Jay said, "We live in an era where liking cars and liking the environment don’t really seem to fit- especially high performance cars." He not only wanted to disprove that, but wanted to inspire America's youth to explore the possibilities and follow their dreams- this car for Leno started as a pipe dream, "and went from zero to here in seven months." Although the Eco Jet was not designed to be a production car - and we may never see it for sale - after a few good conversations with folks at GM, we're confident they understand innovations like these are crucial.

With all that said, we don't want you to think we are gloating for GM-they have a long way to go. Seeing this unveiling and speaking to the GM executives and designers makes us wish that this transition towards eco-friendly performance vehicles could happen on a mass-market level sooner than late (before the ice caps melt).

Our His & Hers Twike commuter vehicle is completely gasoline-, emission-, and guilt-free. This cozy two-seater has a brilliantly engineered zero-emission electric power system that can be supplemented with human pedal power, as desired. Like your significant other, it's a first: the first electric-human power hybrid. Swiss and German engineers have designed it with lightweight aluminum alloys and reinforced floors, and it weighs less than 600 lbs. You will have to find another excuse for running out of gas, however; its state-of-the-art, six-kilowatt hour nickel-alloy batteries can be fully charged from a regular household outlet. Powered by a three-kilowatt electric motor, it can achieve speeds of up to 55 mph with a range of up to 90 miles per charge. When you feel like pedaling, and thereby extending its range for those romantic drives with the convertible top down, the choice is yours. The clever regenerative antilock brake system captures energy from deceleration and channels it back into the storage system to extend the range as well. The Twike has far fewer parts than any messy internal combustion engine; if only all relationships could be this low maintenance.

A British engineering firm has put together a high-performance hybrid version of BMW's Mini Cooper. The PML Mini QED has a top speed of 150 mph, a 0-60 mph time of 4.5 seconds. The car uses a small gasoline engine with four 160 horsepower electric motors — one on each wheel. The car has been designed to run for four hours of combined urban/extra urban driving, powered only by a battery and bank of ultra capacitors. The QED supports an all-electric range of 200-250 miles and has a total range of about 932 miles (1,500 km). For longer journeys at higher speeds, a small conventional internal combustion engine (ICE) is used to re-charge the battery. In this hybrid mode, fuel economies of up to 80mpg can be achieved.

Explains Martin Boughtwood, PML's MD: "Until now, most electric vehicles have been little more than souped-up milk floats, limited by range and speed, with compromised performance. For those with a green conscience who also value an enhanced motoring experience, there is still something missing.

"Working in partnership with our customer, Synergy Innovations, we set out to demonstrate what our electric wheel technology is capable of. We simply took a standard BMW Mini One, discarded the engine, the disc brakes, the wheels, and the gearbox. These components were replaced by four of our electric wheels, a lithium polymer battery, a large ultra capacitor, a very small ICE with generator (so small it almost fits alongside the spare wheel), an energy management system and a sexy in-car display module."

With timing perhaps intended to blunt criticism of the move, Bill Ford announced the strategic shift in an e-mail to employees Wednesday, the same day he and the CEOs of General Motors Corp. and DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler Group sent a letter to Congress promising to double their annual production of alternative-fuel vehicles to 2 million by 2010.

Critics decried the back-pedaling on hybrids as another broken promise by the automaker to build more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Bill Ford's hybrid pledge, made last September, was the centerpiece of a national advertising campaign touting the company as an environmental and innovation leader.

"What I didn't foresee at the time was how rapidly other technologies would evolve," Bill Ford wrote in the e-mail, obtained by The Detroit News. "Now, I am convinced that the objective we had set earlier to build capacity for 250,000 hybrids at the end of the decade is too narrow to achieve our larger goals of substantially improving fuel economy and CO2 performance."

Unique, optimized aerodynamics gives the Aptera(C) a drag form factor that will be lower than any mass produced car in the world. "It looks like nothing you've ever seen because it performs like nothing you've ever seen," says Accelerated Composites founder and CEO, Steve Fambro. "What we've done is changed the way cars are thought of and designed. Rather than designing to a styling aesthetic, like the big auto makers do, we hew to an efficiency and safety aesthetic. When you do that, math and physics mostly dictate the shape of the car, and in this case, math and physics look awesome."

But aerodynamics is only half of the equation. The other half is weight. The Aptera(C) is made almost entirely of lightweight composites, making it one of the lightest cars on the road. Yet this savings does not come at the cost of safety. In fact, the construction of the car is based on the driver-protection "crash box" found in Formula One race cars. "Composites are enormously strong and lightweight," says Fambro. "That's why all the aircraft manufacturers are switching to them."

