As we’ve talked about on these pages before, the battle for the hearts and minds of the next generation of car purchasers is starting. By the end of the year many major auto manufacturers will have some kind of electric vehicle for sale on the mass market and by 2014, nearly all major manufacturers have plans to introduce at least one electric car.

In these early stages, carmakers have chosen several different paths, some opting to go for the cars powered solely by batteries (Battery Electric Vehicles or BEVs) such as the Nissan LEAF, some for the plug-in hybrids (PHEVs; like a Prius with a bigger battery), and some for the extended range electric vehicles (EREVs with small generators on board to charge the batteries) such as the Chevy Volt.

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How many times must a man retire before he is truly and totally done?

For Bob Lutz—the man most recently known for his leadership on bringing the Chevy Volt to market—the magic number may be “two.” Today he announced he was retiring. Again. A year ago he announced his places to retire as GM’s Vice Chairman of Global Product Development on April 1st, 2009, and stay on as an advisor. Then in July Lutz came back to GM again. Is it for real this time?

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div class=fullWidthFigure
img src=/files/lutz-converj-610.jpg alt=Bob Lutz in the Cadillac Converj title=Bob Lutz in the Cadillac Converj /
p class=captionGM’s Bob Lutz sits in the Cadillac Converj. Lutz said, “The Cadillac Converj is cleared for production,” at this year’s Detroit auto show. But according to reports, the vehicle has been canceled./p
/div

p class=introductiona href=http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-01/gm-said-to-drop-volt-based-cadillac-to-focus-on-plug-in-hybrids.html target=blankBloomberg/a is reporting that General Motors stopped work on the a href=/vehicle/cadillac-converj.htmlCadillac Converj/a, a sleek electric-drive coupe, to focus on cheaper plug-in hybrids for its luxury brand. The report is based on comments from two GM executives who asked not to be identified because the details aren’t public./p

pThe decision, if verified by GM, represents an acknowledgement of the high cost of producing plug-in hybrids that run without using any gasoline for long distances—rather than the type of plug-in hybrids that can use smaller and therefore less expensive battery packs. The Cadillac Converj was intended to follow the design of the a href=/vehicle/chevy-volt.htmlChevy Volt/a—referred to as an extended-range electric vehicle or plug-in series hybrid—which runs up to 40 miles before the gas engine is used to maintain the vehicle’s range./p

p“The future lies in plug-in hybrids with smaller electric range,” said Eric Noble, president of CarLab, an Orange, California-based automotive consultant, told Bloomberg. Dropping the Converj is “a tacit admission from GM that they over-batteried the Volt.”/p

h2Right-Sizing Plug-in Hybrid Batteries/h2

pThe three major categories of electric-drive vehicles are conventional hybrids, plug-in hybrids, and pure electric cars. Conventional hybrids, like the Toyota Prius, will continue to use relatively small battery packs—while pure electric cars require much larger batteries in order to deliver approximately 100 miles of range between charges./ppa href=http://www.hybridcars.com/news/report-gm-drops-cadillac-converj-focus-cheaper-plug-hybrids-27366.htmlread more/a/p