Green Car of the Year goes to Chevrolet Volt

The Chevrolet Volt has become the first electric vehicle to win the Green Car Journal’s Green Car of the Year. The electric car with extended-range capability was announced as the winner of the award at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

“This has been a long time coming,” said Ron Cogan, editor and publisher of Green Car Journal and editor of GreenCar.com.  “The electric vehicles that were test marketed in the 1990s tantalized us, but were without a solid business case.  What a difference a decade makes.” 

The Volt has a range from 25 to 50 miles purely on electricity on a single charge. When the battery is running out of power a .4-liter gasoline engine/generator seamlessly engages to create electricity to drive the wheels for an additional 300 miles on a full tank of gas. Thanks to it the Volt is able to fight the range anxiety concerns associated with battery-only electric vehicles.

"The Green Car of the Year® award validates the Chevrolet team's promise to deliver a practical electric vehicle," said Joel Ewanick, General Motors vice president, U.S. Marketing, who drove a Volt 2,394 miles from Detroit to the Los Angeles International Auto Show, where he accepted the award Thursday. "The Volt's a transformational technology that will lead our industry into a new age of vehicle electrification."

For the Green Car of the Year, the Chevrolet Volt was competing with the Ford Fiesta, Hyundai Sonata Hybrid, Lincoln MKZ Hybrid, and Nissan LEAF. The Volt was chosen by a jury formed by six environmental and automotive experts along with Green Car Journal editors.

Other prizes

This week the Chevrolet Volt had already received two other prizes, including AUTOMOBILE Magazine 2011 Automobile of the Year and 2011 Motor Trend Car of the Year.

Motor Trend editors wrote for the January 2011 issue that “We expected a science experiment, but this is a moon shot. The Volt delivers on the promise of the vehicle concept as originally outlined by GM, combining the smooth, silent, efficient, low-emissions capability of an electric motor with the range and flexibility of an internal combustion engine. It is a fully functional, no-compromise compact automobile that offers consumers real benefits in terms of lower running costs.”

As for the editors of AUTOMOBILE Magazine they state that the Volt “is the most sophisticated, most important vehicle on the road today. It won’t just change what we drive, but also how we drive. Owners will plug in at night, heat or cool their cabin before they leave the garage, and adopt new driving styles to maximize their electric range. Then, when the battery is depleted, they’ll mindlessly motor on; free of the limitations that accompanies pure electric vehicles.”