Due to a wildly cooperative joint venture between German carmakers and the Ford Motor Company, owning an electric vehicle in Europe will soon become far more practical.
Daimler AG, BMW, Ford, and Volkswagen Group intend to establish a continent-wide network of ultra-fast 350 kW capacity charging sites that will begin juicing up vehicles as early as next year. Read More >
Jaguar Land Rover’s technical design director Wolfgang Ziebart is decidedly not a proponent of hydrogen-fueled vehicles.
Due to the amount of energy required to produce, cool, and then compress hydrogen for transportation and subsequent usage within a fuel cell vehicle, Ziebart is highly critical of its role as a practical automotive energy source.
Still, a minority of automakers disagree. Read More >
Volkswagen will no longer bring diesel-powered vehicles into the United States, ending speculation that the company may have simply placed the technology on hiatus while the emissions-cheating snafu remained fresh in American minds. Read More >
It sounds like a car guy’s fantasy, using beer to power a car.
And it still is fantasy, unfortunately.
However, a couple of researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder have filed for a patent on a method to use the byproduct of the brewing process to create anodes for lithium-ion batteries, the power source for most electric cars. Read More >
Millennials, the constantly-stereotyped cohort of young adults who won’t watch a black and white movie but still like cars, are every automaker’s go-to crowd for future sales.
Hyundai has announced a plan to tap these would-be car buyers in a way that drills into the very core of what they desire in vehicle ownership (or so studies show). Think of it as the Netflix approach to sales. Read More >
That small-volume, regional roll-out of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles? Yeah, it’s just not doing it for Toyota. The automaker has let development of a fully-electric electric vehicle slide, and now it’s time to play catch-up.
But, rather than saddle the development of a non-hydrogen, non-hybrid green vehicle with the weight of a huge corporate bureaucracy, Toyota has chosen a different route in getting that all-important model to market.
Read More >
Politicians walk back policy promises as frequently as Ram announces special edition 1500s, so it’s not unwise to take campaign pronouncements with a big grain of salt.
Environmentalists and those close to the electric car sphere aren’t happy right now, as Donald Trump’s ascendancy to the Oval Office could put the kibosh on green ambitions. There’s talk of a rollback of fuel economy targets, of California no longer being allowed to be “special” (at least, when it comes to auto industry regulation) — basically, the sky could be falling, but they aren’t sure if it is yet.
Let’s take that frenzied speculation to its natural conclusion. Say the sky falls, environmental regulations are left gutted like tuna on a wharf, and the government incentives to buy an electric vehicle dry up.
Can EVs stand on their own? Read More >
Faraday Future has stopped construction on its billion-dollar electric vehicle factory in North Las Vegas. This is another blow against a company with intentionally foggy structuring, mysterious revenue sourcing, and an financially overburdened parent company.
There’s something about billions of dollars in investment and carefully planned long-term product strategies that make it hard for an automaker to turn on a dime in the face of a threat.
Ford Motor Company CEO Mark Fields says his company has no plans to reverse course on its goal of boosting production of cars and components in Mexico, even after President-elect Trump’s promise of a 35-percent tariff on vehicles crossing the Rio Grande.
It’s a game of chicken Ford intents to win. Read More >
The U.S. Transportation Department has finalized rules that will require electric vehicles and hybrids to emit “alert sounds” at speeds below 18.6 miles per hour, to warn cyclists, pedestrians, and the blind of the approaching danger.
By adding noise to silent-running vehicles, the NHTSA and DOT hope to reduce the number of people currently being run over by EVs. Is this a big problem, you ask? Apparently it is — the regulator claims EVs are 19 percent more likely to strike human flesh.
Jaguar has pulled the wraps off its I-Pace Concept SUV ahead of the Los Angeles Auto Show, but this prototype isn’t just a one-off piece of vaporware, never to be seen again.
The automaker’s first electric vehicle is a go, and is expected to hit the road in 2018 to challenge Tesla’s Model X in the fledgling premium electric SUV segment. Read More >
The fully electric version of Hyundai’s Ioniq hasn’t even hit dealer lots yet and the automaker is already claiming its 124-mile range isn’t enough. Read More >
With lengthy repair times, parts shortages, and colossal distances between locations, Tesla is having real difficulties effectively servicing its current customer base as complaints begin to mount.
While certainly unfortunate news, this will be nothing compared to what it will face when the upcoming Model 3 starts needing the EV equivalent of an oil change.
Jia Yueting, head of China’s LeEco, is finally copping to claims that there was insufficient money to support the company’s wild expanse into new territories.
This is particularly bad news for the moderately sketchy American automotive startup Faraday Future, which is strategically partnered with LeEco and is quite possibly doomed if its parent doesn’t shape up.
Tesla’s free Supercharger network was one of the best parts of being a Tesla owner. Free electricity and the lofty social status that comes with EV ownership? What’s not to like? Well, the the company just announced it’s about to make a “change to the economics of Supercharging.”
After issuing emails urging customers to stop hogging the network last year, Tesla has decided only to allow certain early adopters to make use of the fast-juicing power grid free of charge. Meanwhile, all customers purchasing vehicles after January 2017 will have to pay up.
Recent Comments