One of the most persistent questions around the Chevrolet Volt - aside from whether or not GM will be around long enough to build it - is the fuel economy rating. The problem arises from the unique combination of plug-in electric drive and internal combustion range extender. The current standard test cycles used by the EPA for purposes of calculating the mileage of internal combustion cars are only 11 miles long for the urban cycle and 10.3 miles for the highway. Both of those distances are well within the 40 mile battery range of the Volt. If the current test procedure was used the car would use no gas and this is clearly not a realistic evaluation.

According to the New York Times, the current plan is to run car through each of the test cycles until the battery reaches the "depletion" point. From this data an equivalent mpg figure will be determined. The Volt will then be run on each cycle in charge sustaining mode to calculate fuel consumption. Researchers from the Argonne National Lab are currently studying real world driving habits to determine a "utility factor" for blending the two figures. It is expected that this procedure will yield a final sticker value that tops 100 mpg. Of course, because all of these choices are somewhat arbitrary, the bickering will surely continue for the foreseeable future.


[Source: New York Times]

Perhaps one of the biggest fans on the planet of the Chevrolet Volt is Dr. Lyle Dennis, a New York city neuro-surgeon. Immediately after originally seeing the Volt concept in January 2007, Dennis launched GM-Volt.com. Ever since then he and his readers have been cheerleaders for GM's extended-range EV. Dennis set up a waiting list for people to register their interest in the car, and over 45,000 people have signed up. With the financial crisis that's engulfing General Motors right now, the Volt has remained the only upcoming product that hasn't seen its development dollars cut yet. However, even though the engineering teams are still working on the Volt, the car is ultimately dependent on the survival of the company as a whole. Lyle Dennis wants to maker sure that GM, and thus the Volt, survive. To that end he has written a letter targeted at President Bush, Congress and Treasury secretary Henry Paulson urging them to provide financial aid to GM as soon as possible. If you're interested in expressing your support you can print out the letter from the site, sign it and send it to your representatives.

[Source: GM-Volt]

Some of you may have noticed a story posted elsewhere on the interwebs late last evening about the Chevy Volt. As the story goes, a friend of a friend of a friend, etc told the writer that the Volt program was being put on indefinite hold due to the company's money troubles. With GM releasing its third quarter results in a couple of hours and a huge loss expected, virtually every program at GM is being cut back or delayed. The one exception to that (so far at least) remains the Volt. We checked with the primary spokesman for the Volt program at GM Rob Peterson first thing this morning on this rumor. Peterson tells us that "there's no truth in that statement whatsoever." So the Volt remains on track but GM is expected to announce some other big cuts this morning including lay offs among engineering staff (not related to the E-Flex program).

[Sources: General Motors, Jalopnik]

The issue of the sound, or lack thereof to be specific, of hybrids, electric cars and everything in-between isn't likely to go away any time soon. The problem, as some see it, is that electric motors do not make the same kind of noise that internal combustion engines make, and this could be a problem for blind or deaf people. Is it a real concern? That's difficult to say until these types of vehicles really begin showing up on the roadways and people are interacting with them on a day-to-day basis. We've witnessed first-hand the fact that electric vehicles do indeed make noise, but is that sound enough to ensure the safety of pedestrians? We'll see.

In the meantime, engineers are considering all of their options when it comes to making artificial noises for their EVs and hybrids. For instance, the Volt's designers, led by Frank Weber, intend to add a driver-activated "pedestrian-friendly alert" to the Chevy Volt. The Star Trek-like (seriously) noisemaker would be turned on and off manually it seems. Of course, the Volt will indeed have an engine, but it won't always be running and may, in fact, hardly ever operate depending on its driver's habits. We look forward to seeing how this plays out.


[Source: GM-Volt.com via Inside Line]

Conflicting stories out today on the fate of new vehicle development at GM. AutoNews is saying that the General's cash crunch is means it is "postponing nearly all of its spending on product development in 2009 and 2010." AutoNews' unnamed sources also said that "nothing has been officially canceled, but nearly everything is delayed."

Meanwhile, over in the Detroit News, the word is that GM is "downplaying" the negative-sounding AutoNews report. GM spokesman Tom Wilkinson told the News that "We think [AutoNews is] probably overplaying this a little bit." The good news from both articles, though, is that the Volt seems to be safe, no matter what is happening to the rest of GM's upcoming programs. GM's Rob Peterson confirmed to AutoblogGreen that the cuts will have "no impact" on the Volt program at this time. Full speed ahead, apparently.

