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Green cars did well in Kiplinger's annual rankings (most recent one in 65 years) "One thing we saw a lot of this year, the vehicles that were green … hybrids, diesels, did well in the rankings," said Jessica L. Anderson, an associate editor at Kiplinger's. Kiplinger's tested nearly 1,300 vehicles beginning in October.

Only about 40% of the people who plunked down a $99 deposit to reserve a space in the Leaf queue are actually following up and placing orders with their local Nissan dealers. Not bad - industry watchers says that a 40% fulfillment rate is about right when there is no penalty for canceling a reservation - but it means Nissan likely will build and sell fewer than 10,000 Leafs in the first wave of U.S. sales.

Ford Motor Co. released a three-minute educational video highlighting the company's family of electric-drive vehicles and explaining the differences between hybrid, plug-in-hybrid and battery-electric automobiles. The video does a good job of explaining the differences between Ford's Focus Electric 5-door hatchback, C-Max Hybrid compact MPV, Fusion Hybrid gasoline-electric 4-door sedan, Transit Connect Electric van, and C-Max Energi Plug-in Hybrid 5-passenger compact MPV

Future versions of the Chevy Volt will be outfitted with the new OnStar feature that allows drivers the ability to continually manage their energy usage. Available to owners that opt in is access to current time of use rates that get downloaded into the vehicle's computer. This lets the driver make an informed, possibly money saving, decision when scheduling the Volt's charging time.

Things are stretching out even more for the CODA sedan - it will be rolling off manufacturing lines in Q2 2011, a year later than originally planned. If you're in a small start-up electric car company, I'm sure that CODA's backsliding would make you nervous. There are two aspects of the situation that stand out:

1. The price is fairly high - about $44,000 retail versus a bit under $33,000 for the Nissan Leaf and Wheego LiFE. Why would you paying $11,000 more for a brand new car from a brand new company when you have no idea what the resale value will be, quality and reliability, etc.

2. The production is dragged out and questionable. It's typical for a new car to take about three years from concept design to showroom floor traffic, and sometimes even longer - the Japanese makers have been known for keeping it tight and the Detroit 3 have dragged it out in past years. Still when the product launch is announced, then delayed, then delayed again, it ain't lookin' good.

The CODA Sedan will be selling for $44,900 or $37,400 after federal tax credits. Consumers can reserve a CODA with a fully-refundable $499 deposit at www.codaautomotive.com. The first deliveries will begin at the end of 2010. The pure electric sedan will be able to go 100 to 120 miles on one charge of its lithium ion batteries. It will cost a bit more than $10,000 over the price of the Nissan LEAF, a competitive all electric sedan. The start-up company CODA Automotive will not be working through dealerships - it's starting with an online ordering system. Perhaps it will work with a limited audience.

In other alt car news...

Honda confirmed that its natural gas Civic GX model would still be offered when the next-generation Civic debuts for the 2012 year. The company is considering doubling sales of the CNG Civic in the next two-to-three years. However, that doesn't mean very much. Last year, about 2,000 were sold, so this means 4,000 could be the goal. That's more then test runs for concept cars, but way off from mass market. It's the only one like it out there in the retail market. A lot of fleet managers are true believers in natural gas conversions of their trucks, vans, and buses. They have a lot of positive results to share on the subject.