Q&A with Alex Urist, Vice President of XCharge North America Battery storage, once considered a nifty additional feature for large-scale charging infrastructure projects, is steadily becoming de rigueur for public and commercial charging deployments of all sizes. Adding batteries to the system offers several benefits: coupled with on-site generation, it allows charging to be offered… Read more »
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Winners and losers from GM’s rollback of its EV plans
When GM agreed to unionize its EV battery plants, we applauded the move, believing that the destructive UAW strike would end with the US Big Three legacy automakers and their unions beginning to come to terms with the EV future. We were wrong. As of this writing, the UAW has reached a tentative agreement with… Read more »
An inside look at how utilities view EVs: expanding electricity sales without adding new customers
Q&A with the Orlando Utilities Commission’s Peter Westlake. Anyone who would deploy any kind of large-scale EV charging project needs to work closely (and early) with their local electrical utility. This can be a complex undertaking, especially for companies that work in different regions, as there are around 1,600 utilities in the US, subject to… Read more »
Clearing the roadblocks to electrification of heavy-duty trucks
Q&A with electric truck expert Rustam Kocher Medium- and heavy-duty vehicles make up a small fraction of the vehicles on the road, but they generate a disproportionate amount of pollution. Therefore, electrifying them is critical to reducing emissions. Furthermore, the case for electric trucks and buses would seem to be an easy one to make…. Read more »
Is Toyota’s new CEO introducing a new, pro-EV strategy? Well, maybe.
EV boosters are hopeful that Toyota’s new CEO Koji Sato will preside over a new era at the world’s second-largest automaker, transforming the electrification laggard into a leader. In a recent “New Management Policy & Direction Announcement,” three of Toyota’s top execs assured us that the company is serious about electrification, but also reaffirmed a… Read more »
Ford CEO talks candidly about Ford’s problems with its Mustang Mach-E and F-150 Lightning
Automakers are in the midst of what is arguably the largest technological shift since the birth of the industry, and it’s inevitable that they’re going to have problems. Despite their deep pockets and vast expertise in manufacturing, legacy brands are still struggling to catch up with industry gadfly Tesla—but as VW’s former CEO Herbert Diess… Read more »
This provision of the IRA could deliver much bigger results than the EV tax credits
The so-called Inflation Reduction Act includes a long list of measures intended to promote e-mobility and renewable energy. The one that’s gotten the most press is the revamped system of tax credits for EV purchases—and naturally so, because that’s the measure that most drivers can see benefitting them directly. However, as John Voelcker writes in… Read more »
How to make heavy-duty electric trucks work in practice
Fleets tested Volvo VNR Electric Class 8 tractors for three years: Here’s what they learned. Large commercial trucks and other heavy equipment have run on diesel fuel for many decades now. Requirements for more aggressive emission after-treatment and the hardware to achieve that add cost and complexity for fleet operators. Rising fuel-economy standards during the… Read more »
The promise of wireless charging: smaller batteries, longer battery life, fewer charging stations
Q&A with Momentum Dynamics Wireless charging is nothing new—Charged has covered wireless EV charging since at least 2011—but it may be that its true value is only coming into focus now, as more and more commercial and transit fleets are electrifying. There are many reasons (safety, reliability, liability) that a fleet operator might not want… Read more »
WattEV aims to operate 12,000 electric Trucks-as-a-Service and a charging network to support them by 2030
Electrifying commercial vehicles is a critical part of reducing emissions, so it’s frustrating that the pace of fleet electrification has been so slow. Viable commercial EVs have been around for years, but fleet operators insisted on conducting years-long pilots to prove their reliability. Now that phase is over, and companies are starting to place substantial… Read more »