We Obsessively Cover the Green Scene…

Honda just released an incentive, a big one, for those interested in buying the Civic Natural Gas. American Honda has an alliance with Clean Energy Fuels to provide a debit card pre-loaded with $3,000 that can used at Clean Energy fueling stations around the country. Another perk, for those living in California, is the ability to drive a 2012 Civic Natural Gas Vehicle in the High Occupancy Vehicle carpool lanes through January 1, 2015.

Honda says that the natural gas vehicle offers fuel savings up to 40 percent compared to a typical gasoline-powered subcompact car with its 31 miles per gallon combined EPA rating. Natural gas was costing customers $2.05 per equivalent gasoline gallon in July, according to the most recent Deptartment of Energy data. While not covered in its press release (see below), there are other considerations that car shoppers should research, such as:

• Finding a natural gas station: Clean Energy doesn't state the specific number of public fueling stations that there are in the US, but the numbers are limited. A lot of these stations are behind locked gates at government and business fleet facilities, airports, and bus and utility vehicle gas pumps. Looking over Clean Energy's map, it looks like there are about 180 public natural gas stations, about forty percent of them in Southern California.
• Range limitations: The regular Honda Civic sedan has a gas tank that can hold up to 13.2 gallons and has a combined city/highway mileage rating of 32 miles per gallon for the automatic transmission version. That would mean it could travel 422 miles on a tank of gasoline. Honda gives the Civic Natural Gas a range estimate of 220 miles. Part of the reason for this conservative estimate is that different stations refill CNG differently, and ambient temperature has an effect on how much gas can make it into the tank. There's also a limit to how much natural gas the pressurized tank can hold.
• Price comparison: Natural gas is appealing for those interested in reducing their out-of-pocket fuel expense, with a $2.05 per equivalent gasoline gallon the number cited by Honda, compared to the current national average for gasoline at about $3.80 a gallon. The downside is that the Civic Natural Gas is the most expensive version of the Civic, with its sticker price starting at $27,065 after destination.

So, the $3,000 fuel card is appealing, but it makes sense to look before you leap. Does it make sense for you?

Government incentives can be an important boost for new technologies moving from the testing ground to mainstream markets, but incentives are not guaranteed to achieve intended results – and there's no promise a government can maintain support. In an era of budgetary pressures (such as now), incentives can become easy targets.

The United Kingdom is scrutinizing its electric vehicle incentives. Similar debates are taking place in the US and France. California, for example, cut its EV rebates in half recently to deal with budget and economic constraints. According to a parliamentary report, the £11 million spent on a government program to encourage the use of plug-in EVs benefited only a "handful" of consumers, many of them affluent families who used the government grants to help fund second cars. The House of Commons Transport Committee is questioning whether that was a good use of public funds.

The UK's Department of Transport offers grants up to £5,000 (approximately $8,065 US at current exchange rates) for the purchase of an electric car as part of its emissions reduction strategy. The program has also funded a network of more than 1,600 public charging points across the country. The government was expecting to see tens of thousands of EVs on British roads by 2015, and independent forecasts think it could hit six figures by 2020. So far, the numbers haven't been good – 1,052 eligible cars were registered last year, up from 111 in 2010. As for charging stations, only 500 of the 1,600 units have been installed so far, which could be another barrier for adoption.

Government EV incentives have been in place in major markets around the world, including China, India and Japan. There has yet to be a country celebrating victory on this front, but it's still early in the game. Experts say that it's going to take sticker price reduction, charging station ubiquity, driving experience and more "keeping up with the Joneses" social influence to succeed. Until then, government incentives are being urgently requested by automakers and industry associations.

Huh?

Toyota is looking to boost awareness and potential sales of its Prius Plug In by launching a social-media campaign that involves getting points for plugging in and recharging an iPhone. We think.