[Source: Rob Peterson, AutoNews, Detroit News]

The Chevy Volt has drummed up an absolutely huge amount of hype for General Motors. The car isn't expected to be sold this year or even next near. No, those eager to lower their petroleum usage for transportation in a GM bowtie will need to wait until late 2010 before the new car is expected to be available, and that's assuming everything continues to go relatively smoothly with the car's development. But General Motors has still gotten plenty of publicity, and most of it positive, for even starting on the extended-range electric vehicle in the first place. And now, perhaps Chrysler is trying to get in on the positive spin as well. Perhaps the automaker is ENVI-ous? Or is the automaker preparing for its rumored corporate takeover?

Those of you who use Gmail are probably very familiar with the short little advertising blurbs across the top of your inbox. Those brief ads use keywords from your emails to try and predict your interests, and advertising bits for Chrysler's ENVI program are showing up using "Volt" as a keyword. One one hand, this should be expected, considering that anyone who's interested in the Chevy Volt may be interested in Chrysler's ENVI project. Not all agree with that assessment, though, as you can see here. What's more, that ENVI site has almost nothing of real substantial interest to the green automotive crowd. We'd expect more from Detroit's third largest automaker if its actually going to be attracting attention to the ENVI minisite.

[Source: EcoGeek]

According to a Reuters report, General Motors has chosen Troy, MI-based Compact Power Inc. as the supplier of battery packs for the initial production run of Chevrolet Volts. Compact Power is a subsidiary of South Korean conglomerate LG Chem and was one of two groups that were awarded development contracts for the Volt in June 2007. The other contract went to a partnership of Continental and A123 Systems. CPI has been rumored to have won the production contract for some time and GM acknowledged in late summer that a decision had been made. An official announcement is not expected until some time in November, perhaps at the Los Angeles Auto Show. While a technical decision has been made, GM and CPI still have to settle the commercial details including how the carmaker and supplier will split warranty costs. CPI has been considered to be in the lead since very early on when they delivered their first prototype battery packs almost two months before Continental/A123. When we spoke to Bob Lutz back in June he said although one supplier was in the lead, both companies were continuing to work on packs in the hope of accelerating the learning process.


[Source: Reuters]

Here in the U.S. market, the name Electra was used on big Buick sedans for more than four decades but it hasn't appeared in a new car showroom since 1990. It looks like the Electra could be be making a comeback soon, but not in America. It turns out that Vauxhall, the brand that GM uses to sell right-hand drive Opels in the UK, filed a trademark application back in June for the Vauxhall Electra. GM officials have acknowledged previously that both the Chevy Volt and an Opel badged E-Flex vehicle would be offered in Europe. The Opel/Vauxhall vehicle will likely be based on the Flextreme concept that was shown at last year's Frankfurt Motor Show. The Electra (if that's what it's called) will likely debut sometime in 2011. Saturn is also expected to get a version of the Flextreme here in the U.S., and it will be interesting to see if it revives the Electra name here.

[Source: Greenmotor.co.uk]

After reaching an agreement with the California Air Resources Board recently that would essentially see the Chevy Volt classed as an electric car, it appears GM has now also worked things out with the EPA. The automaker and the environmental protection agency have been discussing just how extended range EVs like the Volt should be tested to evaluate fuel consumption and emissions. The federal agency responsible for enforcing the emissions and fuel economy standards had wanted to treat the Volt like a hybrid so that the battery would be charged at the end of the test cycle.

Although a new testing methodology has not been finalized, GM and the EPA have reportedly reached a preliminary agreement on new procedures that would see the Volt get a rating of at least 100 mpg. The new procedures would be applied to all plug-in vehicles and would rely more heavily on the electric drive capabilities than the internal combustion engine.

Update: GM Spokesman Rob Peterson has just let us know that the Seattle Times report is based on an earlier erroneous, Bloomberg report. GM is still talking to the EPA and nothing has changed in the last two weeks.

[Source: Seattle Times]

While perusing the interwebs for interesting stories, we stumbled upon a letter to the editors at Automotive News that suggests the Chevy Volt should come with a generator. We're pretty sure that they are not talking about the built-in generator that the car uses to recharge its batteries on-the-fly. Rather, what's being suggested is that General Motors package the Chevy Volt with a gas-powered standalone generator that could recharge its batteries if the need arises. Um, where should we start on this one. First of all, that would be defeating the point of the car in the first place, but the biggest reason that this makes no sense is that the car will already come with a gas-powered generator built-in. If the grid goes down, the car will still run if it has gas inside its tank, as the on-board generator will recharge the batteries anyway. This serves as another reminder that the public at-large (including those who work for competing dealerships in Texas) doesn't quite seem to understand how the Volt technology works.


[Source: Automotive News - sub. req'd]

By now many of us around these parts know who Shai Agassi is and what he wants to do. He wants to build a distribution infrastructure of swappable batteries to be used in electric cars with the ultimate goal of making EVs mainstream. The problem is that electric cars remain an expensive proposition. Even with Agassi's approach that would sell the EV without a battery and add on a subscription model for the battery, the up-front cost will remain higher than conventional cars. Nonetheless, in Paris last week Agassi was telling the Wall Street Journal that he doesn't think the Chevy Volt would ever be more than a niche product. He bases that on price of the car, expected to be around $40,000 before any tax incentives.

