For those two reasons, the EV-1 project was cancelled, and when better battery technology DID finally become available, the Volt was built as an extended range car, with an on-board generator so that you will NOT get stranded like someone driving a Nissan Leaf.

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GM's vice president for research and development, Lawrence Burns, says consumers have to start thinking of their car as a power-supplying appliance as well as a means of transportation. (A hybrid car, for example, might be an alternative to an emergency generator during an ice storm.) Meanwhile, GM is endorsing Huber's thinking with plans to introduce plug-in versions of the Chevrolet Volt and a Saturn vue crossover by 2010.

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Fisker, electric with a small gasoline-engine generator, had effectively addressed only a sliver of the potential market for his magnificent car.

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Rob Peterson and Britta Gross of GM, both integral to the Volt program, dare me to guess when the car switches from battery-only to using the gas engine as a generator, and I totally miss it.

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But the engine powers a generator that creates electricity that turns the wheels, so it's an e-car in its way.

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The gasoline engine only turns a generator, which charges the battery and sends electricity to two electric traction motors that drive the car.

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In the vast factory complex, the only sign of life is the hum of a petrol generator as crews work on the abandoned interior - the empty spaces of the fenced-off car park testament to the thousands who would at one time have worked there.

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