small cars

The Environmental Protection Agency recently finalized its list of the top low-mpg cars for the upcoming model year. It doesn’t restrict itself to merely small cars or green cars with hybrid systems or alternative fuels, oh no. The EPA lists the most fuel-efficient cars, from minicompacts, like the Mini Cooper, to midsized station wagons, like the Kia Rondo.

The overall winner in the mpg race was–hold on to your hats–the Toyota Prius, with a rating of 48 mpg city and 45 mpg highway. Here’s the top ten, in case you’re in the market for a brand-new car. The kicker is that these cars, with their low fuel usage and emissions, are the hottest cars on the lot these days. Finding one at a reasonable price may be tricky.

To see the full list, visit FuelEconomy.gov.

1. Toyota Prius, 48/45
2. Honda Civic Hybrid, 40/45
3. Smart ForTwo convertible and coupe, 33/41
4. Volkswagen Jetta and Jetta Sportwagen diesels, 30/41
5. Toyota Yaris, 29/35
6. Mini Cooper manual, 28/37
7. Nissan Versa, 26/31
8. Mini Cooper automatic, 25/34
9. Hyundai Sonata, 22/32
10. Honda Accord, 22/31

And for you glass-half-empty, hell-in-a-handbasket types, the EPA lists the cars with the worst mpg as well. That list tends more toward the Lamborghini/Ferrari/Bentley end of the spectrum, though I was suprised to see the Saab 9-3 on the worst list.

In my capacity as an automotive journalist, I have driven the Mini Cooper before. Several times, as a matter of fact. But when the red 2008 Mini with black stripes was delivered on Friday, I had a mission in mind. I was going to put its EPA fuel economy estimates to the test.

The Mini Cooper in my possession for a few days had a standard 1.6-liter, 16-valve, 4-cylinder engine that could turn out 118 hp. It may not sound like much, but in a car this small, it’s enough. It also had a six-speed manual transmission, which would help in the mpg department. The test car did have sport suspension and 16-inch wheels, rather than the regular 15-inchers, but I didn’t think that would affect the fuel economy much. The EPA estimated 28 mpg in the city and 37 mpg on the highway.

The morning the Mini Cooper appeared in my driveway, I was already late for lunch. I grabbed the keys, reset the mpg counter, threw the car in reverse, and tore off in the direction of the restaurant where I would meet a few friends. I did not drive responsibly. Safety was, as always, my priority, but speed came in a close second. I was surprised, on reaching the restaurant a few miles away, that I had still averaged over 32 mpg, even driving like a jerk.

Over the next few days, I drove in a much more sane way around Portland. Lots of in-town driving, some freeway, some stop-and-go traffic at 5:30. It never dipped below 30 mpg. As you can see, after five days of normal driving, I averaged 33.7 mpg. This is above the EPA’s combined rating for the Mini Cooper of 32 mpg.

I have to give the car back, and it’ll be a while before I get another. BMW, which owns the Mini brand, is pulling back on its press loaners for now. In the meantime, we can all look forward to those precious few electric Mini E models coming to the States for real-world testing.

One of the most talked-about unveilings at the Paris auto show this month was the all-electric version of the Smart car, called the Smart ED. (That stands for Electric Drive, not the subject of those old Bob Dole commercials.) Parent company Daimler says the cars will go into production in late 2009 for delivery to “selected customers.”

Daimler leased 100 early versions of an electric Smart to Londoners earlier this year to get real-world experience with plug-in vehicles. The second phase of testing, announced last month, will take place in Berlin with another 100 cars.

The updated version seen in Paris at the auto show will have a 90-mile range, which is twice as far as the current crop of neighborhood electric vehicles will go on one charge. No word on if or when the Smart ED will show up at U.S. dealerships.

Legendary design firm Pininfarina has brought its own little EV to the Paris auto show this year, the B Zero. Actually, the model name is written B0, but the company has helpfully let us know that it’s pronounced “B Zero.” Presumably, they don’t want us Americans running around calling it the “BO.”

The B0 will roll off the production line in late 2009 as a 2010 model, the Italian company says. The mass-produced car is a collaboration between Pininfarina and Bollore, who will provide the powerplant. The proprietary system will use batteries and supercapacitors to propel the B0 about 150 miles per charge, with a top speed of 80 mph.