So why aren't the auto makers switching? "Cost," says Fambro. "They haven't figured out cost-effective manufacturing processes for composites. But we have."

The Aptera(C) utilizes proprietary composite construction that significantly lowers manufacturing cost when compared to most other composite construction methods, and even steel. The patent-pending "Panelized Automated Composite Construction," or PAC2(C), lends itself to parallel assembly and has a very low initial capitalization. Additionally, AC's patent-pending hybrid technology allows off the shelf engines and electric motors to be seamlessly integrated for a very low cost. Another reason the big automakers aren't jumping to composites is corporate inertia. "They have many billions of dollars invested in factories and infrastructure for making cars the old-fashioned way. They couldn't walk away from that if they wanted to. This is something that only a new company can do, and that's where we come in. We are going to disrupt the status quo."

With all the histrionics about rising gas prices coming out of Washington these days, SUVs must be an endangered species in our nation's capital, right? Well, not exactly. At Capitol Cadillac, just inside the Beltway, SUVs are flying off the lot. Last week, former White House chief of staff Andy Card dropped by to pick up a new SRX, Caddy's midsize SUV, says dealer Daniel Jobe. But Jobe's hottest seller, by far, is the newly redesigned chrome-encrusted Cadillac Escalade, an incredible hulk that gets 13mpg in the city. "My biggest problem is not gas prices," says Jobe, "it's getting enough of these trucks."

One in four new models today comes equipped with a gas-thirsty V-8 engine—which is unchanged from last summer, before gas prices spiked, according to new data from J.D. Power. And some of the best-selling rides on the road today are GM's trio of beefy new SUVs—the Chevy Tahoe, the GMC Yukon and that blingy 'Slade, which saw its sales surge 127 percent last month. Meanwhile, last year's "it" car, the hybrid, is becoming a harder sell. Sure, dealers are still selling out of the Prius, but sales of the Honda Accord hybrid plunged 69 percent last month and Ford had to resort to a zero percent financing deal to jump-start its Escape hybrid. For all their megawatt buzz, hybrids still account for just 1 percent of U.S. auto sales and are outsold by SUVs 23-1. "Not a lot of people are jumping up to pay $3,000 extra for a hybrid," says Memphis Toyota dealer Kent Ritchey. "For $3,000, you can buy a lot of gas."

The car, named "TeamGreen," is 3.1 metres (10 feet 2 inches) long and a mere 0.6 metres (2 feet) wide, weighing just 30 kilograms (four stone).

"It's a labour of love," said Green, a technician in the mechanical engineering department of Bath University, south-west England.

"I think the car is important because it is a reminder to us all that the way to achieve fuel-savings is to drive lighter cars -- it's the weight of this car that is the main reason for its fuel-efficiency," he said.

Green's car is powered by a single cylinder four-stroke engine with a capacity of just 35 cc.

It will be the only British entry in a global competition in France later this month to decide the world's most fuel-economic car.

"The new data from the latest AutoVIBES study provides insight into consumers’ future buying intentions," said Rick Wainschel, vice president of marketing research and brand communications for Kelley Blue Book. "Extreme shifts in segment consideration levels reveal just how profound the impact of recent increases in gas prices is on consumers and their vehicle purchase behaviors. This information will be an important bellwether of the long-term effect of this issue on new-vehicle shoppers."

These preliminary April 2006 AutoVIBES data also show an increase in awareness of alternative fuel vehicles. Sixty-six percent of consumers are aware of E85 (a mixture of 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline), and 59 percent are aware of flex-fuel vehicles (those that can run on either regular gasoline or E85). The April awareness levels for both E85 and flex-fuel vehicles jumped a significant number of points over the previous month (E85 and flex-fuel awareness levels were at 60 percent and 55 percent in March 2006, respectively).

"With gas prices on the rise and continuing to climb, consumers are more aware of and interested in highly fuel-efficient cars now than they have been in the last 25 years," said Jack R. Nerad, executive editorial director and executive market analyst for Kelley Blue Book and kbb.com. "We expect to see increased consumer interest for some of the recently-introduced fuel-efficient sub-compact vehicles such as the Toyota Yaris, Nissan Versa and Honda Fit, in addition to hybrid, flex-fuel and compact models."

Consideration for compact sedans is at an all-time high at 19 percent, up four points from the previous month.

Hybrid vehicle consideration also reached an all-time high in April at 14 percent, which is more than double the percentage of consumers that were considering hybrids last month. (Six percent considered hybrids in March 2006).

In contrast, consideration for mid-size SUVs is at an all-time low at 19 percent, and full-size pickup consideration also is down considerably at 11 percent, a 5 point drop from the previous month.

