On the road to zero emissions

The number of motor vehicles in the world will triple by 2050 - but carbon dioxide emissions from vehicle exhausts will have to halve in that time. A big ask? Yes, but it must be done, a Japanese motor industry expert tells Rob Maetzig .When Michio Shinohara sat down to chat with the news media in Auckland last week, one of the first things he did was to bombard the journalists with some rather sobering statistics.While the world's motor vehicle fleet is currently less than one billion, the trouble is that more than 60 per cent of that fleet is in developed countries.Big growth is now taking place in the less developed countries including China and India, warned Mr Shinohara, who is the general manager and chief engineer of Honda Motor Company's...

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Honda CEO “Not Satisfied” With Automaker’s Recent Performance

Honda CEO Takanobu Ito criticized the “complacent” nature of his company at the Beijing Auto Show, taking aim at poor sales figures, a lack of product direction and a need to focus on improving the company’s hybrid systems.Honda’s market share slid by 0.4 percent, with Ito citing the disappointing sales of the Insight hybrid as a particular sore spot. In Insight has been pitched as an alternative to the Prius, but poor reviews, lower fuel economy numbers and the lack of cachet surrounding the vehicle has seen the Insight get trounced in the sales race, with Toyota selling 5 times as many Prius hybrids.The most surprising part of this candid interview was Ito’s admission that “It’s possible we grew complacent about the good performance of the...

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2010 Honda Accord EX vs. 2011 Hyundai Sonata SE, 2010 Subaru Legacy 2.5i - Comparison Tests

Here's a really good comparison test between three really good cars....Practically Chic: Does style really matter in these mid-size schleppers armed with just four cylinders and slushboxes?For all the ascendance of crossovers—certainly the most amoebic of all automotive classifications—mid-size sedans continue to be one of autodom’s biggest sales categories. There are many reasons for this—all-around family usefulness, resistance to the swollen SUV bulk of crossovers, respectable fuel economy—but double-take glamour is rarely one of them.This mid-size dedication to stylistic timidity has always mystified us. Given a choice between two implements that function with more or less equal efficiency, wouldn’t you be inclined to pick the one that...

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Beijing 2010: Honda Li Nian Everus sedan concept

I can't help but think that this concept is showing the direction that Honda may be going with the next generation Honda Civic....The Beijing Motor Show is well under way, and Honda is showing off a new concept slated for the Chinese market. Called the Li Nian Everus, the car is the fruit of a partnership between the Japanese automaker and its Chinese partner, Guangqi Honda Automobile. We don't have too many details on the sedan other than the fact that at this point, it's nothing more than a concept.Judging by the renderings, we're tempted to guess this thing has more than a little Civic DNA swimming around in its blood stream, though it looks like Honda raided the Acura design department for the car's less-than-traditional nose and rear-end.Speaking...

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Maruti-Suzuki Launches New Wagon R Priced at Rs. 3.28 Lakhs | All New Wagon R Photos, Pic and Images

Maruti-Suzuki Launches Ne,w Wagon R Priced at Rs. 3.28 Lakhs | All New Wagon R Photos, Pic and ImagesMarut-Suzuki India launched face-lifted version its successful model Wagon R on Friday, 23rd April, 2010. New Maruti Wagon R The new Wagon R - titled as ‘blue-eyed boy’ has gone to major changes from the front and increased in length, Height and width while the rear portion is almost same with the addition of chrome near number plate.All new WagonR has been fitted with Suzuki's new K10B engine, 98cc three-cylinder engine makes best in-class power, pegged at 68PS claiming fuel efficiency under ideal conditions to be around 18.9 kmpl.All New Maruti-Suzuki WagonR Prices in India:LX: Rs 3.28lakhsLXi: Rs 3.57lakhsVXi: Rs 3.81lakhsVXi (ABS + Airbags):...

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Happy Earth Day from The Honda Portal!

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FT-86 Price and Range Out Of Control?

According to sources,”…ballooning development costs will result in a more expensive Toyota FT-86 when it arrives late next year…”This is without mentioning the disputes over the origin of the power plants…According to Toyota, the boxer engine is ill-favored, saying, “The Subaru boxer engine planned for the car is not considered to be that clean or fuel-efficient.”…and that prices with the boxer in tow, could top,”…the Japanese price up to around £15,000 ( $23,000 ), with the range-topper costing £17,000 ( $26,000 ).”Quite the hike in cost, wouldn’t you agree?The FT86 is one of the biggest cars to come out in decades and already it is marred in controversy with very little to show for its actual form.One key element is the internal shift for...

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Honda Freed “premium compact MPV” launched: RM112,980 in Malaysia

This would do well here, 6X seater, looks like power sliding doors, seats fold up in the 3rd row like the Element....what's not to like?Honda Malaysia has launched the Freed, which the company describes as a “premium compact MPV” in a new market segment. The “premium” slant is meant to distance this seven-seater from rivals’ compact MPVs, and the Freed’s price of RM112,980 (OTR with insurance) backs up the positioning – it’s costlier than the Nissan Grand Livina 1.8 and the much larger Toyota Innova, for instance.The Freed has a unique trump card however – automatic sliding doors that can be operated from the key fob (and from within the car, of course). These doors come with anti-pinch sensors and open to a gap of 600 mm. Honda also points...