If zero emissions and a high-tech lithium polymer battery aren’t enough to float your eco-warrior boat, the car also has solar panels on its roof and even a few on its tiny hood. Right now, the panels will be able to run “some of its equipment,” according to Pininfarina. I assume this means they provide enough power for creature comforts like the radio and maybe air conditioning.

Hyundai’s got the blues. Two of them, to be exact. Like Mercedes-Benz, the Korean manufacturer has apparently tired of everything being green and branded its eco-conscious automotive efforts blue, as in the i20 blue and Santa Fe blue Hybrid, both of which debuted at the Paris auto show in early October.

The “blue” designation doesn’t mean hybrid; it means aerodynamic, efficiency, and weight measures have been taken to lower the car’s environmental impact. In the case of the i20, Hyundai took the following steps to lighten its footprint:

• 1.4-liter diesel engine
• six-speed gearbox, rather than a five-speed
• low-friction engine oil
• software to optimize timing, injection, and idle speed
• ISG start-stop system that cuts the engine while the car is not moving and not in gear
• full-length covers underneath the car to reduce drag
• Michelin Energy low rolling resistance tires

All this adds up to 15% lower carbon dioxide emissions and a 15% improvement in fuel efficiency (from 55 mpg to 63 mpg).

The Santa Fe blue, meanwhile, has a 2.4-liter engine mated to a 6-speed transmission and a 30 kW electric motor and a lithium polymer battery. The company says that this parallel hybrid architecture, as they call it, will be the basis for all Hyundai’s hybrids in the future. In the Santa Fe, the system returns 38 mpg. As part of the new blue lineup, it also incorporates many of the features, such as ISG start-stop, found in the i20 blue.

In the past six months, American car buyers have fled from buying SUVs and oversized pickups in favor of small, fuel-efficient cars and hybrids (if they can find one on the lot, that is). But car makers still feel that some small cars are too small for our roads.

Hyundai, for instance, is making a global push to establish itself in the small-car market. But not so much in the U.S. Its tiny five-door hatchback i10 model, for example, won’t be sold on American shores.  They’re looking instead to bring the larger i20 and i30 cars rather than the i10, which was designed with the European market in mind.

Though nothing is set in stone, not bringing the i10 to the small-car-starved dealerships here in the U.S. is a curious move for a company whose sales have been constrained by the limited availability of its current small cars, like the Elantra. Not even the i20, which is slightly larger and makes its debut in Paris next week, is officially set for import to the U.S.

Now that Wall Street and shifty mortgage schemes have the U.S. economy tanking and financing is hard to come by, the American car consumer’s wish for small, inexpensive, gas-sipping cars could become a demand. Everybody stand up and wave what few dollars you have in the direction of the i10 and the Ford Fiesta Econetic.

Fuel-efficient small cars like the Smart ForTwo and EVs like the Zap Xebra have a built-in cuteness due to their diminutive size. But the 2009 GEM Peapod acutally made me say, out loud, “Oh! They’re adorable.”

Like the Xebra, the Peapod is a neighborhood-electric vehicle, or NEV, so it can’t do highway speeds or ferry your family to Yellowstone for vacation (unless you live less than 30 miles from Yellowstone and have a very small family). Surprisingly, the Peapod is longer and taller than the Smart ForTwo, and even has rear seats. But the NEV’s top speed is 25 mph, where the gasoline-powered ForTwo can do a highway-capable 90 mph.

The Peapod comes from those eco-innovation lovers over at Chrysler’s ENVI outfit, the same folks who brought us the Chrysler, Jeep, and Dodge EV designs in late September. The design of the latest little EV is completely new, unlike, say, the Jeep or the Town and Country minivan EVs, and features a lot of glass and a shape straight out of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

I’ve blogged about GEM before, back in the dark ages of EVs (early 2008). With the advent of the Peapod, though, the decade-old, North Dakota-based subsidiary of Chrysler got a new-ish name, GreenEcoMobility. Whatever they call themselves, this is a big improvement over GEM’s glorified golfcarts of old. And by old, I mean six months ago.

October 4 is opening day at Mondial de l’Automobile, or the Paris Auto Show to most Americans. Europe has long had more small cars that get better gas mileage than what we can buy in the U.S., and a wider array of clean diesel cars. We can certainly expect to see more of these kinds of autos in Paris this year; the difference is that now we want them, too.