The Associated Press has photographed Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert (R-IL) ditching his brightly colored hydrogen automobile in favor of a gas-guzzling black SUV after exiting a news conference and photo opportunity at a Washington, DC gas station.

After the conference, which addressed high gas prices, Hastert and other Congressmen had been carted away in fuel saving and alternatively powered automobiles. Just blocks away from the scene, Hastert was photographed ditching his in favor of his usual official car.

For security purposes, congressional leaders' official cars are required to be armored, limiting their choices in those respects mostly to vans or SUVs. Time magazine reported in December that House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has searched unsuccessfully for a suitably armored hybrid.

In all, 25 VIPs are participating in the fourth annual "Red Carpet, Green Cars" event sponsored by Toyota Motor Corp. and the environmental organization Global Green USA. McDormand, Phoenix, Gyllenhaal, Jennifer Aniston and George Clooney are all expected to arrive at the Oscars in Toyota or Lexus hybrids, including the Toyota Prius, Lexus RX crossover and a hybrid version of the Toyota Camry, which goes on sale in May.

Event spokeswoman Kathy Kniss said the program began with just four participants in 2002, but interest in fuel-efficient vehicles has grown exponentially since then.

Other automakers are also getting into the act. Ford Motor Co. said Cathy Schulman, the producer of best-picture nominee "Crash," plans to arrive in a hybrid Mercury Mariner, while best-supporting-actor nominee Gyllenhaal's entourage is scheduled to show up in a Ford Excursion powered by clean-burning biodiesel.

General Motors Corp. also will be bringing VIPs to the ceremony, but its focus will be on luxury rather than fuel efficiency. GM spokeswoman Ryndee Carney said a fleet of 50 Cadillacs - mostly 2007 Escalade SUVs - will be used to pick up and drop off celebrities. Carney said the automaker also will run ads during the broadcast featuring GM's two other luxury brands, Hummer and Saab.

According to the report, a Fit hybrid would be priced at about $11,790, which the paper said would make it the world's first hybrid car priced under 2 million yen, or about $16,840.

Honda already has Accord and Civic hybrids and the groundbreaking Insight, the first gas-electric hybrid car on the U.S. market. If the Fit hybrid does go on sale at under $12,000, that price would sharply undercut the hybrid offerings of Honda's rival Toyota. The standard gasoline-engined Fit is set to go on sale in the United States later this year.

According to a recent study by CNW Marketing Research of Bandon, Ore., 32 percent of American new-car buyers say they would "seriously consider" a hybrid if gas prices reached $3.75 a gallon. That’s up from 19 percent in 2002.

Hybrid prices range from the two-seat Honda hatchback Insight at about $20,000 to the luxurious Lexus sport utility vehicle, the RX 400h, which starts at $49,060.

Starting Jan. 1, federal tax credits will range from $1,700 to $3,000 depending on how much fuel a car saves, which may help some consumers.

Called Eliica, short for Electric Lithium-Ion battery Car, it boasts a neck-snapping 0-100kmh time of just four seconds and a 0-160kmh time of seven seconds, which means the Eliica accelerates faster than a Porsche 911 Turbo.

Professor Hiroshi Shimizu, of Japan's Keio University, believes his team can make the electric car popular. He feels that the movement towards stricter emissions laws will favour these zero emission vehicles.

"If we continue producing current levels of CO2, we will face a global-warming crisis well before 2040, a long time before fossil fuel reserves run out. We need to halve these emissions now," he says.

Earlier this year, at Italy's Nardo high-speed test track facility, the Eliica recorded a top speed of 370kmh. Shimizu says the car would break 400kmh on a smoother surface.

No reason for the extra set of axles is given, though perhaps they’re needed when the vehicle is traveling at its top speed of 230 mph, which actually was reached one day last year at the Nardo in Italy. The Eliica takes 10 hours to charge and will travel 125 miles on a charge. It can accelerate to 62 mph in 4.1 seconds, after which we imaging you’d need to recharge it again. The team’s goal is beat the top speed of the Bugatti Veyron and produce 200 units of the Eliica for people like George Clooney and that ex-Baywatch babe who still drives an EV1.

Now a software issue is causing Hiroshi Okuda's Toyota Motor to recall a 160,000-strong armada of Prius cars sold mainly in the U.S. and Japan because the gas-electric hybrid vehicles were stalling. A Toyota spokesman said there were no safety concerns, but that the company has decided to fix the fault free of charge. The problem may cause the gasoline engine to stall, but does not affect the electrically powered brake and steering functions, he added.

