Fuel cell technology company Intelligent Energy has extended its joint development program with one of its existing Asian automotive OEM customers. The new contract is worth around £6.5 million (US$10 million) and is expected to last for approximately two and a half years. The new joint development program marks another... Read more →

The California Air Resources Board (ARB) released a draft Short-Lived Climate Pollutant Reduction Strategy. The draft strategy describes proposed actions the State will take to move forward aggressively to reduce emissions of short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs). SLCPs include methane, black carbon and fluorinated gases (F-gases) such as refrigerants, insulating foam... Read more →

Lord Drayson, CEO and Chairman of Drayson Technologies, introduced Freevolt: an energy harvesting technology that turns ambient radio frequency waves (RF) into usable electricity to charge low-power electronic devices. The patent-pending technology was developed by an international team from Drayson Technologies and Imperial College London. Drayson Technologies is the first... Read more →

Volvo Cars, the premium car maker, and Autoliv, the automotive safety technology company, two of the world’s leaders in automotive safety, have agreed to work together on the Drive Me large-scale autonomous driving (AD) initiative. Drive Me involves 100 self-driving Volvos being used by families and commuters on public roads... Read more →

Schaeffler has been testing and demonstrating the performance capabilities of 48 volt hybridization in a range of concept vehicles including the“Gasoline Technology Car” (GTC), co-developed with Ford and Continental and the “Schaeffler Efficient Future Mobility North America” vehicle, as launched at the 2015 Detroit Motor Show (NAIAS) (earlier post). Schaeffler... Read more →

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln will lead a $13.5-million, multi-institutional research effort to improve sorghum as a sustainable source for biofuel production. Funded by the US Department of Energy, this five-year grant takes a comprehensive approach to better understand how plants and microbes interact, and to learn which sorghum germplasm grows... Read more →

By the end of 2015, Toyota will make a new ITS (Intelligent Transportation System) safety package available on three models in Japan. The package, named ITS Connect, uses Japan’s standardized ITS frequency of 760 MHz to receive and share data transmitted by external infrastructure and other vehicles. Equipping ITS on... Read more →

Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Group Co Ltd (JAC) and Ricardo are collaborating on a project to develop the Ricardo HyBoost concept (earlier post)—a combination of low-cost technologies to deliver improved performance and fuel economy which featured recently in the Ricardo Centenary celebrations —into volume production on a JAC vehicle. The Ricardo... Read more →

At the upcoming 44th Tokyo Motor Show 2015, Honda will showcase its all-new fuel cell vehicle—tentatively being called the FCV&mdash NSX hybrid supercar, and NEOWING three-wheeler hybrid, as well as stage the Japan premiere of the all-new Civic Type R and the planned production model of the Odyssey Hybrid equipped... Read more →

Renesas Electronics Corporation announced the R-Car W2R system-on-a-chip (SoC), the first member of the new Renesas R-Car Family of devices developed specifically for V2X applications. The new automotive wireless communication SoC is designed for Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) communication in the 5.9-gigahertz (GHz) band. Through the use of Renesas’... Read more →

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has updated air pollution standards to further control toxic air emissions from petroleum refineries. The rule requires first-of-its-kind fenceline monitoring to better protect and inform nearby communities, while also strengthening emission controls for flares, pressure relief devices, storage tanks, and delayed coker operations that... Read more →

Tesla launched the delayed battery-electric Model X SUV at an event at its Fremont factory Tuesday night (the launch event itself running behind schedule as well) with an emphasis first on the safety of the vehicle; second on the innovative falcon wing lifting rear doors and second row seating; and... Read more →

As part of its restructuring, Volkswagen Group is combining its activities in the US, Mexico and Canada into the newly formed North American Region (NAR). The Supervisory Board has appointed Prof. Dr. Winfried Vahland, since 2010 the CEO of Group company ŠKODA, to take over all responsibility for the North... Read more →

Eleven European and North American governments are the founding partners of the International ZEV Alliance, which has the mission of accelerating global adoption of zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs). California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Oregon, Rhode Island and Vermont in the United States; Québec in Canada; and The Netherlands, Norway and the United... Read more →

LG Chem Power Inc. (LGCPI), announced that Prabhakar Patil, who has served as the CEO for 10 years, will retire effective tomorrow. He will be succeeded by Denise Gray starting 1 October. Gray was the Director of Global Battery Systems Engineering at General Motors, where her team successfully developed and... Read more →

Volkswagen AG announced that it will retrofit the some 11 million vehicles equipped with the 2.0-liter EA 189 Euro 5 diesel tainted by the software emissions defeat device. (Earlier post.) New vehicles with EU6 engines currently available are not affected by the cheat, Volkswagen said. The scope of the retrofit... Read more →

Mercedes-Benz has delivered the first Euro VI-compliant Econic NGT (Natural Gas Technology) to Vienna International Airport. The natural-gas-powered truck will operate as a catering truck equipped with a lifting mechanism manufactured by Doll. Econic’s low cab enables a very low delivery height from catering vehicle to plane, which means that... Read more →

Researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) have detailed the role of NOx in the formation of the brown haze that hovers over cities on sunny days. A paper on their work was published recently in the RSC journal Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics. The PNNL team examined the chemistry of... Read more →

Schaeffler has developed a new P2 (parallel, two-clutch) high-voltage hybrid module—arranged between the internal combustion engine and transmission—that can transmit engine torques of up to 800 N·m (590 lb-ft) to the transmission without having to incorporate a commensurately expensive clutch.The new generation P2 hybrid module can be used in both... Read more →

XPRIZE Chairman and CEO Peter Diamandis competition the $20-million NRG COSIA Carbon XPRIZE, a competition to address CO2 emissions from fossil fuels. Teams are challenged to develop breakthrough technologies that convert the most CO2 into one or more products with the highest net value. Co-sponsored by NRG and COSIA (Canada’s... Read more →

Starting next month, Park24 Co., Ltd. and Toyota Motor Corporation will expand the scope and scale of their joint car sharing service trial in central Tokyo. (Earlier post.) In addition to continuing to use the Toyota i-Road, the service will now also make use of the COMS, a super-compact electric... Read more →

Emission measurements conducted by Institute of Transport Economics in Norway, in collaboration with VTT in Finland, show that new Euro 6 cars with diesel engines are struggling with NOx emissions well in excess of regulatory type limits when in real traffic. Since 2011, TØI and VTT have conducted emission measurements... Read more →

Gevo has begun selling renewable isooctene to BCD Chemie, a subsidiary of Brenntag. Initial orders in 2015 are expected to result in revenues to Gevo of more than $1 million. The isooctene will be produced at Gevo’s biorefinery in Silsbee, Texas, derived from isobutanol produced at Gevo’s plant in Luverne,... Read more →

Shell announced on Monday that it will cease further exploration activity in offshore Alaska for the foreseeable future. The company said the decision reflects the results from Burger J exploration well located in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea; the high costs associated with the project; and the “challenging and unpredictable” federal regulatory... Read more →

The Center for Economic Criminal Matters (Zentralstelle für Wirtschaftsstrafsachen) of the German public prosecutor in Braunschweig (Staatsanwaltschaft Braunschweig) has begun an investigation of Prof. Dr. Martin Winterkorn, the former CEO of Volkswagen AG, over the VW exhaust affair (“VW-Abgasaffäre”). The focus of the investigation is the accusation of fraud related... Read more →

The Board of Directors of Alcoa has unanimously approved a plan to split the lightweight metals leader into two independent, publicly-traded companies. The globally competitive Upstream Company will comprise five business units that today make up Global Primary Products: Bauxite, Alumina, Aluminum, Casting and Energy. The Value-Add Company will include... Read more →

As part of the Joint Venture between Dongfeng and Renault—Dongfeng Renault Automotive Company (DRAC)—DRAC will produce an electric vehicle that is based on the Fluence Z.E. The electric car will be produced at the Wuhan plant in 2017 and will be commercialized under a local Dongfeng brand for the Chinese... Read more →

Ballard Power Systems has signed a joint development agreement and a supply agreement to develop and commercialize a fuel cell module specifically designed for integration into low floor trams manufactured by CRRC Qingdao Sifang Company, Ltd. (CRRC Sifang), a Chinese rolling stock manufacturer. The agreements include 2016 delivery of 10... Read more →

The Volkswagen Passat GTE plug-in hybrid (earlier post) is now on sale, starting at €44,250 (US$49,000) for the sedan, €45,250 (US$51,000) for the wagon. Volkswagen uses GTE to designate its plug-in models; the Passat is the second Volkswagen brand PHEV after the Golf. The Passat GTE is powered by a... Read more →

By employing proprietary pretreatment and processing, researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Drexel University have produced flexible polymer carbon composite films from scrap tires for use as electrodes for supercapacitors. The first synthesized highly porous carbon (1625 m2 g−1) using waste tires as the precursor. The narrow pore-size distribution and high... Read more →

Researchers from Central South University in Changsha, China, have developed a separator with a nitrogen-doped porous hollow carbon sphere (NHC) coating for use in Li-S batteries. The NHC-decorated separator enormously improves the utilization of active material and enhances electrochemical performance. They prepared the nitrogen-doped porous hollow carbon spheres by pyrolysis... Read more →

An international research study examining the safety performance of US and EU motor vehicles has found differences in performance between the two. The study is the first side-by-side comparison of predicted risk for EU-regulated and US-regulated vehicles and was conducted collaboratively by The University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI);... Read more →

Nano-structured steel materials design company NanoSteel (earlier post) introduced its first powders designed for the binder jet 3D printing process and its initial commercial application in additive manufacturing. These materials, BLDRmetal J-10 and BLDRmetal J-11, enable the 3D printing of components for highly abrasive environments that can benefit from additive... Read more →

