GM Partners to Produce Plug-in Hybrid Van
It's taken a stake in start-up Bright Automotive
Kevin Bullis 08/03/2010
- 3 Comments
General Motors is getting into the extremely fuel-efficient delivery van business with an investment in the startup Bright Automotive, it announced today. It's buying a minority stake in the start-up, which is developing a plug-in hybrid van aimed at fleet customers. The van can travel 38 miles on battery power alone, or it can act as a hybrid, combining gas and electric power to get 36 miles per gallon.
The vehicle seems to be a challenge to Ford's successful Transit Connect, a conventional gas or diesel powered delivery van that will be offered as an electric vehicle later this year. GM says that the Bright van has the advantage of having a longer range than the Ford electric vehicle, which can only go 80 miles on a charge. The Bright van has a range of about 400 miles when using both electric and gas power.
The Bright van also has an unusual hybrid arrangement. The front wheels will be powered by a gas engine (the engine and transmission will come from GM) and the rear wheels will be powered by an electric motor. Bright has developed control systems that coordinated between them.
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tssstein
4 Comments
Electric Van
Government Motors will never be around to take advantage of such weak technology. Only if the electric motors were built into the wheels and the chasis was layered to form multiple battery cells in composit, supported by and with alcohol generating turbine, could the company survive to produce an Electric van. GM doesn't have the Vision, mission, purpose, scientific capability and innovative and change-management oriented leadership to take advantage of such a need. GM has become a hybrid government committee driven by union owners and overseen through sterile Ivy League technocrats with little of no experience. This is a sinking ship being led by rabid idiologically dead rats.
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