GM's Smoke and Mirrors on the Volt. Posted by Biodiversivist, Gristmill, September 22, 2008. "For those of you who missed it, GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz hit the talk show circuit last week to talk up the latest incarnation of the Chevy Volt (more on his boneheaded climate change comments here and here). The marketing goal is to create the public perception that the Volt is an electric car (get it, volt?)... [but] the Volt will not be an electric car. It will be a hybrid, specifically a plug-in hybrid. As with all other plug-in hybrids, it will have extra batteries that can accept a charge from the grid that will propel it without using the gasoline engine for some distance dictated by battery size and driving conditions. But once that charge is used up, it will drop into hybrid mode and stay there until you can plug it in again. The public doesn't -- and if GM is successful, probably never will -- understand that the Volt is just a plug-in hybrid. It will not fully recharge its batteries using the gasoline engine. An attempt to do that would wreck its gas mileage. My beef here is that GM is using smoke and mirrors to convince the public that the Volt is a revolutionary new car when it really isn't."
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