Reflecting on the implications of the still evolving Volkswagen emissions testing scandal (“a vehicle emissions scandal of unprecedented proportions”), analysts at Lux Research suggest that one outcome of the crisis could be an aggressive push by Volkswagen to accelerate the push towards plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles. VW was slowly... Read more →

Audi is broadening its range of online services with the new Audi connect offerings myCarManager and myService. These allow the customer to control specific functions remotely by smartphone or arrange a service appointment online, for example. The new services bring enhanced convenience and security, and are available immediately for the... Read more →

Researchers at the University of York (UK) have found that longer-chain unburned hydrocarbons released from diesel—which are not currently explicitly considered as part of air quality control strategies—represent only 20–30% of the total atmospheric hydrocarbon mixing ratio but contribute more than 50% of the total atmospheric hydrocarbon mass and are... Read more →

Under a newly signed long-term license and supply agreement, Ballard Power Systems will supply Guangdong Synergy Hydrogen Power Technology Co., Ltd., an existing partner in China, fuel cell power products and technology in support of the planned deployment of approximately 300 fuel cell-powered buses in the cities of Foshan and... Read more →

A city with half a million inhabitants would save about SEK 100 million (US$12 million) per year if the city’s buses ran on electricity instead of diesel, according to an analysis conducted in collaboration between the Volvo Group and the audit and advisory firm KPMG. The analysis has taken into... Read more →

The US Department of Transportation’s Federal Transit Administration (FTA) announced the availability of $22.5 million (FTA-2015-006-TRI) through the latest round of the Low or No Emission Vehicle Deployment Program (LoNo). The LoNo Program is a capital program focused on deploying new low- or no-emission production buses that are market-ready or... Read more →

Volkswagen said that an internal assessment following the revelation of cheating on emissions testing in EA 189 2.0L diesels (earlier post) has concluded that approximately five million Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand vehicles are affected worldwide. In the heat of the initial discovery of the emissions testing cheating, Volkswagen had said... Read more →

The California Air Resources Board sent a letter to automobile manufacturers notifying them that ARB will begin using enhanced testing procedures for modern light-duty diesel vehicles to determine compliance with emission levels to which they were originally certified. ARB developed its enhanced screening techniques as it dug into the anomalous... Read more →

The Air Resources Board re-adopted a Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS), which requires a 10% reduction by 2020 in the carbon intensity of transportation fuels. The program requires that transportation fuels used in California meet a baseline target for carbon intensity which is reduced each year. The Board also adopted... Read more →

Following its appointment of Matthias Müller as the new CEO of the Group (earlier post), the Supervisory Board of Volkswagen AG approved a new management structure for the Group and the brands as well as for the North America region. The changes follow in the wake of the diesel emissions... Read more →

In response to charges from environmental NGO Deutsche Umwelthilfe (http://www.duh.de/ ) that it had rigged emissions data, Daimler “sharply” denied the allegations and said that it was evaluating legal options pertaining to the approach taken and the public assertions made by the DUH. We categorically deny the accusation of manipulating... Read more →

At its meeting in Wolfsburg today, the Supervisory Board of Volkswagen AG appointed Matthias Müller, currently Chairman of Porsche, the new CEO of Volkswagen AG with immediate effect. (Porsche is a Volkswagen Group company.) Former CEO Prof. Dr. Martin Winterkorn resigned on Wednesday in light of the Volkswagen diesel emissions... Read more →

An 8-module Li-ion traction battery from AKASOL GmbH powers the ZF electric Advanced Urban Vehicle concept presented at the IAA in Frankfurt. AKASOL is a supplier of Li-ion batteries for high-performance applications. (Earlier post.) The 8 modules of the AKASYSTEM battery are configured 2/3/3 in 3 system units and can... Read more →

Eaton has announced its newest supercharger—TVS2—which improves vehicle manufacturers’ ability to deliver an optimal single boosted application, or to pair this device with other boosting technologies in order to deliver compound boosting solutions for improved engine performance—a combined supercharger-turbocharger system. The announcement came at the 20th Supercharging Conference in Dresden,... Read more →

Honda has announced several initiatives under its new “Green Path” approach to reducing the total life-cycle environmental impact of its products and operations in North America. Among these is a $210-million investment in a new, more environmentally responsible auto-body painting facility and innovative paint process at its Marysville, Ohio auto... Read more →

The gap between official fuel-economy figures and the real world for new cars in the EU has reached 40 per cent, according to the latest update by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) to its on-going research into in-use vehicle fuel efficiency and CO2 emissions. (Earlier post.) Since 2001,... Read more →

As the Volkswagen emission testing scandal threatens to spill over onto other automakers, BMW yesterday issued a sharp statement in response to a report in Auto Bild suggesting emissions from an X3 test were out of the norm. “The BMW Group does not manipulate or rig any emissions tests. We... Read more →