Good green news coming from GM today: After more than 1 million miles and 4 million hours of testing, the company is so confident in the forthcoming Chevrolet Volt's lithium-ion battery that it has decided to offer an extraordinary 8-year standard warranty on the battery.

According to a release from GM, the warranty will cover "all 161 battery components, 95 percent of which are designed and engineered by GM, in addition to the thermal management system, charging system and electric drive components."

"The Chevrolet Volt's batteries have exceeded our performance targets and are ready to hit the road," Micky Bly, GM's executive director of global electrical systems said in a statement.

Because the battery can be warmed or cooled, the Volt will be the first electric vehicle that will be able to operate under a full range of climate conditions. The battery's management system monitors it constantly—500 diagnostics, at over 10 times per second—to ensure optimum performance. And its energy management system keeps the battery from fully charging or running down, thus extending its life.

GM recently announced that the Volt will be available this fall in Austin, Texas; New York City; New Jersey; and Connecticut. It was already slated to appear in California, Washington, D.C., and Michigan.