Here’s a list of debuts and concepts to look for at Mondial de l’Automobile as the reports start filling the blogosphere next month.

Debuts

• Ford Fiesta ECOnetic, 65 mpg and not U.S.-bound
• Hyundai Santa Fe Hybrid, with lithium-ion batteries
• Nissan Pixo minicar, one foot shorter than the Chevy Aveo

Concepts

• Citroen Hypnos hybrid
• Honda Insight hybrid, poised to battle the Prius
• Lexus LF-Xh hybrid, based on the concept LF-X SUV
• Nissan Nuvu EV minicar
• Opel Insignia EcoFLEX sports tourer, clean diesel on sale in Europe next spring
• Peugeot hybrid
• Renault Ondelious diesel mild hybrid
• Suzuki SX4-FCV fuel cell vehicle, already certified in Japan

The stalwart Consumer Reports has come up with a list of a dozen or so used cars that get great mileage. The list is divided into two categories, under $10,000 and between $10,000 and $20,000. There’s no mention of tailpipe emissions, so the focus is on the price of gas, not the ecological impact of the vehicles.

The hybrid 2000 Honda Insight tops the fuel economy numbers at 51 mpg for under $10,000, but there were only about 17,000 of these cars in the country even while it was still being produced. Good luck finding one now — especially for that price. You might be better off socking your down payment away in a savings account and waiting for the reincarnated Insight hybrid to arrive in dealerships next spring.

It’s interesting to note that the cars are as old as a 1998 Mazda Protege LX and as new as a 2007 Honda Fit Sport with a manual transmission, but even more interesting is the fact that one lone American car, the 1998-2002 Chevy Prizm, made the list. It can be snagged for less than $10,000, and it gets a respectable 32 mpg.

CR, being the people’s advocate that it is, points out that the older cars on the list lack some safety features common in new cars, like ABS and side-curtain airbags. Check out MSN Autos for the full list.

Mitsubishi announced this week that it will bring a fleet of its i MiEV electric cars to New Zealand in February 2009. Local and national government officials will take turns driving the cars to spur discussion of infrastructure, marketing, and presumably some kind of incentive for bringing the cars to the good people of New Zealand in the future.

Why New Zealand, you ask? Why not the U.S. or some other nation tiring of the flucuation in oil prices? Two reasons, one of which is dead simple: Kiwis drive on the left side of the road, just like they do in Japan. The cars are built in Japan, and will be introduced first to the Japanese market, so there aren’t any adjustments to be made. The steering wheel is already in the right place.

The second reason is Mitsubishi Motors’ partner in the tour, state-owned Meridian Energy. Not only is it New Zealand’s largest energy provider, but 100% of that energy comes from renewable sources, like hydroelectric dams and wind farms. That means in New Zealand, the i MiEV can be a zero-emissions car coming and going.

We Americans have it pretty good — freedom of speech, religion, and the press; pursuit of happiness; pulled-pork sandwiches — but not when it comes to green cars. Here’s a rundown of the latest models we want, but can’t have:

• Diesel-powered Ford Ka This little number will get 56 mpg from it’s 1.3-liter engine, and put out 75 horsepower. At the Ford presentation I recently attended, someone asked speaker and powertrain expert Dan Kapp about Euro-spec clean-diesel Fords coming to the U.S., and he said not in the foreseeable future.

• Ford Fiesta ECOnetic Another small, diesel-powered Ford. This one, which goes on sale in the U.K. in November, gets 65 mpg and would be priced similarly to the Toyota Prius, if it ever made it to these shores. Which it won’t. Ever, according to Business Week.

• Honda Fit Hybrid So Ford says it won’t bring its diesels to the U.S. because we’re all about hybrids, so why has Honda decided not to go forward with its Fit Hybrid? Competition with itself. It wants all the hybrid love to go to its new Insight, due next spring. So no one gets the Fit Hybrid until the next redesign, a Honda spokesman told Edmunds.com.

• VW BlueMotion Diesel Golf The latest TDI-powered Volkswagen to come down the pike is a quick little four-door hatchback that gets 52 mpg, according to a VW press release, while still achieving 103 hp and a top speed of 117 mph. Luckily, VW did deem the U.S. worthy of the new Jetta SportWagon TDI, which gets 40 mpg on the highway and emits a mere 6.4 tons of CO2 annually.

