Cambridge Chronicle. The city of Somerville, Ma, has converted more than 80 of its large city-owned vehicles to run on a B20 biodiesel blend instead of petroleum-based diesel. The biodiesel powers city-owned garbage trucks, construction and hauling vehicles, sewer maintenance equipment, forestry equipment and several school buses. The move to... Read more →

The Yomiuri Shimbun is reporting that Toyota will release the long-discussed hybrid version of the Camry in North America in 2006. Toyota hopes to sell tens of thousands of the cars in the first year, aiming to dominate the hybrid car market in the United States... The launch of the... Read more →

Ford and GM sales dropped in October, while those of Chrysler, Toyota, Honda and Nissan increased. Ford continues to see its car sales erode, down almost 20% from the same month last year. The Japanese automakers captured a larger percentage of market share at their US-based rivals’s expense. Chrysler increased... Read more →

Hybrids had their best sales month of 2004 in October, with US sales soaring to 9,530 units. Sales of the Toyota Prius jumped to 6,123 units—its highest volume month ever. That represents almost a 50% increase in volume from October 2003, and a year-to-date increase of 177.5% from 2003, with... Read more →

Arotech Corporation’s Electric Vehicle Division has successfully run its zinc-air hybrid electric bus prototype with fuel cells using commercially available zinc rather than the proprietary dendritic zinc required to this point. This could boost the prospects for commercializing the zinc-air hybrid bus, which is now in the fourth and final... Read more →

Laksamana.net reports that Indonesia is struggling to meet its liquefied natural gas (LNG) export commitments next year and is trying to reschedule contracts or to cut cargo volumes in 2005. A third—very expensive—option would be to buy cargoes overseas to fulfill its obligations. Indonesia is the world’s top LNG exporter,... Read more →

DOE’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and Westport Innovations are working together to develop and to deploy LNG (liquefied natural gas) fueled engines with high-pressure direct-injection (HPDI) technology in tractor-trailers. This project, part of the Next Generation Natural Gas Vehicle (NGNGV) program, is targeted at delivering a heavy-duty engine suitable... Read more →

Syrian oil production peaked in 1996 at 586,000 barrels per day, and then began a slow decline. That decline has apparently suddenly accelerated. Albawaba.com cites a Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) report indicating that the country’s production of crude oil has dropped to below 500,000 barrels of oil a day... Read more →

Reuters. Mazda intends to launch a hybrid SUV using technology from Ford, which owns 33.4% of the Japanese automaker. “Through our partnership with Ford, we are now proceeding with the development of a hybrid version of the Mazda Tribute, which we will launch as early as possible,” Imaki told a... Read more →

Azure Dynamics, a provider of hybrid electric vehicle systems for commercial fleets, has selected Cobasys as the source for its NiMH battery packs for the production of up to 2,000 series hybrids for Purolator Courier in Canada. Cobasys is a joint venture between ChevronTexaco Technology Ventures—a subsidiary of ChevronTexaco—and Energy... Read more →

Kyodo News. Toyota has cumulatively sold more than 282,315 units of its various hybrids worldwide through the end of September, according to Toyota Executive Vice President Ryuji Araki. The Prius accounts for 87% of that number (244,441 units). Read more →

Oman has awarded Halliburton contracts worth between $400–$500 million to help it shore up its rapidly dwindling production of crude oil. Halliburton will assist state-controlled Petroleum Development Oman with oil well drilling, monitoring and production to help it raise its output to a targeted 800,000 barrels a day of crude... Read more →

Rediff.com. State-run Indian Oil Corporation has entered into a $3 billion deal with Iran to develop a gas block in the enormous South Pars field, to build an LNG liquefaction plant and to sell the resulting product. This is the IOC’s largest non-Indian investment to date, and one of the... Read more →