Sales of conventional hybrids may be flat, but electrification is steadily creeping into ICE vehicles through the rear door, so to speak. Auto supply giant Bosch has developed a hybrid powertrain that it says costs just a fraction of today’s hybrid systems. “The boost recuperation system is the hybrid for everyone,” says Bosch Board Member… Read more »
Mitsubishi’s 2016 Outlander PHEV, due to go on sale in Europe in September, will make its European debut at the upcoming International Motor Show in Frankfurt. Also on display will be a Vehicle-to-Home (V2H) system that is now available in Europe. First launched in Japan in 2013, the Outlander PHEV is now sold in 48… Read more »
Oh the irony! Could something called the Hummer Tax Loophole end up supercharging sales of Tesla’s new Model X? Section 179 of the federal tax code allows taxpayers to immediately deduct the cost of certain assets, including “heavy vehicles and equipment,” instead of depreciating them over time. Electrek reports that this became known as the… Read more »
Daimler is accelerating into the electric future. Last year the company spent about half of its 5-billion-euro R&D budget on electrification and other emission-reducing technologies, and announced that it would introduce 10 new plug-ins by 2017. The Mercedes S550 Plug-In Hybrid, the group’s third model with a cord, went on sale in the US in… Read more »
San Francisco-based Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) probably has the most EVs in its service territory of any utility in the country – some 65,000, or 20 percent of the US total, according to a spokesman. The company wants to build an enormous deployment of 25,100 charging stations in northern and central California – the… Read more »
Well, that’s one way to get a charging network rolled out in a hurry. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has decreed that all gas stations must be equipped with public EV chargers by November 2016, the Moscow Times reported. Critics immediately pointed out the incongruity of such a sweeping measure in a country that is… Read more »
Efficient Drivetrains, Inc. (EDI) has partnered with Shaanxi Automotive to build a fleet of plug-in hybrid trucks to the Port of Shanghai. Shaanxi said it expects to provide up to 200 of the PHEVs in 2016. The two companies are already working together on plug-in natural gas hybrid city buses. Shaanxi built a prototype bus… Read more »
Chinese president Xi Jinping will be visiting the US next month, and Tesla, for one, thinks the Obama administration should talk to him about about making it easier for US automakers to do business in China. All the big global OEMs produce vehicles in China, mostly through joint ventures, as foreign carmakers are prohibited from… Read more »
There’s little good news for EV-lovers this month. August US plug-in sales of 8,972 were essentially unchanged from July, and were even further behind August 2014’s figure of 12,172. There were no major position changes – most of the leading models posted minor declines or increases. The bright spots at the moment are outside the… Read more »
Samsung SDI has unveiled several new types of Li-ion battery packs, including a 500 Wh e-bike pack that can deliver a range of 100 km. Another new battery pack for e-bikes is equipped with 21700-type batteries, which have higher energy capacity than previous cylindrical cells. Samsung hopes to make it the new standard in small cylindrical… Read more »
