The Mitsubishi i-MiEV has been named as the greenest car of 2012 by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE).

It is first time in twelve years of the ACEEE’s annual greenest list that an electric car has come top, with the i-MiEV claiming the highest ever Green Score-at 58-since rankings began in 1998.

What’s more the Mitsubishi’s tiny electric car has knocked the Honda Civic Natural Gas from the top spot after an impressive run of eight years.

In the 14^th annual list, the Honda Civic CNG came joint second with the Nissan Leaf, followed by the Toyota Prius, the Honda Insight, and the Smart ForTwo. Hybrids dominate the greenest list occupying half of all the top ten spots. Highly efficient conventional petrol vehicles also continued to have a presence on the greenest list, claiming three of the top spots.

All vehicles are analysed on the basis of a Green Score- a singular measure that incorporates tailpipe emissions, fuel consumption, and emissions of gases that contribute to climate change.

This year the environmental assessments were improved too in the generation of Green Scores to more accurately estimate vehicles’ environmental impacts. These include improved emissions estimates for the vehicle manufacturing process, changes reflecting current natural gas extraction practices, and consideration of upcoming shifts in the generation mix for the electricity used to power electric cars.

The winning car, the i-Miev is to make is making its model year 2012 debut on the American market. With a combined city and highway fuel economy of 112 miles per gallon equivalent according to the official US EPA rating, the i-MIEV outpaces all other vehicles currently sold in United States. “

Even taking into account the emissions generated from the electricity used to power the i-MIEV, it still handily outscores other vehicles on the market today,” said ACEEE lead vehicle analyst Shruti Vaidyanathan.

It is the subject of this month’s manufacturer spotlight, (see article) and now Nissan’s luxury brand, Infiniti, has revealed the name of its brand new range extended electric sports car.

Scheduled to debut at the Geneva Motor Show in March, the concept car will be known as EMERG-E. It will be the first vehicle from Infiniti to not only boast a range-extending drivetrain; but to also feature one that is mounted in a mid-ship package to optimise handling. It is believed that this optimises weight distribution.

According to Infiniti, the ultimate goal of the EMERG-E is to combine extreme low emission open-road performance with the ability to run on zero emissions when driving in urban situations.

Sales of the Ford Transit Connect have continued at a rapid pace after Azure Dynamics Corporation announced 45 new sales.

It has revealed that it will send 20 units to Europe; and 25 to North America. The latter order will include six units through the General Services Administration in San Antonio, Texas; as well as a four-unit order from Verizon; and a four-unit order from an internet company.

Thanks to these orders, Ford Transit Connect Electric sales have now surpassed $32million in less than 12 months.

The Ford Transit Connect Electric features a lithium-ion battery from Johnson Controls and it can achieve a range of 50-80miles.

Part of the reason for the success has been its agreements with more than 160 Ford commercial truck dealerships across key markets in North America. Around 90 of these support sales and service activities for the Transit Connect. Meanwhile it also has deals in six European countries with 57 store locations.

Wireless charging is seen as the future for electric cars – and now a Stanford University research team has advanced the concept further.

It is designing a high efficiency wireless charging system that utilises magnetic resonance coupling. This allows for wireless transmission of electric currents between metal coils. Its hope long term is to develop an all-electric highway that will charge cars and trucks as they move down the road.

Published in the journal Applied Physics Letters, the design could potentially transfer around 10kW of electrical energy to a coil 6.5ft away – with efficiency of up to 97 per cent.

The idea behind resonant coupling wireless power transfer is to utilise two copper coils that are turned to resonate at the same frequency. They are placed a few feet apart with one coil connected to an electric current that generates a magnetic field, and that causes the second to resonate. This results in the transfer of electric energy through the air from the first coil to the second.

The concept is similar to the work of WiTricity, the MIT spin-off company, which is developing a stationary charging system that can transfer around 3kW of electric power to a vehicle parked in a garage or on the street.

OnStar is hoping to boost the development of Smart Grid solutions by encouraging energy companies and tech firms to use its application programming (API).

The subsidiary of General Motors hopes to broaden the potential of electric cars, including the Chevrolet Volt, after announcing plans to give developers access to a proprietary API that can create mobile applications to interact with OnStar services. 

Its services use an Advanced Telematics Operating Management System – a cloud application platform that connects to six million OnStar customers.

The APIs will work with a host of OnStar solutions including:

-         Demand response: This connects utilities to companies with intelligent energy management products. For example, companies could use OnStar to manage energy use for Volt customers.

-         Time of use rates: Will offer Volt owners rate plan deals via email.

-         Charging data: OnStar has the capability to send and receive electric vehicle data that helps utility providers to interface with the supply equipment – including location-based data that identifies charging locations and determines potential load scenarios.

-         Aggregated services: This, with the customer’s consent, allows electric service providers to manage the charging of vehicles in a specific area.

Are electric vehicles good for your health? A new study from the University of Minnesota, University of Tennessee and Tsinghua University investigates.

It compared emissions – CO2, PM2.5, NOx and HC – from conventional vehicles and electric vehicles, including electric cars, light scooters and bicycles. The study was partly motivated by the rise in popularity of electric bikes in China– known as e-bikes – which is seen as the single largest adoption of alternative fuel vehicles in history. There has been an 86 per cent annual growth rate over the past decade.

The study is important because in China, 85 per cent of electricity production is from fossil fuels – with around 90 per cent from coal. Indeed most electricity generating units in China lack advanced pollution controls and so it is not clear-cut that electric vehicles would automatically be “better” than conventional vehicles for drivers’ health.

