Chevrolet Volt Charging Cable on 2040-parts.com

CAFE standards set to rise to 54.5 mpg for 2025

President Barack Obama on Friday revealed ambitious plans to raise the corporate average fuel economy standard for cars and light trucks to 54.5 mpg by the 2025 model year, a landmark move that will dramatically remake carmakers' product portfolios and consumers' buying habits. Unlike the first CAFE standards passed by Congress in 1975, the Detroit automakers now publicly support the high requirements and have begun retooling their fleets to adapt the changes. “[This] represents the single most important step we've ever taken as a nation to reduce our dependence on foreign oil,” Obama said in a morning press conference.

AW gets a long-term natural-gas Honda Civic

For all those wanting to save the universe, may we introduce the latest member of the AutoWeek green car fleet--a Honda Civic GX. The GX is a regular Civic in every respect but one--its 1.8-liter four-cylinder internal-combustion engine is powered solely by compressed natural gas. The main benefit of this is that it achieves as close to zero emissions as you can get in a mass-produced passenger car.

Ferrari F70: First Photo

We have what appears to be the first photo of the Enzo replacement - the Ferrari F70 – taken at a private viewing for Ferrari clients in China. Despite expectations that the new Ferrari F70 would be revealed before the end of 2012 – which is what Ferrari boss Luca di Montezemolo told us – we still haven’t had the reveal of the F70 in any form, and certainly not at the Los Angeles Auto show, where we expected Ferrari to debut their new hypercar as it’s the last motor show of note for 2012. It now looks like – short of a non-motor show reveal – that the new F70 will bow in at Detroit in January, but ahead of that it seems Ferrari are already showing the F70 to select clients.