Global automotive Tier 1 manufacturer Motherson Group is collaborating with Israeli cleantech company UBQ Materials. The companies are joining efforts to implement the carbon-negative UBQ thermoplastic (earlier post) into auto parts manufactured by Motherson Group for the automotive industry. UBQ is a patented material converted from 100% unsorted household waste,... Read more →

Despite the trend toward transportation electrification, the lithium industry has had a rough few years. In its new Lithium Outlook to 2030 report, Roskill notes that the prolonged downward trend for lithium compound and mineral concentrate prices has caused a difficult environment for many lithium producers since 2018. In 2019,... Read more →

The California Air Resources Board has approved significant changes to the requirements for reporting emissions from stationary sources to help communities assess air pollution at a local level. The improvements to the emission inventory will help with prioritizing efforts to further reduce emissions of pollutants that cause smog as well... Read more →

The US Department of Energy (DOE) is awarding $35 million to 11 projects as part of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy’s (ARPA-E) Submarine Hydrokinetic And Riverine Kilo-megawatt Systems (SHARKS) program. SHARKS teams will develop new economically competitive Hydrokinetic Turbines (HKT) designs for tidal and riverine currents. Hydrokinetic energy is an... Read more →

Freudenberg Sealing Technologies is starting high-volume production of its DIAvent pressure compensation component for the first time for use in a Chinese passenger car: the new ARCFOX α-T electric car from the Chinese manufacturer Beijing Electric Vehicles (BJEV). In 2017, Freudenberg introduced the innovative pressure compensation element DIAvent. In batteries... Read more →

MAHLE has commissioned a test bench for electric drives in Stuttgart/Germany. This equipment will be used to develop and test e-axles and e-drive units for a wide range of electric and hybrid vehicles. The first test on a unit was successfully performed on behalf of a customer just a few... Read more →

Solaris has delivered an electric Urbino 12 school bus to the commune of Gręboszów in Poland. The purchase of the eco-friendly vehicle was subsidized by the NFOŚiGW (the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management) as part of the “Kangaroo: A Safe and Environmentally Friendly Way to School” program.... Read more →

Ebusco, supplier of electric buses & chargers and Rocsys, supplier of EV charging automation, will provide a fully automated charging solution at bus depots. The innovative Rocsys robotics solution ensures that the CCS plug of the depot charger is plugged into the bus automatically and 100% correctly. As a part... Read more →

Entreprise Générale du Cobalt (EGC) signed a trading agreement with Trafigura Pte Ltd. The trading agreement includes the provision of finance by Trafigura to fund the creation of strictly controlled artisanal mining zones, the installation of ore purchasing stations and costs related to the transparent and traceable delivery of cobalt... Read more →

Buick’s vehicle-to-everything (V2X) technology made its debut at the Guangzhou International Automobile Exhibition. Later this year, Buick will become the first brand in China officially to roll out the market-ready technology on a production vehicle, a Buick GL8. V2X technology has a crucial role to play in improving safety and... Read more →

Xpeng Inc., a leading Chinese smart electric vehicle company, announced its next-generation autonomous driving architecture at Auto Guangzhou 2020. The company is incorporating lidar as a new hardware component for its next-generation autonomous driving architecture, significantly improving the vehicle’s high-precision object recognition performance. The new hardware architecture is a combination... Read more →

By making use of a previously undesired side effect in oil recovery, researchers at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (TUAT) have developed a method that yields up to 20% more heavy oil than traditional methods. A paper on the work is published in the ACS journal Energy & Fuels.... Read more →

Cummins, in conjunction with European Hydrogen Week, shared new research showing that more than half of the United Kingdom (UK) commuters would be willing to travel to work on a train or bus powered by hydrogen to lower their carbon footprint and reduce emissions. Nearly half of commuters in Belgium... Read more →

Three of the most popular plug-in hybrids in 2020 all emitted more CO2 than advertised when tested in the real world, according to tests commissioned by European environmental NGO Transport & Environment (T&E). T&E said governments should therefore end the purchase subsidies and tax breaks for plug-in hybrids. T&E has... Read more →

A large number of components in automobiles are made from plastics; these have to meet exacting safety, heat-resistance and quality requirements. That is why, so far, only petroleum-based materials have been suitable for manufacturing plastic components in automobiles that are subjected to particularly intensive wear. Such materials are not recyclable... Read more →