The campaign's minute-long video, available below, shows a few folks in various stages of ecstasy plugging in their phones, after which a voice repeats the tagline "Fun to Charge." The game, called "Plug-In Championship," is supposed to "bring to life" the fun of recharging a Prius PHEV. Green Car Reports explains that gamers can score points, share their experiences with social-network friends and maybe buy more Prius PHEVs, though that website is as confused about the whole thing as we are.

With 7,734 U.S. vehicles sold year to date, the plug-in Prius is the lowest-selling of the four Prius variants, but has still outsold the all-electric Nissan Leaf by about 2,500 vehicles this year.

The Eco has landed.

In this case, the first US EcoCentre, which specializes in selling neighborhood electric vehicles (NEVs) made by China-based Liuzhou Wuling Special Purpose Vehicle Manufacturing Co., has opened for business, Plug In Cars reports.

The EcoCentre, which is operated by Lincoln and Jaguar dealer Ramon Alvarez, is in Irvine, CA, near Los Angeles, and also sells Coda Automotive electric vehicles. The NEVs, which have a top speed of 25 miles per hour and a single-charge range of up to 40 miles, range in price from $9,995 for the EcoE mini car to $17,995 for the EcoVan.

Alvarez first announced his intention to sell the EVs in July at the National Association of Minority Auto Dealers conference in Las Vegas. The cars might be small, but his hopes are big. He told Plug In Cars that he expects, "conservatively," to sign up dealers to open as many as 200 EcoCentres open in five years.

The Golden State is providing some green for the Tesla Model X.

The California Energy Commission (CEC) has awarded electric vehicle maker Tesla Motors $10 million to expand its Fremont, CA, plant to accommodate production for the Model X SUV.

Tesla, which currently employs around 3,000 people, will add more than 500 jobs to build the Model X. Production is expected to start in 2014, and Tesla itself is investing $50 million getting ready for Model X production. Tesla unveiled a prototype of the Model X, complete with its "falcon-wing" doors, in February.

The CEC's grant was part of $20 million in awards for "clean transportation" projects within the state. Details on these grantees are available below, but readers will likely be most interested in the $1.8 million that Zero Motorcycles received to "expand the company's full electric motorcycle production capacity." There's also $300,000 for a compressed natural gas (CNG) station that will refuel CNG-powered garbage trucks.

NanoSteel Company, a nano-structured steel materials designer, has announced that one of the most quotable characters in the auto industry, Bob Lutz, has joined its board of directors. The 10-year-old, Providence, RI-based company says that it "has achieved a significant breakthrough in the development of nano-structured sheet steel with exceptional strength and ductility" for the automotive industry. In other words, it could one day make lightweight material to improve vehicle efficiency while still offering many of steel's traditional benefits. In August, General Motors announced that GM Ventures was investing in NanoSteel.

Lutz brings about 50 years of experience in the automotive sector, having served in design and marketing executive positions for General Motors, Chrysler, Ford, and BMW. He's more recently known for championing plug-in hybrid electric vehicles – the Chevrolet Volt and Via Motors pickup truck – and was also enthused about electric scooters a while ago. Lutz thinks NanoSteel fits well with his passion for efficiencies and advanced technologies.

"The company's innovative approach has the potential to offer the most natural progression for automakers to stick with their most trusted material - steel - and at the same time enjoy exceptional properties that support the design of next generation fuel efficient vehicles," Lutz said in a statement (available below). He also said he likesf that NanoSteel's production method could drive efficiencies across the supply chain.

Lutz works as an industry consultant, and there hasn't been any word lately about him taking another top management position with the Big 3. One thing seems to be true about the opinionated 80-year-old Bob Lutz: he won't be retiring anytime soon.

Carbon fiber has been in use for many years in the automotive industry in the name of performance, but Ford is trying to bring this lightweight material to the masses in the name of fuel economy. As a part of the German-funded Hightech.NRW project that began in 2010, Ford and Dow Automotive Systems have been trying to come up with a way to make carbon fiber feasible for everyday cars.