I already let you know that G-Wiz EVs in the UK are undergoing serious customization. Now, I find out Smart ForTwos right here in the US are getting tatoo-inspired makeovers by Ed Hardy. That should butch up those Smarts.

The Project Tattoo upgrade is more than skin-deep, though. It includes a new chrome exhaust system that ups horsepower by 6 and torque by 14 lb.-ft. There’s also a Kenwood AM/FM/CD/DVD player and Garmin touch-screen nav system, in addition to the tatoo-embroidered car seats.

The cars will be numbered 1-100 as part of a limited-edition series and signed by French fashion designer Christian Audigier, who markets the Ed Hardy brand.

Reva’s teensy electric car, the G-Wiz, is the best-selling EV in the U.K. The car has an owner’s club, with nearly 600 members so far, and you can park it in London for free, which saves Brit commuters nearly $2000 a year. Retailer GoinGreen can get you into a brand-new G-Wiz of your very own for about $18,000.

Granted, the cars are weird-looking. Weirder than a Smart ForTwo, anyway, but maybe not as weird as a Zap Xebra. If they’re going to drive such strange-looking vehicles, Londoners seem to think they might as well go all the way. The cars are often subjected to custom paint jobs and marketing wraps, as if they weren’t getting enough attention from passers-by.

Here, for example, is a car covered in what looks like parking garage locations:

This example is covered in lightning bolts, though it tops out at 50 mph:

GoinGreen has even partnered with a designer to produce a special-edition G-Wiz featuring one of her designs, Sunlight Through Leaves, which was on display at the London auto show this year:

So, my fellow Americans, let the Brits inspire you to fancy up your weird-looking green car, whether it’s an old Honda Insight with the covered rear wheels or a brand-new GEM with its space-age ovoid doors. Why stop at fuzzy dice and seat covers? These cheap neighborhood electric vehicles are crying out for you to put your personal stamp all over them.

Photos by Rain Rabbit, canonsnapper,  and jonanamary.

The NY Times reported last weekend on a dozen autos you might not expect to get such great gas mileage. Among their picks was a Corvette, which I can tell you first-hand gets better gas mileage than you’d expect, at 26 mpg on the highway — if you drive it reasonably and responsibly. But who does that in a Corvette?

Here’s the Times’s list with combined miles per gallon, but you’ll want to read the whole list on the newspaper’s Web site. Reporter Lawrence Ulrich includes everything from tiny econoboxes to full-size SUVs and pickups. He purposefully left out the obvious, like the Prius and Honda Civic, to focus on overlooked models in broad categories.

• Toyota Camry Hybrid, 34 mpg
• Volkswagen Jetta TDI, 33 mpg
• Mini Cooper, 29 mpg
• Nissan Versa, 27 mpg
• Honda Accord coupe, 24 mpg
• Toyota RAV-4, 24 mpg
• Mazda 5, 23 mpg
• BMW 328i, 22 mpg
• Toyota Tacoma, 21 mpg
• Chevy Corvette, 19 mpg
• Ford Flex, 19 mpg
• Mercedes-Benz GL320 Bluetec, 19 mpg

Mitsubishi announced that it has partnered with Pacific Gas and Electric to test the new all-electric i MiEV in California at the end of 2008. The utility company will test the four-passenger cars in the “real world,” and gauge the impact charging a fleet of EVs will have on the grid.

Similar testing with seven electric utility companies in Japan went so well that the company stepped up its EV program and will offer the i MiEV in Japan next summer. Global sales expectations for the car are so high that Mitsubishi has plans to build a lithium-ion battery factory that will open in April 2009. The plant will produce enough batteries to equip 10,000 vehicles.

The i MiEV is based on the Japanese-market i-series mini car, but its 47-kW motor is said to have better acceleration and performance than the 64-hp engine in the gasoline-powered version. Though a quick conversion shows 47 kW to be equal to 64 hp, electric motors have 100% torque available as soon as you press the throttle, making it seem quicker.

Keep an eye on PG&E and Mitsubishi to see how these cars play with California traffic and how soon they might reach U.S. consumers.

New online app Fuelly allows users to record mileage, track it over time, share it over the network with other Fuelly users, and compare fuel economy to EPA numbers. Do it from your desktop or take on the go with your iPhone or other mobile, Web-lovin’ technological wonder.