The recall follows hot on the heels of an investigation by the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration into customer gripes about problems with the popular fuel-efficient vehicle. In June, the agency said it had received 33 reports of engine stalling in 2004 and 2005 Prius vehicles.

"It's kind of hard to be arguing to conserve gasoline when you're driving around in a Ford Expedition that guzzles it down at a 6- to 8-mile per gallon clip," Bush said last month.

"You need to practice what you preach," Richardson said.

So far, DaimlerChrysler AG is the only company that has committed to building its own plug-in hybrids, quietly pledging to make up to 40 vans for U.S. companies. But Toyota Motor Corp. officials who initially frowned on people altering their cars now say they may be able to learn from them.

"They're like the hot rodders of yesterday who did everything to soup up their cars. It was all about horsepower and bling-bling, lots of chrome and accessories," said Cindy Knight, a Toyota spokeswoman. "Maybe the hot rodders of tomorrow are the people who want to get in there and see what they can do about increasing fuel economy."

The extra batteries let Gremban drive for 20 miles with a 50-50 mix of gas and electricity. Even after the car runs out of power from the batteries and switches to the standard hybrid mode, it gets the typical Prius fuel efficiency of around 45 mpg. As long as Gremban doesn't drive too far in a day, he says, he gets 80 mpg.

That would require a significant increase in U.S. hybrid sales. A total of 83,153 hybrids were sold in the United States last year, according to R.L. Polk & Co., a Southfield, Mich. -- based firm that collects and interprets automotive data. The Toyota Prius hybrid dominated that market, with 53,761 new Prius cars registered.

Press said Toyota will meet its goal by aggressively introducing new hybrid versions of its lineup. The company launched two hybrid sport utility vehicles this year -- the Lexus RX 400h hybrid in April and the Toyota Highlander hybrid in June -- and will introduce hybrid versions of the Lexus GS sedan and the Toyota Camry next year.

In addition, Press said Toyota has 10 hybrids under development.

The thinking is, with gasoline prices hitting record highs and traffic in the nation’s major cities becoming increasingly congested, Americans are likely to buy fewer gas-guzzling SUVs and trucks and gravitate toward smaller, more efficient vehicles like the Smart Car - a mere 8 feet, 2 inches long and just over 5 feet tall - according to ZAP's CEO Steve Schneider.

"The market timing for what we are doing couldn't be better," Schneider said. "Fuel prices are at all time highs, and social responsibility about global warming is something that's more in the mainstream and not a left-wing thing," he added. "And there's the issue of our dependency on foreign oil too - all this makes our business plan very timely."

J.D. Power projects that hybrids, which accounted for just 0.5 percent of the U.S. market last year, will increase to 3.5 percent by 2012 -- totaling 650,000 vehicles. Diesels are expected to grow from a 3.4 percent market share in 2004 to 7.5 percent or 1.37 million.

Americans bought 16.9 million new vehicles last year, and Power is projecting the market at more than 18 million in 2012.

Waiting lists are so long that many customers are paying extra just to move ahead in line. Others are paying full sticker price for a used hybrid -- a practice rarely seen outside the trade of Ferraris and other super sports cars.

While automakers rely on cash rebates to prod sales, some car dealers are marking up the price of hybrids, or simply turning customers away.

Toyota already has 12,000 U.S. orders -- a six-month backlog -- for the hybrid Highlander sport utility vehicle, although the model will not hit showrooms until June.

The Japanese automaker has curtailed advertising for its new Lexus RX 400h hybrid to trim the order backlog. It now stands at 9,000.

Toyota said it plans a US$10 million investment in the Georgetown plant, but said it expects capacity and employment to stay the same. The plant 12 miles north of Lexington, Ky. employs about 7,000 workers and can build up to 500,000 vehicles per year.

The PHEV Car is a hybrid vehicle driven by a compressed air engine combined with electric motor. PHEV CAR is driven by expansive force of compressed air and it also uses a battery driven motor when it is necessary. Compressed air engine is operated by two strokes (suction (expansion)-exhaustion) when the internal combustion engine is operated by four strokes (suction-compression-explosion- exhaustion). Compressed air engine is operated during the start, acceleration or going up a hill where the electric motor consumes a great deal of power rapidly. The compressed air engine converts back to the electric motor when the vehicle reaches a speed of 20-25 km/h.

Earlier this year, GM unveiled the Opel Astra Diesel Hybrid, a sedan concept vehicle the company claims would increase fuel economy by 25 percent over a comparable diesel car, or approximately 59 miles per gallon. The vehicle uses a hybrid system with two electric motors being co-developed with DaimlerChrysler, according to GM.