To demonstrate how important carbon fiber could be in non-performance-car applications, Ford installed a carbon fiber reinforced plastic hood on the Focus wagon shown above. Ford says carbon fiber is five times stronger than steel yet is just one-third the weight. This prototype hood weighs about half of what a conventional steel hood would weigh, and it still passes all of the safety needs required from a vehicle including dent resistance, pedestrian protection and during frontal crashes.

CFRP parts are apparently more time consuming to paint, so the project is also trying to find a faster way to finish the parts while keeping the same quality standards in place for steel components.

CFRP is an ideal material to use on hybrids and EVs, but Ford also has a plan to reduce the weight of its vehicles by about 750 pounds each by the end of the decade. Currently, resources and production methods make carbon fiber an expensive material, so the biggest test will be getting these costs down to make it economical for use in a sub-$20,000 car. There's no word how much this prototype hood cost Ford to produce, but in a day where automakers are trying to squeeze every last pound out of a car's curb weight, carbon fiber could become a very important material in future vehicles.

Scroll down for Ford's press release.

It looks like they do more than surf down in San Diego.

Folks at the UC San Diego's Jacobs School of Engineering say they've figured out a way to make batteries lighter and faster-charging by creating algorithms that simulate the physical activity inside a typical lithium-ion battery. Usually, just the battery's current and voltage is tracked.

UCSD, along with Bosch and battery maker Cobasys, received a grant worth almost $4 million from the U.S. Department of Energy's Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) to study the process, and it looks like the university is making good use of the funds.

The process is a complicated one. Professor Miroslav Krstic and UC President's Postdoctoral Fellow Scott Moura used an analogy of a ticket taker who can track how a movie audience is choosing its seats based on the speed of the line into the theater. Think of the moviegoers as patrons and the seats are the particles. There are more details in the press release below.

We're not sure what that all means, exactly, but we do understand that the researchers say they may be able to reduce the cost of a battery by 25 percent and cut recharging times in half, which is pretty major considering that costs and charging times are two of the primary issues holding back broader adoption of electric vehicles.

Think of it as an SUV for the environmentally conscious gentry.

Land Rover might make a plug-in hybrid-electric vehicle (PHEV) version of its Range Rover as early as 2015, UK's Auto Express reports, citing Jaguar Land Rover Hybrid Technology Chief Engineer Peter Richings.

Land Rover, whose Jaguar affiliate has already produced a PHEV prototype that gets an estimated 73.5 miles per gallon equivalent, is eying the Range Rover as a possible production PHEV because the model's buyers would likely be able to afford the cost of the new technology. Richings said the model would debut sometime between 2015 and 2020.

Land Rover confirmed at its 2013 model unveiling in September that it would get a hybrid variant that would pair a 3.0-liter diesel V6 with an electric motor. That model, which won't be available in the U.S., will have 333 horsepower and 45 miles per gallon (on the more lenient European driving cycle). Land Rover said in April that it may also get an extended-range plug-in variant as early as 2014. Pictured above is the diesel-powered hybrid Range_e concept from the 2011 Geneva Motor Show.

Plug In America is saying Aloha to Hawaii's growing legion of electric-vehicle drivers.

The electric vehicle advocate group used a $50,000 grant from the State of Hawaii to produce a 48-page guidebook (PDF) designed to help novices adopt their first electric vehicle. The document – downloadable for free from Plug In America's website – covers issues such as charging costs and installation expenses. It also discusses ways to install a charger in places like a single-family home or multi-unit dwelling and other factors to consider, and was written to be useful to people in any state, not just Hawaii.

Along with California, Hawaii's been a leading U.S. state when it comes to alt-fuel vehicle adoption (rightly so) because of the combination of relatively high gas prices and short driving distances that take the edge off of range anxiety. Interested in the first EV in Hawaii? We've got that story for you right here.

In fact, for those keeping track, the U.S. Department of Energy says Hawaii has 260 EV charging stations, or about one for every 1,700 vehicles there. That's pretty impressive, considering that the U.S. in total has almost 10,000 vehicles per charging station.