There are currently, as of the minute I’m writing this post, 1,981 cars registered with the site. Interesting note: there are more Jettas using Fuelly (71) than Priuses (34), and more Civics (157) than any other model. There’s one Ferrari Testarossa listed, but right now it says it gets 200,000 mpg after one fill-up. I find that hard to believe.

The site also offers gas-saving tips, most of which I’ve covered over at sister site RiverWired.com, but they always bear repeating. And there’s a forum for asking questions and posting your own fuel-saving tips.

Plug-In Supply in Petaluma, California, is selling plug-in conversion kits for the Toyota Prius for the low, low price of $4,995. How can they sell it so cheap? First, that’s the price of the kit only, no shipping or installation included; second, they’re using CalCars Open Source Prius+ Technology as the basis of the conversion.

For you do-it-yourselfers and engineers out there, the kit includes lead-acid batteries and the box to hold them, charger, and wire harness. There’s also a switch you can flip to operate your Prius on battery power up to 52 mph — 10 mph higher than an unmodfied Prius. The converted PHEV can then run 10-15 miles on electricity before the gasoline engine kicks in, giving you 100+ mpg. Plug-In Supply even designed the kit to be upgraded to lithium-iron-phosphate batteries for longer range, when they become available.

There are currently only a handful of dealers where you can buy the kit and lug it home, but Plug-In Supply is looking for more. Those nine dealers already on board stretch from California to Florida and New Jersey, though, so you might be able to find one not too far from home.

Now that Mini is going electric, everybody wants a piece of the action. Smart has a test EV running around in Europe right now, and while Tata has long had plans to introduce an electric car, they’re going ahead with a diesel this year.

The electric Smart ForTwo, known as the Smart ed, has a 41-hp electric motor and sodium-nickel-chloride batteries. It gets about 70 miles per charge, and has a maximum speed of 70 mph, which makes it a reasonable commuter EV, even if your commute involves highways. Price and market haven’t been announced, but they do expect it to go on sale in 2010. Cross your fingers that it comes your way — and you can afford it.

While we may have to wait a while for the EV version of the Tata Nano, the diesel version will hit the Indian market in October. The hatchback will go a rocking 50 mph from its little 33-hp, 2-cylinder diesel engine, but it gets 52 mpg city, 61 highway. The added efficiency will drive up the regular Nano’s price of $2,500 to about $4,200.

Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn says that Nissan has joined forces with the Tennesee Valley Authority to promote zero-emissions vehicles, including EVs. The collaborators expect to have a full-scale electric vehicle project in place by 2011.

Ghosn has previously committed Nissan to introducing zero-emissions cars of one kind or another in the U.S. by 2010 and globally by 2012. The company has made similar deals with Isreal, Denmark, and Portugal as part of its zero-emissions plan. TVA is the largest public power supplier in the U.S., and it seems to be eager to usher in the use of EVs, especially if they can charge overnight during inexpensive off-peak hours.

As a side note, Nissan will be shifting production from trucks like the Titan and Frontier to smaller, more fuel-efficient four-cylinder cars. Sound familiar, Ford? Of course it does. Nissan has a 30-day supply of passenger cars available right now, but a 6-month supply of pickups. They’re aiming to get that balance shifted ASAP.

After a disastrous second quarter, Ford announced that they’re going to build fewer trucks and SUVs and import six small cars that the company’s been selling in Europe. Consumers, and the dealers who can’t move SUVs off their lots, are chomping at the bit to get these more fuel-efficient vehicles.

The Ford Focus and Fiesta sedans and hatchbacks currently on the streets of Paris and London will be available in the U.S. in 2009-2010. At the same time, three truck plants — two in the U.S. and one in Mexico — will switch over to building the small cars that are currently in such short supply. I can’t help but think that a little bit of foresight on Ford’s part could have saved them from their worst quarter ever, which just ended with a total loss of $8.7 billion.

If we’re lucky, we Americans will get the latest Fiesta, the ECOnetic, which debuted in London July 22. It gets the best fuel economy in the company at 3.7 l/100 km, which on this side of the pond is an amazing 63.5 mpg. It also has the lowest CO2 output in its class, at 98g/km, yet it still has a top speed of 110 mph.