XL Fleet announced that Farmbro Inc., an Ontario-based upfitting solutions service provider specializing in commercial and work vehicles, expects to double its sales volume from approximately 1,000 XL unit installations in 2020 to more than 2,000 in 2021 to meet the increasing demand for fleet electrification in Canada. As part... Read more →

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has reached settlements with two Iowa companies for allegedly tampering with car engines to render emissions controls inoperative, in violation of the federal Clean Air Act. According to EPA, Menzel Enterprises Iowa Inc. of West Des Moines installed “defeat devices” in at least five... Read more →

Most Europeans living in cities are still breathing air that is dangerous to their health, according to the European Environment Agency (EEA) in a new report; governments are not doing enough to cut toxic emissions at source, campaigners warn. Data show that harmful emissions, especially from farming and domestic heating,... Read more →

Australia and Germany have released national hydrogen strategies to help grow the development of renewable hydrogen as a clean source of energy. UNSW Sydney will lead a consortium of Australian research and industry partners, who will work together with partners in Germany to test the feasibility of a renewable energy-based... Read more →

Hyundai Motor Company and INEOS signed a memorandum of understanding to explore new opportunities to accelerate the global hydrogen economy. Hyundai and INEOS will jointly investigate opportunities for the production and supply of hydrogen as well as the worldwide deployment of hydrogen applications and technologies. Both companies will initially seek... Read more →

China-based SVOLT Energy Technology Co., Ltd. will invest up to €2 billion to establish its European production site in Germany. A module and pack factory as well as a state-of-the-art cell factory with 24 GWh production capacity in the final expansion stage will be built at two Saarland locations. Battery... Read more →

Researchers at Imperial College London have developed a membrane-based extraction system for the production of biofuels which uses less than 25% of the energy of current processes and produces ten times more biofuel with more than 99.5% purity. The open-access findings are published in the RSC journal Energy & Environmental... Read more →

The Architecture Reference for Cooperative and Intelligent Transportation (ARC-IT) version 9.0 is a major release of the US National ITS Architecture Reference that fully defines and upgrades the four architecture views that were initially defined in ARC-IT 8.0. This includes changes to support vehicle automation content inspired by research results... Read more →

Proterra announced that Broward County Transit (BCT) has agreed to purchase 12 40-foot Proterra ZX5 battery-electric transit buses with 660 kWh of onboard energy and the DuoPower drivetrain. With Broward County’s purchase, Proterra has now sold more than 1,000 battery-electric transit buses in North America. Introduced in September, the Proterra... Read more →

DHL is piloting four BYD Class 8 battery-electric trucks in the Los Angeles market, just in time for the peak holiday shipping season. Equipped with a comfortable air-ride cab and air suspension, the trucks have more than enough power and torque to operate at 82,000 lbs. combined weight. DHL plans... Read more →

Conventional water electrolysis for the production of hydrogen faces technological challenges to improve the efficiency of the water-splitting reaction for the sluggish oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Noble metal-based ruthenium oxide (RuO2) and iridium oxide (IrO2) are used to enhance the oxygen generation rate. However, these noble metal catalysts are very... Read more →

Yachts de Luxe (YdL) of Singapore has placed a commercial 10-year worldwide contract with OXIS Energy valued at $5 million to build the world’s first luxury boat to be powered by Lithium-Sulfur (Li-S) battery cells and battery systems technology. The objective is to achieve a range between 70 and 100... Read more →

The BMW Group has founded IDEALworks GmbH—a fully-owned subsidiary—headquartered in Munich. The aim is to become a leading supplier of autonomous robotics solutions in the logistics sector. The name “IDEAL” stands for Industry-Driven Engineering for Autonomous Logistics. In founding IDEALworks, we are creating a new business segment for our logistics... Read more →

Hexagon Purus signed a multi-year master frame agreement with Everfuel to deliver multiple units of newly designed 45-foot hydrogen distribution systems. The systems will be used to transport hydrogen to refueling stations serving hydrogen fuel cell electric passenger car fleets (e.g. taxis), trucks and buses. At signing, Everfuel ordered its... Read more →

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) has approved draft new mandatory regulations to cut the carbon intensity of existing ships. This builds on current mandatory energy efficiency requirements to further reduce greenhouse gas emissions from shipping. The MEPC also agreed the terms of reference for assessing... Read more →