It found that concentration rather than intake is optimal for health comparison – because electricity generation typically occurs further from people than exhaust emissions meaning intake values are usually lower for electric vehicles than for conventional vehicles.

Among the findings were that electric vehicle emission factors vary based on the city they are in; and that PM2.5 emission factors are usually lower for conventional vehicles than they are for comparable electric vehicles.  It believes that compared to a new Euro IV petrol car, average electric car emission factors are around the same for CO2 and 19 times higher for PM2.5 – but e-bikes outperform cars, buses and motorcycles on most emission metrics.

The study concludes therefore, that replacing petrol cars with electric cars results in increased CO2 from combustion emissions and all-cause mortality risk from primary PM2.5.

According to a new study by the Centre for Transportation and Logistics, electric commercial vehicles could cost nine-12 per cent less to run than trucks powered by diesel when vehicle-to-grid revenue is accounted for.

The study looked at data collected by office supplier Staples and worked out the costs for 250 delivery trucks using pure electric engines; hybrid engines; and conventional diesel engines. It suggested the trucks would drive 70miles a day for 253 work days per year – with diesel costing $4 a gallon.

It found that trucks with internal combustion engines averaged 10.14miles a gallon; compared to 11.56miles per gallon for hybrids. The electric only trucks managed 0.8kilowatt-hours per mile.

However, the study went one step beyond most comparisons by looking at what would happen if the fleet of trucks were part of a vehicle-to-grid system. This would mean their batteries could be plugged into the grid for 12hours overnight, with truck owners paid by utility firms for the power services they would provide.

The study looked at several scenarios and found that businesses could earn $900-$1,400 per truck per year in current energy markets – this would represent a reduction of seven-11 per cent in operating costs.

As an added bonus, money would be saved on fuel and maintenance as electric trucks place less wear and tear on brakes. It would also drop operational costs per mile from 75 cents to 68 cents when the vehicle-to-grid electric trucks replace those with internal combustion engines.

London is a long way off its target of becoming the electric car capital of Europe, a new report from the London Assembly suggests.

Back in 2009, London Mayor Boris Johnson announced a target of getting 100,000 electric vehicles onto the streets of London as soon as possible as part of his plans to make the UK capital the leading city in Europe for EVs.

But according to Charging Ahead? report published today by the Assembly’s Environment Committee, there are just 2,313 electric vehicles in London today; representing just two per cent of the Mayor’s goal.

What’s more, there are around 400 charge points across London compared to a  recent target of 1300 expected to be installed by next year; which in itself is a target revised down from the original aim of 25,000 by 2015.

It is not just private businesses and individuals that are failing to take up electric cars as quickly as the Mayor expected, there are also fewer than 50 electric vehicles in the Greater London Authority’s (GLA) own fleet compared to the Mayor’s aim of 1000 by 2015.

With London’s promise to make the Olympic Games the greenest ever, the shortfall in EV numbers is likely to be a source of great embarrassment to Boris. The Committee is now calling on him to revise and clarify his targets and set out timescales for implementing charging infrastructure.

Murad Qureshi AM, Environment Committee Chair said: “Electric vehicles could help improve London’s air quality but only if there are enough of them and they are used over a long period of time.

“Currently progress is slow and we are concerned that it could take many years before we see any environmental benefits from the Mayor’s ambitious plans.”

Reports suggest that currently there are more electric vehicles per capita in Norway’s capital Oslo-not London- than any other capital in the world.

Spainhas been slow to embrace electric cars – but that may all change thanks to a new Smart Community System Demonstration Project, led by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Mitsubishi Corporation and Hitachi.

The project aims to demonstrate and verify various businesses that are needed to establish an electric vehicle transportation infrastructure inSpain. It will have a budget of around US$65.2million and will be conducted until March, 2016.

Currently around 40 per cent of Spain’s energy consumption comes from the transportation sector – with the bulk of its energy derived from fossil fuels. As such, Spain hopes to increase electric vehicle registrations to 250,000 by 2014.

Among its goals will be: to establish greater use of electric vehicles including high-speed electric vehicle chargers; develop a recharging business model; create a smart grid management system; and deploy information and communication technology platforms that will connect the infrastructure with power systems.

As part of the project, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries will supply the electric vehicle management centre with 200 electric vehicles, in-vehicle units and high-speed chargers. Hitachi meanwhile, will provide the demand-side management system; and Mitsubishi Corporation will offer a package of business elements and services to assist with global expansion.

Electric vehicles could soon become commonplace in the Colombian city of Bogota, after a project was introduced to spearhead an electric taxi fleet.

The project was put together by the Clinton Climate Initiative Cities programme, and its partner the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group. It has been born from Bogota’s role in the C40-CCI Electric Vehicle network of 15 global cities and the electric taxis are expected to be operational in the city within a few months.

Jay Carson, the CEO of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, commented that the electric taxi project is a significant achievement for Bogota. He believes it represents the city’s decisive action to implement new transport policies while addressing climate change.

Currently, the transportation sector is the largest source of CO2 emissions in Latin America and so it is hoped the Bogota electric taxi project will help to improve air quality and noise pollution. It is thought that by converting the taxi fleet to electric vehicle technology, operating costs and greenhouse gas emissions can be cut by 80 per cent and 70 per cent respectively.

The city of Bogota has agreed to support the project over a three-year period. It has also received support from electric car manufacturers such as BYD, with its e6 electric car, and Mitsubishi, with its i-MiEV electric car, both of which will be involved in the project.