Agassi thinks that is too high for what would otherwise be a $20,000 vehicle, like the Chevy Cruze on which it's based. As far as he goes, he's right, but he doesn't go far enough. GM and everyone else know that any car that will be mainstream has to have an affordable up-front cost. That's why GM originally wanted a $30,000 price point for the Volt. That's why they went with a smaller battery and range extender. The realities of the battery situation will continue to make longer range electric driving unaffordable for the foreseeable future from a purchase standpoint regardless of whether you take the GM or Better Place approach.

While Agassi's subscription-based software background may make sense for large deep pocketed corporations, for regular people the cost of entry is a much bigger hurdle than the total cost of ownership. If you can't pay the door charge, it doesn't matter if the drinks are free once you get inside. That's why so many people relied on cheap lease deals and nothing down mortgages over the last decade. The current reality of what is happening in the financial markets means that there is a high probability that none of these approaches will prove to be viable anytime soon. Unless a manufacturer can find a way to get that entry cost down and soon, all EVs will likely remain niche products for many more years.


[Source: Wall Street Journal]

There has been a fair bit of discussion and controversy in the last couple of weeks on the interwebs about the exact nature of the powerflow and battery charging in the Chevy Volt. Back in July GM's Larry Nitz discussed how the charge sustaining mode would work. As with parallel hybrids the battery is generally kept between about 35 and 85 percent charge. That means when the battery reaches its "depletion" point it still has a significant amount of charge left. The range extender has less power output than the the electric drive motor is capable of (100 hp vs 150 hp) but it has enough output to work in most day-to-day driving conditions. The range extender doesn't normally try to charge the battery fully as that is deemed to be less efficient and more costly than holding the battery at the minimum until the car can be plugged in. For the times when more power is needed such as acceleration or hill climbing some of the reserve battery power is available to be used. The battery can be drawn down below the "depletion" point to about 25-30 percent. When this happens, a combination of regenerative braking and some surplus power from the range extender will bring the battery back up to the minimum. A video after the jump shows the various modes and the power flow.



[Source: General Motors]

Ever since the Chevrolet Volt appeared as a concept last year, debate has been hot and heavy over exactly what it is. Although many call it a hybrid because it has a battery and an engine, GM prefers to call it an extended range-electric vehicle (ER-EV). That poses a problem for GM when it comes to emissions and fuel economy testing. With its 40 mile electric only range the Volt could complete the US06 test cycle that is part of the current EPA test regimen without ever running its engine. So far this doesn't sit well with the EPA which considers the Volt a hybrid and expects it to complete the test cycle with a charged battery. GM and the feds have been going back and forth on this for months. Reports out this morning on Bloomberg and the Detroit Free Press indicated that GM and the EPA had reached an agreement that would potentially see the Volt as the first car classified with a 100 mpg rating are erroneous. We called spokesman Rob Peterson to get the scoop, and it turns out that GM has reached an agreement with the California Air Resources Board, (CARB) on a unique classification for the Volt. Peterson told ABG that this classification would reflect the Volt's true capability, essentially treating it as an EV. According to Peterson, "the classification helps us to optimize the Volt for what it does do, instead of being put into the category with a normal hybrid." This will potentially allow GM to run the Volt with the planned charge sustaining mode rather than having to run the engine to fully recharge the battery at the end of the test.

The agreement with CARB gives GM a bargaining chip in its talks with the EPA, but Peterson cautions that the automaker and the federal agency "still have a long way to go" to finalize any agreement. The Volt may yet get that magic 100 mpg rating, but it's not there yet.


[Source: General Motors]

At an event in Flint MI today, GM CEO Rick Wagoner and Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm were on hand to officially announce that GM will be building its new 1.4L direct injected four cylinder engine in the city in new facilities on the campus of the Flint South Powertrain plant. GM will be spending $370 million dollars erect a 552,000 sq ft plant and tool it up. The company will start building the new factory immediately and full scale production is set to start in early 2010 in preparation for the North American launch of the Chevy Cruze. The Flint factory will also be the exclusive source of the range extending engines for the Volt. The plant will use 300 flexible machining and assembly stations so that a variety of four cylinder engines can be built without retooling. GM is planning to double global production of small four cylinder engines (1.0L to 1.4L) between now and 2011 and expects one-third of its North American volume to be fours by that time. The 1.4L is an all new engine that will produce 140 hp and 148 lb-ft of torque. We'll have more information on the 1.4L later today after a technical briefing.


[Source: General Motors]