It’s generally expected that autonomous vehicles will prove to be safer than those driven by fallible humans, but hard figures will be needed to convince regulators and a skeptical public. During a talk in Norway, Elon Musk said that Tesla is beginning to amass some statistics on the safety of its Autopilot-equipped vehicles. “The probability… Read more »
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Companies scramble to secure lithium supplies as “white petroleum” prices soar
The hottest commodity on the planet right now is not oil or coffee but lithium, according to a recent article on OilPrice.com. The ballooning battery market is expected to drive demand for the light white metal, and mining companies, battery producers and automakers are scrambling to secure supplies. Goldman Sachs predicts that for every 1%… Read more »
A dealership perspective: How we can sell millions of EVs
Sales of EVs and PHEVs are growing at what seems like an impressive pace, but are still tiny in relation to the larger auto market. Total new vehicle sales reached an all-time high of over 17 million in 2015, but plug-in sales just cracked the one-percent mark in Europe, and are still well under one… Read more »
Ford has no plans for a 200-mile EV
At a Ford conference about a year ago, Charged asked CEO Mark Fields (and every other exec we could buttonhole) if the company had any plans for an answer to the 200-mile Bolt that GM had just announced. His coy answer of “nothing we can talk about” led willing minds to believe that there was… Read more »
Electric torque vectoring: A motor for each wheel or a single-motor-clutch system?
In February, engineering firm GKN Automotive announced a new torque-vectoring option for electric drive called eTwinster. Torque vectoring technology is generally defined as a vehicle’s ability to vary the power to each wheel. To quickly control the torque applied to the wheels independent of one another – increasing stability, responsiveness and agility – GKN’s new… Read more »
Wrightspeed to provide its turbine-based PHEV powertrain to New Zealand bus operator
Ian Wright was a co-founder of Tesla, but he soon left to start his own company, partly because he felt that large commercial vehicles represented a better target for electrification than passenger cars (read more about Wright’s electrifying adventures in the April 2014 issue of Charged, and in the book Tesla Motors). Since then, Wrightspeed’s… Read more »
Will Model 3 owners have unlimited free access to the Supercharger network?
Tesla’s Supercharger network is one of the brand’s greatest assets – a valuable benefit for customers and a strong selling point against the (so far, mostly theoretical) competition. Since the Model 3 hit the stage, one of the hottest questions has been, will 3 buyers get the same free Supercharging privileges that S and X… Read more »
Chinese researchers develop aluminum-graphite dual-ion battery
A team from the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has developed a novel, environmentally friendly low-cost battery. In “A Novel Aluminum-Graphite Dual-Ion Battery,” published in Advanced Energy Materials, Yongbing Tang and colleagues present a new aluminum-graphite dual-ion battery (AGDIB) that they say offers higher energy density than conventional LIBs, as… Read more »
Will federal tax credits still be around by the time you get your Model 3?
(Updated 4/5/16 11:00am EST to include link to IRS code and information suggesting how Tesla could maximize available tax credits.) Tesla’s mission has always been to bring EVs to the mass market, and the culmination of the company’s grand strategy is the Model 3, unveiled last week at a price of $35,000. Auto market analysts tell… Read more »
GM names LG Chem Supplier of the Year
GM has honored Li-ion battery maker LG Chem by naming it a GM Supplier of the Year at an awards ceremony in Detroit. LG Chem was one of only 110 of GM’s suppliers to receive this exclusive award, which it has now won for six consecutive years. There’s no question that LG Chem is an… Read more »