Portland, Oregon is proud of its reputation as a charged city – it’s home to about 4,000 EV drivers. Four years ago, the city designated a downtown block as an EV zone called Electric Avenue, complete with a number of public charging stations. It soon became a popular place for EVSE makers to test new… Read more »
EVs require far less maintenance than legacy vehicles, and some have predicted the demise of the friendly neighborhood repair shop. However, an increasing number of independent workshops are carrying out routine servicing and repairs on hybrids and plug-ins, according to Autodata. Autodata supplies technical information to the automotive aftermarket, and over the last quarter, it… Read more »
A coalition of European manufacturers and research institutes has launched ALISE (Advanced Lithium Sulfur battery for EVs), a collaborative effort to develop and commercialize lithium-sulfur technology. The objective of the 7-million-Euro ($7.6 million) project is to achieve a stable 500 Wh/kg Li-S cell by 2019. The final deliverable of the ALISE project will be a… Read more »
Piece by piece, EVSE is spreading across Europe. Little Luxembourg is the latest country to establish a charging network, announcing that up to 850 public charging stations will be installed over the next five years. Details of where the chargers will be located and how they will be operated and maintained remain to be worked… Read more »
As more automakers turn to aluminum to reduce the weight of their vehicles, Novelis, one of the world’s largest suppliers of aluminum sheet, has announced the development of the Advanz 7000-series of high-strength alloys designed for safety-critical auto components. According to Novelis, 7000-series products are two to three times stronger than currently-used automotive aluminum, and… Read more »
Japanese giant Panasonic is by far the largest automotive batter supplier at the moment, with a 39% market share. According to a new report from Lux Research, it will probably hang onto that position, increasing its share to 51% as EV batteries grow to a $30-billion market by 2020. However, there’s a real possibility that… Read more »
Iconic British sports car builder Aston Martin plans to produce an electric version of its four-door Rapide within two years, CEO Andy Palmer told Automotive News. The electric motorcar will feature all-wheel drive, about 800 hp and a 200-mile range, said Palmer. The announcement comes as no great surprise. In his previous role as Chief… Read more »
DriveNow, a joint car-sharing venture of BMW and Sixt, which operates in several German cities, as well as London and San Francisco, is adding 400 BMW i3s to its fleet in Copenhagen. DriveNow allows users to reserve vehicles via a smartphone app, and return them anywhere within its service area. It is closely coordinated with… Read more »
Roland is one of the world’s best-known builders of electronic musical instruments – its synthesizers, which are played by Herbie Hancock, George Duke and hundreds of other virtuoso musicians, can recreate any sound audible to the human ear. So when Japanese startup automaker GLM, which builds an electric version of the Tommykaira ZZ racing car,… Read more »
Airports around the world are installing EVSE, and at least one has decided that Level 1 charging is the most logical choice. Portland International Airport (PDX) has installed 42 Level 1 PowerPost EV charging stations, manufactured by Telefonix (profiled in the February 2014 issue of Charged). PDX chose the PowerPost because of its integrated, retractable… Read more »