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GM pays back government loans in full

Here's a bit of good news....Kansas City, Kansas – General Motors has made its final payment of US$5.8 billion to the U.S. Treasury and Export Development Canada, paying back its government loans in full and ahead of schedule. The payment includes $4.7 billion to the U.S. Treasury, and $1.1 billion to Export Development Canada.The announcement was made by GM chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre at a ceremony in Fairfax, Kansas to announce an investment of $257 million in Fairfax and Detroit Hamtramck assembly centres. The investment will prepare Fairfax to build the next-generation Chevrolet Malibu and make Detroit Hamtramck a second source for the model. Fairfax currently builds the current Malibu and the Buick LaCrosse.As part of the launch of the...

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Volkswagen’s electric Milano Taxi concept

Now, that's just too cool....This is the taxi of the future, according to Volkswagen. VW, which will launch its first production electric vehicles in 2013 has shown this electric driven taxi at the Hanover Trade Show. Called the Milano Taxi concept, it is a city MPV tailored to the needs of taxi drivers and passengers with innovative details such as a swivel-sliding door that opens in a forward direction and customisable taxi touchscreens.The green and black paint of the concept cab is a tribute to the fashion capital of Milan, where taxis were once painted like this. VW says that the Milano’s styling bears similarities to the iconic Volkswagen Samba Bus of the 1950s, and this plus its emissions-free drive and practicality could “make it a...

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Huge New Fuel Source Found: Old Cars

Talk about unfortunate timing: Just as the scrapping incentives all around the world are running out, a Japanese company found a way to turn old cars into fuel.According to The Nikkei [sub], Japan’s JFE Engineering Corp. is set to open an automobile recycling center that turns the increasing amounts of plastics found in a car back into fuel.The Nikkei says that the Kanagawa plant (halfway between Tokyo and Yokohama) will open in July. It has the capacity to process some 40,000 tons of scrap a year, which comes from automobile crushing sites in the Tokyo area. When the plant is through with the scrap, 9,000 tons of steel, copper and other valuable metals will have been sorted out. The sorting magnets are especially green: They use wind power....

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THE HONDA CR-Z SPORTY HYBRID COUPE

Pure eye candy....this car is looking better and better the more I see it....THE HONDA CR-Z SPORTY HYBRID COUPEThe Honda CR-Z is a unique new car, combining the advantages of a clean, efficient petrol electric hybrid powertrain with a 6-speed manual transmission and a stylish coupe body.This exciting new coupe will change current perceptions of hybrids, with its driver-focussed, chassis and responsive 1.5-litre engine.-All-new, sporty, aerodynamic, 2+2 coupe form-Wide track, short wheelbase chassis for agile and responsive handling-Unique 3-Mode Drive System to tailor steering, throttle response and IMA assistance to the driver's needs-1.5-litre i-VTEC engine coupled to the Honda IMA parallel hybrid system with CO2 emissions of 117 g/km and...

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Next Generation Honda Civic Rendering

Hmmm, not sure what to say about this one, looks an awful lot like that small car sold in Asia by Honda.... if what they're saying is true, the code name for the new Honda Civic project is "2 HC"....2011-2012 Honda Civic (2 HC codename) Rendering and speculationThere are reports emerging concerning the next generation Civic (nine generation) that is set to be introduced in september 2011 as a 2012 model year car. Knowing the traditional way of doing things by Honda, the different markets in Japan, Europe, and America, will be getting their own variant of the famous Civic.rumore to reduce width from arond 1750 mm to 1695 mm as the car that width below 1700 mm will get a special reduce tax benefit in japan. the Next generation Honda Civic (2...

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Honda's first truck tops in reliability

Guess which pickup truck has the top reliability rating of any consumer truck sold in the United States. Two hints: It's built by a company that's known for fuel-efficient car, and it's not one of the best-selling trucks in the country.The answer: The Honda Ridgeline.Introduced in spring 2005 as Honda's first pickup, the Ridgeline isn't a brawny brute capable of towing 8,500 pounds and climbing over sizable rocks off road.Rather, the Ridgeline is a four-door, five-passenger, four-wheel drive, mid-size truck that's agile for everyday driving and comfortable for outdoor getaways on less-aggressive off-road terrain. Towing capacity is 5,000 pounds.And the Ridgeline remains the only truck with some innovative features, such as a lockable trunk...

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What's really behind the Toyota debacle

Interesting read, a lot of things that I didn't know....(Fortune) -- At 77, Hiroshi Okuda, chairman of Toyota, is still causing trouble for the automaker.He is being painted, most recently in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal, as both the architect of a global expansion that proved ruinous and an enemy of the Toyoda family.But blaming Okuda for what has gone wrong at Toyota (TM) recently hardly gets to the root cause of the company's problems.For that, Toyota executives will have to look deeper into themselves. If they are diligent, they will find an anachronistic management structure that has proved inefficient and counterproductive, and could be potentially ruinous.Toyota is basically organized the same way it was half-a-century ago when it...

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