It’s a strange dilemma China has on its hands.  And most Chinese will probably never even see this blog due to the massive censorship on its hands.

We all know that China’s so polluted that their air makes Los Angeles smog taste like a crisp mountain stream.  So naturally, they’re really putting the push on to go green and get some more electric cars on the market.

Well, they’re not the only ones there, but China’s got a SERIOUS problem.  Where most of us have been driving cars for a long time, and are starting to seriously think about going green just by ourselves, the Chinese have not had cars all that long.  Well, not INDIVIDUAL Chinese, anyway.  Individual Chinese haven’t had cars all that long and now that they’ve got them, they mean to keep them.

Now along comes the government telling them, oh, yeah, I know you’ve had this car like all of six weeks but we need you to give it back to the state.  Oh, don’t worry–we have electric cars coming out.  When?  Um…soon.  And they’ll only cost as much as what you paid for the last car!  Subsidies?  Um…look…just get back to work, okay?  Or we’ll kill your children.  You know how this works by now.

It’s a tough road China’s got to drive to get its citizens to go green, and there are plenty of ruts and bumps in it.

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The folks out at Delphi are working on a way for you to be able to check many of your car’s features  from your iPhone.  Pretty soon, if the folks at Delphi have their way, you’ll be able to do all of the following: start or stop the car, roll down the windows, check tire pressure, monitor oil and brake fluid life, as well as detect if the car has been broken into.

But this isn’t the most interesting part…no sir.  Delphi has also been fiddling around with remote control of the gas, brakes and steering column, essentially allowing for the possibility of driving your car from your iPhone.

I don’t know whether to be amazed or horrified.  On the one hand, if someone steals your car, you could pretty much recover it with your iPhone, and that’s awesome.  But if someone steals your iPhone, they could have your car within minutes, and that is NOT awesome.

I’m left a little unnerved by this technological movement.

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From the look of the initial reports, the LC3 model of the Toyota Land Cruiser is going to get some serious modifications made to it.  Let’s take a quick look at the list.

–It’ll be getting about thirty five miles per gallon on a new kind of diesel engine, but a gas engine will be available on other models and get roughly the same mileage.

–The suspension has been revised and will give a more comfortable ride.

–Power and braking systems are altered to improve the Land Cruiser’s offroad capabilities.

You can see that there are a whole lot of improvements made in the newer model Toyota Land Cruiser, and chances are this will draw a whole lot of interest, especially from current truck and SUV owners planning to make trades.  A small SUV that gets thirty five miles per gallon and comes in straight gas or diesel?  That’s too good for a lot of car buffs to turn down.

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Ford really wants to get the word out there that their new 2010 Fusion Hybrid is a force to be reckoned with, recently announcing a campaign to put the vehicle’s fuel efficiency to the test.

Apparently, the above car is set to be driven over 1,000 miles for 43 consecutive hours from Mount Vernon, VA to Washington, DC, all on a single tank of gas. Ford is saying that the car needs to average 57 miles per gallon, a task that may actually be accomplishable given the fact it has reached as high as 70 miles per gallon.

And to top it all off, the drive will raise money for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. You get em’ Ford!

Press release after the break. (more…)

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Ready to go all electric on your car? What about all coffee? It looks like biofuel can be made out of any oily source which means coffee fuel might just be the thing that will power you car soon.

According to experts it takes 5-7kg of coffee grounds to make a liter of biofuel which will eventually result in a price of about $1 per gallon. Does that mean you’re going to get coffee to go and gas from your local coffee shop? And talk about the better smell!

via TheEconomist

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What will fuel the cars of the future? Will the cars of 2025 run on electricity, hydrogen combustion engines, ethanol or bio-diesel, solar power, or some hybrid combination of any number of these? Ethanol was touted by the U.S. government very briefly for reasons that seem in retrospect to be more political than practical. Ethanol has lower emissions than gasoline and can be produced right here in the United States, but recently studies suggest that it actually takes more energy to produce than is contained in the fuel itself, making the environmental impact kind of self-defeating.

Ethanol costs about $2 per gallon, which is less than Petroleum based fuel, but cars using E85 (an 85% Ethanol blend) get 10-20% few miles per gallon that run on regular gas. On the up side, some cars specially made to run on Ethanol based fuels (like the Chrysler Sebring, Ford F150, and GMC Yukon) are already on the market and are no more expensive than regular models.

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Chrysler’s gas saving cards were way cooler before the economic crisis. Back when the gas was priced at $4 per gallon for fuel a $2.99 per gallon for three years was a good incentive to purchase a Chrysler.

But now, when gas has reached a low $2.15 per gallon price, the card is useless. There’s not pretty much you can do with it now, is it? Not that we’re hoping that the gas price will rise above $2.99 again, but some people out there are getting no savings for the cars they purchased.

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The best thing the current depression has brought to us is the gas price drop. Last Friday, a barrel of oil hit its lowest price in over a year finishing at $77.70. Translated into English that means the current price of your favorite gallon of gas might be around $3.35. In July the same merchandise was sold for $4.11. So don’t wait! Go grab all the gas you can grab while waiting for OPEC’s meeting next month which will probably bring a more expensive price for the barrel of juice.

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The VW Jetta TDI is quite the car you might need for the current gas prices. And we have a story to prove exactly that. It looks like a Jetta managed to enter the Guinness World Record for traversing the lower 48 U.S. states while returning 58.82 mpg. That great wouldn’t you say?

John and Helen Taylor traveled 9,419 miles in 20 days. They were driving within 5 mph of the speed limit. The Jetta consumed just 11 tanks of ultra low sulfur diesel gas and averaged 853 miles per tank. Can anyone beat that? Congratulations to the Taylors for the unprecedented performance anyway.

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Are you considering a hybrid? It might just be the best decisions you have ever made recently. It looks like the oil price is going up again which is not good!

A barrel of Oil was priced at over $130 in the New York Mercantile Exchange which means the price jumped 24%. The day ended with the oil price up 14.78% at $120.00 for October contract expirations. It’s a tough year and we might see the oil price getting even higher.

So go on then, inspect those hybrid cars and get one. Not that fancy but a whole lot cheaper to drive.

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A blue car with two doors was spotted in some pictures. Is it the Chevy Volt? You know, one of the most awaited for American cars? People say it is. The Chevrolet electric car, the 2011 Volt. It is similar to the Chevy Cobalt or the Ford Focus hatchback.

The Volt is going to hit the market in the first 2011 as it will enter production in late 2010. If this is the real thing well then it looks like they are on the right track. Chevrolet has about two years to test it out and make further improvements.

This electric car’s price range is between $30,000 and $40,000. Too much? Well you will be saving a lot on gas. The car can go 40 miles with one electric charge while a gasoline engine will boost that range to 435 miles.

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