KEY POINTS:
Holden launched its new Commodore station wagon 48 hours ago on roads between Adelaide and the wine-growing Barossa Valley. Called the Sportwagon, it is smaller, with less room in the rear, than the outgoing model. That's because it is built on the VE sedan chassis _ all Holden
wagons since the 1971 HQ have been based on long-wheelbase Statesman/Caprice platforms. The new model has also been designed to be re-engineered for left-hand-drive markets, where carry-alls are compact and sportier. The Sportwagon gets conventional V6 and V8 petrol engines, although a dedicated LPG-powered V6 is touted for next year.
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Toyota plans to install solar panels on some of its next-generation Prius hybrids, says a report from Japan. The panels, supplied by Japanese company Kyocera, would be able to help power the air-conditioning on premium versions of the petrol-electric sedan. The new Prius is expected to be unveiled at the Detroit motor show in January. Kentaro Endo, a director at Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry who specialises in renewable energy, said the application of solar energy was severely limited in vehicles. "Even if you laid solar panels out on the entire roof of a house, you only generate enough energy to run two hair dryers," he said.
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Renault will introduce stop-start technology in all of its European models between 2009 and 2010. Until now, the carmaker has been unenthusiastic about the fuel-saving technology. But higher fuel prices and new taxes on gas-guzzling cars in many European countries have changed Renault's strategy. "Rising fuel costs and new environmental taxes will help us introduce technologies like stop-start that our customers were previously not willing to invest in," said Renault's environment director, Alice de Brauer.
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Paul Blumberg, Professor of Sociology at the City University of New York, was stirred by a story in the US that said Hummer dealers were asking General Motors for a petrol-electric hybrid version to help flagging sales of the gas-guzzling truck. In a letter to the editor, Blumberg writes: "A hybrid Hummer? Isn't that a contradiction in terms? The whole idea of the Hummer in the first place was, in that delightful phrase, conspicuous waste. If General Motors [produces] a hybrid Hummer, I [want] a fat-free pizza and an inexpensive Rolex."
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Automotive industry research company J. D. Power and Associates is telling advertisers with big budgets in the US to move away from television because digital technology allows new-car buyers to fast-forward commercials. Instead, it says, car companies should use online TV to reach buyers. It says in a study that 68 per cent of new-car buyers use the internet to find TV information. "Those numbers are higher for luxury-car buyers _ 79 per cent of buyers of mid-sized luxury vehicles accessed TV content on the web."
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The US Government has given a bus company that shuttles gamblers from Colorado Springs to nearby mountain-town casinos US$382,000 ($505,574) for "anti-terrorism" training. It comes from the Homeland Security fund set up after 9/11 and will be used for "vehicle security, GPS systems, and training drivers to be aware of their surroundings, of what's unusual and the people on board," says the Colorado Springs Gazette.
alastair.sloane@nzherald.co.nz
