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These cars are headed to the Great Crusher In The Sky

It happens every year. We bid adieu to some cars and trucks that will be missed, and say good riddance to others wondering how they stayed around so long. Whether they're being killed off for slow sales or due to a new product coming along to replace them, the list of vehicles being discontinued after 2012 is surprisingly long and diverse.
CNN Money has compiled a list of departing vehicles, to which we've added a few more of our own. In the slow sales column, cars like the Lexus HS 250h, Mercedes-Benz R-Class and the full Maybach lineup appear, while the Ford Escape Hybrid, Mazda CX-7 and Hyundai Veracruz are all having their gaps filled with more modern and more fuel-efficient alternatives. Obvious exceptions to the rule include models that still sell in decent numbers like the Jeep Liberty and the Chrysler Town & Country (which will eventually be replaced by a crossover-like vehicle).
Check out our gallery of discontinued cars above, then scroll down for more information.

Volvo's plan for China: sell them on the clean air inside the car

Large Chinese cities aren't known for having clean air. Just this week, the Chinese city of Harbin filled with record levels of smog after starting the city's coal-fired heating system, according to CNN. But Li Shufu, the chairman of Geely, Volvo's parent company, says the automaker's astute attention to cabin comfort in areas such as air filtration is a selling point for the Swedish automaker in China, Forbes reports.
Shufu says when he is inside a Volvo, he feels like he's in Northern Europe, but when the door is opened, he feels like he's in Beijing. The chairman made the remarks at the fourth annual Global Auto Forum (GAF) in China (which also happened to be attended by Alan Mulally, CEO of Ford, which was Volvo's owner until 2010), where he emphasized Geely's hands-off approach to managing Volvo, saying, "Geely and Volvo are brothers, not father and son."
While good filtration contributes to cabin comfort, the way we see it, Shufu also is allowing Volvo to play to its most well-known strength: safety. Smog protection via air filtration might not seem like the most important safety feature for a car in the US (unless you live in Los Angeles), but when you consider that Harbin's level of fine particles was up to 30 times higher than the World Health Organization's recommended standard on Tuesday, we'd think twice about that. Fine particles, which are 2.5 micrometers in diameter or less, are considered to be the most harmful to health.

Daimler, Geely mull China as production hub for hybrid powertrains

FRANKFURT — Daimler and Geely on Friday said China could emerge as a manufacturing and export hub for hybrid powertrains jointly developed for Volvo and Mercedes-Benz cars. Earlier this week, Daimler said it would cooperate with China's Geely to build next-generation combustion engines for use in hybrid vehicles. The engines will be produced in China as well as in Europe, and Geely and Daimler will cooperate in engineering, sourcing and production, the companies said in a joint press release. "The export of the engine from China is considered to be an option," the release further said. Mercedes-Benz aims for more than half of its passenger car sales to be comprised of plug-in hybrids or purely electric vehicles by 2030. Geely is ChinaÂ’s most internationally known automaker. It owns Volvo Cars and Lotus, almost half of Proton and 9.7% of Daimler. Through wholly owned company Polestar, it builds low-volume Polestar 1 hybrid performance cars in the western city of Chengdu and Polestar 2 volume sedans in Taizhou in the east. "The companies plan to develop a highly efficient modular engine," a spokesman for Daimler said, adding that it would be used in hybrid drivetrains and manufactured in Europe and China. The modular engine will be used in cars under different marques at Geely and Daimler, a person familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity as the companies are still in the early stages of developing the engine. An Conghui, President of Geely Holding Group, President and CEO of Geely Auto Group said: “This project reflects the need for economies of scale and targeted research and development investment in clean and highly efficient powertrains and hybrid drive systems and their applications." Geely also plans to build a plant with annual manufacturing capacity of 30,000 premium EVs in the western city of Chongqing, run by a wholly owned, newly registered company, according to documents on its website. Geely and Polestar declined to comment. The plan comes as foreign automakers including BMW AG and Tesla expand EV production in the worldÂ’s biggest market, sourcing major EV components such as batteries locally and often even exporting a portion of the vehicles it builds.   Auto News Earnings/Financials Green Plants/Manufacturing Mercedes-Benz Volvo Green Automakers Future Vehicles Hybrid