Mazda North American Operations (MNAO) announced the introduction of the all-new Mazda MX-30, the brand’s first battery-electric vehicle that was unveiled at the 2019 Tokyo Motor Show, to the US market beginning in fall 2021 with California dealerships. The vehicle will mark the first step in Mazda’s multi-solution electrification strategy.... Read more →

When winter storms threaten to make travel dangerous, people often turn to salt, spreading it liberally over highways, streets and sidewalks to melt snow and ice. But a new study led by Sujay Kaushal of the University of Maryland warns that introducing salt into the environment—whether it's for de-icing roads,... Read more →

Hyundai’s 2022 Tucson, with its all-new design, will begin arriving in the US market this spring (gasoline and hybrid models), with plug-in models available in summer 2021. The new 2022 Tucson internal combustion models will be produced at Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama (HMMA) and Ulsan, Korea. The new Tucson for... Read more →

Yamaha Motor has developed an electric motor reaching the industry’s highest class in output density. This unit is aimed at use in hyper-EV models and other offerings in the high-output mobility segment; Yamaha is accepting orders for commissioned prototype development from April this year. Since 2020, Yamaha Motor has been... Read more →

Mobileye, an Intel Company, and Udelv, a Silicon Valley venture-backed company, announced that Mobileye’s self-driving system—Mobileye Drive—will “drive” the next-generation Udelv autonomous delivery vehicles (ADV), called “Transporters.” The companies plan to produce more than 35,000 Mobileye-driven Transporters by 2028, with commercial operations beginning in 2023. Our deal with Udelv is... Read more →

Cummins Inc. and Tula Technology, Inc., a leader in propulsion efficiency, announced at SAE International’s WCX the results of their collaborative study on the effectiveness of Tula’s diesel Dynamic Skip Fire (dDSF) in reducing nitrogen oxides (NOx) and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions on a Cummins X15 HD Efficiency Series diesel... Read more →

Ampcera Inc., a developer of solid electrolyte technologies for advanced electric vehicle batteries (earlier post), announced a new, low-cost, energy-efficient internal heating battery architecture that directly targets the solid electrolyte separator, the key component in solid-state batteries. This novel technology enables solid-state batteries to deliver superior performance, including starting and... Read more →

The California Energy Commission (CEC) has approved a first-of-its-kind project to accelerate the deployment of infrastructure needed to fuel zero-emission trucks, buses and equipment. Administered by CALSTART, the EnergIIZE Commercial Vehicles (Energy Infrastructure Incentives for Zero-Emission Commercial Vehicles) project will use a concierge-like model working directly with eligible applicants to help plan and... Read more →

Proterra Inc has been selected by the Washington State Department of Enterprise Services as a vendor to supply zero-emission battery-electric transit buses and charging infrastructure under the state’s regional Cooperative Purchasing Contract. Proterra was chosen to help streamline local transit agencies’ access to vehicles that best meet their specific transit... Read more →

Neste and NuStar Energy L.P. announced that supply trucks are now able to load Neste MY Sustainable Aviation Fuel at the NuStar-operated Selby Terminal near San Francisco, California. The first gallons have been safely picked up and delivered to the nearby Monterey Regional Airport. Due to the strategic location of... Read more →

US-based Group14 Technologies, a global provider of silicon-carbon composite materials for lithium-ion markets, announced the launch of its first commercial-scale 27,000-square foot US manufacturing factory to meet demand for higher-performing lithium-silicon anode materials. The new factory, located at Group14 HQ in Woodinville, Washington, also will house a new R&D center,... Read more →

Volvo Cars, Zoox and SAIC are among the growing number of leading transportation companies using the newest NVIDIA DRIVE solutions to power their next-generation AI-based autonomous vehicles. NVIDIA’s design-win pipeline for NVIDIA DRIVE now totals more than $8 billion over the next six years, reflecting a growing range of next-generation... Read more →

A new partnership comprising Los Alamos National Laboratory, Advent Technology Holdings Inc., Brookhaven National Laboratory, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) will work over the next few years to bring to market high-temperature proton exchange membrane (HT-PEM) fuel cells. Traditional PEM fuel cells have a relatively low operating temperature,... Read more →

ABB has secured a contract with Spanish shipbuilder Astilleros Gondán to supply the all-electric power solution for fast 40-meter urban passenger ferries transporting up to 540 passengers each across Lisbon’s Tagus river. The 10 new ferries will be operated by the public ferry company Transtejo, S.A. and will replace the... Read more →

The Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Grand Est and Occitanie regions in France have signed the first order for dual-mode electric-hydrogen trains in France. Acting on behalf of the four regions, SNCF Voyageurs has placed an order with Alstom for the first 12 dual mode electric-hydrogen trains (plus two optional trainsets) in the... Read more →

Leclanché SA has developed a new, high-energy 65 Ah lithium-ion pouch cell to meet the demands of bus and truck manufacturers seeking increased range and operating time for fully electric and hybrid-electric vehicles. Leclanché’s new high energy, 65 Ah lithium-ion pouch cell is designed for energy intensive applications. It features... Read more →

Battery Resourcers, a vertically integrated lithium-ion battery recycling and manufacturing company, recently completed a $20-million Series B equity round with financing led by Orbia Ventures, the venture capital arm of the multinational Orbia, and participation from other investors including At One Ventures, TDK Ventures, TRUMPF Venture, Doral Energy-Tech Ventures andJaguar... Read more →

REE Automotive Ltd (REE) announced a strategic collaboration agreement with Magna International to bring to market Modular Electric Vehicles (MEVs) for tech companies and new electric mobility players under the “Powered by REE” brand. The strategic collaboration will explore the combination of REE’s REEcorner technology (earlier post) with Magna’s vehicle... Read more →

China is positioning itself to dominate the global supply of copper, a material in high demand as the world transitions to alternative energy systems, according to experts from Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. “If China’s dominance of rare earth element supplies is the global energy transition’s ‘elephant in... Read more →

Total has begun producing sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) at its La Mède biorefinery in southern France and its Oudalle facility near Le Havre. The biojet fuel, made from used cooking oil, will be delivered to French airports starting in April 2021. Total will also be able to produce SAF as... Read more →

Juneau residents will begin to see Capital Transit’s first battery-electric bus in service and on the road tomorrow. This is the first electric bus owned and operated by a public transit agency in Alaska. Capital Transit unveiled the bus, manufactured in California by Proterra, during an event on Monday. Juneau... Read more →

Researchers from the Smart Systems Group at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, UK, working together with researchers from the CALCE group at the University of Maryland in the US, have developed a new method to estimate battery health irrespective of operating conditions and battery design or chemistry, by feeding artificial intelligence... Read more →

Lexus plans to display the LF-Z Electrified Concept at Auto Shanghai 2021, which opens on 19 April 19 in Shanghai, China. Unveiled in late March, the LF-Z Electrified is a BEV concept vehicle that is symbolic of Lexus’s brand transformation and incorporates driving performance, styling, and advanced technology set to... Read more →

Insight LiDAR announced that its product, Insight 1600, is the first LiDAR with the combined high resolution and velocity detection to enable pedestrian gesture recognition. The new capability can be used by AV perception teams to predict the actions of pedestrians quickly and accurately. When humans drive, we’re constantly scanning... Read more →

Plug Power Inc. has been invited to submit a Part II Application for a loan guarantee under the US Department of Energy (DOE) Title XVII Loan Guarantee Program. The invitation for the Part II application is for a proposed $520-million loan guarantee from the DOE to support the use of... Read more →

In 2020, the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office (HFTO) launched the Million Mile Fuel Cell Truck Consortium (M2FCT) to leverage the potential opportunity fuel cells in the heavy-duty vehicle (HDV) market and to align with the H2@Scale vision for clean and affordable hydrogen across multiple... Read more →

LG Energy Solution and SK Innovation have agreed to settle all legal disputes relating to EV batteries in the United States and Korea. As a result, all litigation between the companies, which began in April 2019, is resolved. In this agreement, the two companies agreed to the following terms. SK... Read more →

A team of scientists from Heriot-Watt University has found the waters in the Faroe-Shetland Channel (FSC) are teeming with oil-eating bacteria. The FSC is a deepwater sub-Arctic region where the oil and gas industry has been active for the last 40 years. An open-access paper on the research was published in... Read more →

Toyota Motor Europe (TME) has started KINTO Europe GmbH, a limited liability company with headquarters in Cologne, Germany. Toyota Financial Services Corporation (TFSC), Japan, holds 51% of the company’s shares, with the remaining 49% owned by TME. Both TME and TFSC are wholly owned by Toyota Motor Corporation, based in... Read more →

The National Transportation Safety Board has released its 2021 – 2022 Most Wanted List of Transportation Safety Improvements; one of the 10 items in the list was “Require Collision Avoidance and Connected Vehicle Technologies on All Vehicles”. These technologies include forward-collision warning and automatic emergency braking, which can warn the... Read more →