Automotive X Prize News - May 4th, 2008

Aptera Guided Factory Tour Video. Short, but excellent, but you can see them hard at work! Apparently the Aptera MK-0 (mark 0, the first one ever made) was "made just to show people we weren't full of crap!" The picture above is of the crushing rig, part of their safety testing. Presumably the green color is the natural color of the composite material, before the requisite white paint.

First Tesla Electric Car Store Opens in Santa-Monica, with requisite party. Also, check out the How Stuff Works Page on Tesla Motors, very through!

Global TV covers Fuel Vapor Alé. It's 3:24, which is pretty long for a news segment! You get to see it go super fast.

Speaking of How Stuff Works, they have a short page on the Automotive X Prize, featuring Tesla. It looks like it hasn't been updated since before the Progressive Insurance sponsorship of the prize.

Study: Steam Hybrids Using Waste Heat Recovery Could Reduce Fuel Consumption Up To 31.7%. The only team I know of that is planning to use steam is the Physics Lab of Lake Havasu. But given this report, maybe more teams will take a look at the possibilities? In a related vein, Thermoelectrics' Potential for Material Impact on Climate Crisis Questioned, Even in Vehicle Waste Heat Recovery states that thermoelectrics need a lot more R&D before it will be feasible to get more than 10% increase in vehicle efficiency from them. But I bet they are simpler and lighter than using steam :-)

Peter Diamandis to speak at Long Now in September. Actually this is old news, but you can mark your calendar now: Sept. 12th (Friday) - Peter Diamandis, "Long-term X-Prizes", in San Francisco.

New-gen Prius to get larger engine, more efficient. And, apparently Toyota might make "Prius" into it's own
"Make", with a possible wagon option and a smaller hybrid both using "Prius". And, a 60% production boost for Prius in 2009 means the vehicle will become even more common!

Deutsche Bank: Electric Cars Could Wipe Gas Cars off the Map, a conclusion they reached after studying the Project Better Place business model.

Why the Automakers wern't screaming over CAFE Rules: apparently the new rules include a sliding scale for the required fuel efficiency, with "footprint" (area between the wheels) indexing the scale. So automakers will be able to cheat by increasing wheelbase and track, which is crazy. Fortunately it looks like the market will continue to drive higher efficiency even without CAFE.

Brad Templeton has been writing an interesting series on Self Driving Cars, which he views as much superior to Public Transit as a way to get people around efficiently. How is that possible? Robodelivery and high-end, low-usage equipment rental. He's right about the efficiency of 100 MPG vehicles vs. public transit vehicles, but I hope to see him address the infrastructure: roads vs. rails, etc. I think we need to find a better, more efficient and longer lasting way to make roads for this vision to be truly sustainable.