Volkswagen has finalized the last of three settlements with the US Department of Justice, part of the German automaker’s penance for its evasion of emissions regulations. Almost $3 billion of the settlement funds is being directed to the Environmental Mitigation Trust, which will fund state-level clean transportation grant programs. States are now in control of… Read more »
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Trump budget eliminates federal clean car research programs
In some areas, the Trump administration may seem aimless and disorganized, but when it comes to environmental and energy policy, it is moving with brutal efficiency to terminate America’s transition to renewable energy and electrified transport. The president’s budget request for fiscal year 2019 decimates EPA and DOE programs that drive advanced vehicle manufacturing. It… Read more »
Groupe Renault joins consortium to deploy fast charging infrastructure in southern Europe
Groupe Renault has partnered with the E-VIA FLEX-E charging network, which will deploy 14 fast charging stations in Italy, France and Spain by the end of 2018. The new charging stations will be located along motorways and expressways, and will offer capacities of 150 to 350 kW. The E-VIA FLEX-E network is part of the… Read more »
Vehicle-to-grid project reveals challenges of the early days
Los Angeles Air Force Base became the first federal facility to replace its entire general-purpose fleet with plug-in vehicles in a two-year V2G research project Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) is a technical and policy-based effort to optimize the way EVs interact with the electrical grid. V2G developers view EVs as “resources” within an electrical network. In V2G… Read more »
2018 smart fortwo loses its top – and its gas engine
The smart isn’t for everyone, and it has never pretended to be. The media buzz these days centers around the trendy trio – Model 3, the Bolt and the new LEAF, each of which aspires to be “your affordable, every-day, one-and-only car,” as Motor Trend recently put it. The smart does not aspire to any… Read more »
Ionic Materials emerges as a leader in solid-state batteries by focusing on polymer science
Mike Zimmerman, CEO and founder of Ionic Materials, has this to say about his company: “Ionic will play a major role in the solution to the world’s energy problems.” That’s a pretty bold statement. But then again, Mike Zimmerman is a pretty bold man. An experienced polymer scientist, Zimmerman has worked on a number of… Read more »
Chinese battery giant CATL aims to enter US market
Contemporary Amperex Technology Limited (CATL) is hardly a household name to US EV advocates, but that could change if the company’s plans come to fruition. CATL, which was profiled last week by Bloomberg, was founded in 2011 and now sells more cells to EV-makers in China than any other firm. CATL hopes to raise $2… Read more »
New study finds consumers are behind the curve on EVs
Automakers and policymakers around the world are preparing for the transition to EVs. Toyota, Volvo, VW, BMW, Mercedes and other brands are setting ambitious sales goals and investing substantial sums. Norway, the Netherlands, France, the UK and China are talking about phasing out sales of legacy ICE vehicles. There’s just one key group of stakeholders… Read more »
Scania and Northvolt partner to develop batteries for heavy vehicles
Scania, a member of the Volkswagen Group, and Northvolt, a 2016 startup that is building what it calls a European gigafactory for Li-ion batteries (with a planned 32 GWh annual capacity), have agreed to work together to develop and commercialize battery cell technology for heavy commercial vehicles. Scania will invest €10 million ($12.5 million) in… Read more »
Recycling worn cathodes to make new batteries
As lithium-ion batteries proliferate, the question of what to do with them when they wear out is becoming a major environmental concern. Less than five percent of used batteries are recycled today. Nanoengineers at the University of California San Diego have developed an energy-efficient recycling process that restores used cathodes from spent batteries and makes… Read more »