The BBC covers an amusing competition of automobile efficiency:

Around midday the cars arrive at the Royal Automobile Club in London’s Pall Mall to have their energy consumption measured.

Many of the drivers are stunned to learn how little energy they have consumed.

Exact data that compares the participants’ performance will only be released by the organisers towards the end of this week, but it seems clear that few, if any, of the cars taking part have used more than a gallon of diesel, or equivalent amounts of electricity.

The fuel bill for the winner of the conventional combustion energy category, for instance – a BMW 320D – comes in at £3.66 – which seems good value given that it has carried four adults and TV equipment much of the way.

“An event like this is much more like the real world than the official tests the car manufacturers use,” says David Ward, director general of the FIA Foundation and BBC News’ fellow driver of the car, which consumed just three litres (about two-thirds of a gallon) of diesel to cover the distance.

That sounds to me like they used two-thirds of a gallon of diesel for four adults and equipment traveling about 100 miles…in a BMW.

W00t! Meanwhile in America…

Cadillac postpones using efficient diesel engines (even though it would be an easy conversion) while their gas-guzzling antiques (10 mpg!) somehow manage to find buyers

Cadillac continued to gain strength in the U.S. luxury auto market, posting a total of 12,620 sales in September. This is an 11 percent increase from a year ago, and the eighth consecutive month of year-over-year sales gains for the brand. For the third quarter of 2010, total sales were up 65 percent over 2009.

As a result, Cadillac continues to be the fastest-growing luxury brand in the U.S. Calendar year to date, Cadillac sales are up 44 percent and the brand has gained more than 2 percentage points of market share in the luxury segment.

Congrats to Cadillac on recovery and strong sales but is it really that much to ask for an engine with same or better performance but three times more efficiency and none of the pollution? Other companies can do it. What’s the hold-up?

The Dutch authorities have started a campaign with sniff cards to help find cannabis plantations

When scratched the card reveals its scent as well as a police number people can call if they suspect that a neighbour grows marijuana on a large scale.

The card also lists other indicators of urban cannabis cultivation, such as the buzzing sound of ventilators, suspicious connections to electricity supply points and curtains that are kept closed.

Citizens are told to fear the physical risks of cannabis farming and turn them in for purposes of public safety.

Dutch authorities say that the plantations are a hazard, claiming they can cause fires or accidents because of the cables and lamps needed to maintain a cultivation temperature of 27C [80F].

Authorities believe that there are 40,000 illegal cannabis plantations in the Netherlands hidden away in attics, apartments and warehouses.

Wow. 40,000 plantations? If they are going to call this a risky business, prone to fires or accidents, shouldn’t they also release the percentage of failures from bad plantations? I do not see any examples. Given 40,000 plantations running a risk level of X the police could also compare it to other agriculture with a risk level of Y…but something tells me they just want stated harm to be taken for granted and not debated.

The temperature of 80F, for example, is a point of data that can be verified easily.

A quick search finds that growers recommend 68F to 78F during the day and 53F to 63F at night. Still warm but far from any risk of fire. Those temperatures are close to residential norms.

It occurs to me that police are perhaps admitting they are not able to detect plantations. Drawn curtains are foiling their best high-tech helicopters and elite troops. Maybe a neighbor reporting a risk gives special legal authority to enter a home? They just have to convince the public of a problem worth solving.

Perhaps instead the police could lead a campaign on proper electrical wiring and lighting to prevent fire or accidents. That would not only reduce the risk for cannabis plantations (wrong problem solved?) but help out every other industry and home as well. They even could subsidize low-risk heating solutions like solar and radiant flooring. It might not be as amusing and creative as the sniff-tests, but probably would result in better overall results in terms of public safety.

Autoblog claims to have an inside scoop on some electric car development by VW and Audi. They call it “Inside Volkswagen’s electronic toy store”

Even more exciting than VW’s work with EVs is the research that it’s doing with autonomous cars, that is, driverless cars. After taking second place in DARPA’s Urban Challenge in 2007, the Stanford-VW team came up with the idea of racing an Audi TT up Pike’s Peak this year. Audi has kept the results of this effort hush-hush, but is going to make a public announcement any day now. Interestingly, the cost of the electronics in the DARPA car was around $250,000. But for the Pike’s Peak run the cost was slashed to somewhere between $25,000 and $50,000. That’s a rate of improvement that smashes through Moore’s Law!

I’m going to guess it was at the high end of that rather large price range but they must have picked the low end for a reason. Maybe it’s $25K without the automation? The automation angle is really cool, but I still would like to see a hybrid-diesel as it seems to have the most appropriate power-range metrics for American roads.

Photos are available too.

Mahindra once said they would deliver light diesel-powered pickup trucks to America at the end of 2009. Then they went silent. Now they have written to say the trucks may still come early next year if they can get through the EPA process, find enough parts, and have any left over from domestic sales. Why does this import/export situation seem backwards to me? It used to be Detroit telling the world they might have to wait:

While I cannot give you a firm answer on timing, I can tell you in my estimation, trucks will arrive in the spring of 2011.

Mahindra has applied for and received their EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) certificate, which means the vehicles have passed emission requirements. They also filed with (NHTSA) National Highway Safety Administration, which handles US standards for safety.

With these hurdles completed, it would seem production is imminent, but other factors may hinder the US launch. India’s car sales are on a dramatic trajectory upward. The sales pace combined with an industry wide parts shortage is impacting home market sales, which will have an affect on the United States introduction.

The truck specification sheet can be downloaded from the Mahindra site. The sheet boasts 236 ft/lb of torque while still getting “somewhere around 30 mpg”. This means payload capacity is not only higher than Chevy, Dodge, Ford, Nissan and Toyota but the engine will not struggle under load. A Ford Ranger, for example, puts out only 154 ft/lb torque in their most efficient engine.

So clearly it puts American small pickup trucks to shame on paper in terms of power and efficiency, and Mahindra is rated as one of the “Top 200 Forbes most reputable companies” but it is still up in the air if and when we will be able to test one. That is why for now I have to call it the Naan-Truck.

Update 2023: Oh, India, why must you be so plain awful?