The energy efficiency of electric buses from BYD didn't get lost in translation, apparently.

The Chinese company entered its all-electric buses in a fuel-efficiency testing program put on in Colombia by the Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) and InterAmerican Development Bank (IABD), and the buses came up big.

Running against diesel and CNG-hybrid buses on a 12-mile route through Bogota that took between 60 and 90 minutes to complete, BYD's bus achieved a 7.3 km/liter-equivalent by measuring costs and 11 km/liter-equivalent measuring by energy output, which was the best among the buses tested. By our math, that comes out to between 17 to 26 miles per gallon equivalent, which doesn't sound great relative to cars, but is three to four times what the typical smoke-belching diesel bus gets.

BYD says the 200-plus electric buses it has put into service in Shenzhen, China have put on more than 5.5 million miles. In June, the company sold six buses to the Dutch island of Schiermonnikoog. In May, BYD won a contract to sell the city of Windsor, Ontario, for what was said to be the first North American municipal fleet of all-electric buses. BYD's press release is available below.

Fuel efficiency gains for new vehicles sold in the US were in a bit of a holding pattern last month, according to a new report from TrueCar. Fleetwide fuel efficiency for new US light-duty vehicles in September rose 5.5 percent compared to 2011 figures, but remained the same as August 2012 figures.

In September, new cars got an average of 23.2 miles per gallon, up from an even 22 miles per gallon in September 2011. Through the first three quarters of 2012, US fleetwide new-vehicle fuel economy has been up 5.9 percent from 2011. Looking at individual automaker figures, Toyota showed the biggest year-over-year fuel efficiency gain (with a 1.4 percent increase), while Honda and General Motors both made 1.1 percent advances. On the flipside, Volkswagen's fuel efficiency gains were the lowest among the automakers tested, rising just 0.2 percent from a year ago. More details available below.

Honda has followed in the water-exhaust trail of fellow Japanese automakers Toyota and Nissan as well as South Korea-based Hyundai in reaching an agreement to accelerate the development of hydrogen fuel-cell electric vehicles (FCEV) in the Nordic countries.

Honda joined in on the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with representatives from Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Iceland. The agreement, signed recently in Copenhagen, specifically targets FCEV refueling infrastructure development from 2014 and 2017.

The countries involved have been pushing for FCEV development for at least a couple of years. In February 2011, Hyundai and its Kia affiliate reached its own MOU with the Nordic countries to speed up the vehicle-development process. Some say FCEVs are a "best of both worlds" solution to cutting greenhouse gas emissions because they emit nothing but water vapor and can go about as far as a conventional vehicle on a full tank. One stumbling block is building out an refueling infrastructure, which this MOU addresses. You can find the press release below.

Honda is leasing the FCX Clarity (pictured) in limited numbers the U.S. and Japan, and was the first automaker to make FCEVs available to the public with the launch of the FCX in 2002.

Well, this certainly isn't going to end the way Ford continues to compare its C-Max Energi plug-in hybrid to its competition from the Toyota Prius family. Beating earlier expectations that it would be rated at 95 MPGe (but meeting even earlier expectations), Ford has announced that the Energi has been rated at 100 MPGe combined (that's 108 city, 92 on the highway). Yes, that makes it "America's most fuel-efficient plug-in hybrid," as Ford so proudly states in a new press release, available below. To compare, the Toyota Prius Plug-In gets 95 MPGe combined, and the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid gets 98.

When it goes on sale later this year, the C-Max Energi will have a lot of ground to make up on the showroom floor, even with its objectively better numbers. Last month, the Prius Plug-In sold 1,652 copies while Chevy sold 2,851 Volts. The non-plug-in version of the C-Max Hybrid sold 969 units in September. Will MyFord Touch, constant Prius-bashing and a lower starting price be enough to put the Energi on top of the plug-in hybrid sales ladder?