Alstom will supply six hydrogen fuel cell trains, with the option for eight more, to FNM (Ferrovie Nord Milano), the main transport and mobility group in the Italian region of Lombardy, for a total amount of approximately €160 million. The first train delivery is expected within 36 months of the... Read more →

Empa, together with FPT Motorenforschung AG Arbon, Politechnico di Milano, lubricant manufacturer Motorex and other partners, is exporing the use of DME as a fuel for heavy-duty engines. A DME test engine has been in operation on a dynamometer in Empa’s Automotive Powertrains Technologies Laboratory. The scientists intend to provide... Read more →

Monolith Materials, Inc. has received an investment from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America, Inc. to support its commercial-scale, emissions-free hydrogen manufacturing technology. The announcement is the latest in a series of recent strategic investments made by MHI in support of achieving a decarbonized world. Monolith Materials is the first US manufacturer... Read more →

While cobalt prices have shown positive signs of late, there are nuances within the market which highlight the key fundamentals that will likely decide cobalt’s future price trend—which is taking its cues less and less from the industrial metal supply chain, according to a new report from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence.... Read more →

The Product Development group at ArcelorMittal Tailored Blanks (AMTB) has developed a novel floor ring which integrates battery and occupant protection in battery electric vehicles (BEVs). The concept enables OEMs to integrate BEV powertrains in existing body architectures for internal combustion engine (ICE) models. The floor ring concept integrates passenger... Read more →

Lotus Engineering is launching a pilot containerized battery testing facility to assess energy storage solutions for the booming EV sector. It will allow Lotus Engineering to carry out various battery cell, module and pack characterization tests, performance evaluations, and component and lifetime testing under controlled conditions. Early feasibility study support... Read more →

Volkswagen Group Components is the central supplier for the first models of the new Volkswagen ID. family and numerous other Group brand models based on the modular electric drive matrix (MEB). Volkswagen Group Components contributes around 40% of the overall added value of the first fully electric SUV by the... Read more →

Audi is now enabling faster charging with alternating current (AC). Effective immediately, e-tron 55 and e-tron Sportback 55 customers can order a second on-board charger that doubles the power from 11 kW to as much as 22 kW at appropriate charging terminals. This option will follow for the e-tron 50... Read more →

CAKE, the Swedish manufacturer of lightweight electric performance motorcycles, signed a letter of intent with the Swedish battery developer and manufacturer, Northvolt, to form a long-term partnership for the supply of sustainable battery cells for their line-up of electric motorcycles. A CAKE electric motorcycle. Large-scale production will start in 2021... Read more →

Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles is focusing on electromobility and with the ID. BUZZ brings its classic, the Bulli, to the road as a fully electric version. KUKA is responsible for the planning, delivery, assembly and commissioning of a fully automated body shop system for the underbody of the all-electric ID. BUZZ.... Read more →

In a new report, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Air Enforcement Division (AED) estimates that the emissions controls have been removed from more than 550,000 diesel pickup trucks in the last decade. The AED report includes only tampering that involves the complete removal and disablement of emissions controls hardware.... Read more →

Royal DSM will start a strategic partnership with Neste to enable the production of high performance polymers made from sustainable feedstock. This enables DSM and its customers to reduce the carbon footprint of their own products while supporting the industry to transition to a circular economy. In the new strategic... Read more →

ŠKODA AUTO has begun series production of the electric ENYAQ iV at its main plant in Mladá Boleslav. The battery-electric SUV is the first ŠKODA series production model based on the Volkswagen Group’s Modular Electrification Toolkit (MEB). (Earlier post.) The ENYAQ iV is ŠKODA’s first series-production model that was designed... Read more →

Renault Trucks has delivered the first of twenty electric 26-tonne Renault Trucks D Wide Z.E. vehicles to Feldschlösschen, a subsidiary of the Carlsberg Group. We are proud to see our pioneering work with electric trucks, which began several years ago now, finally paying off. We are the first company in... Read more →

Volkswagen Group Logistics will be using certified fuel from vegetable residues for certain new car shipments via marine routes. The fuel is produced from materials such as used oil from restaurants and the food industry. The first car freighter was refueled for the first time with this oil in mid-November... Read more →

Audi has presented the new e-tron FE07 that has been developed by Audi Sport, with a new Audi MGU05 motor-generator unit. The electric racing car, with an all-new electric powertrain that was developed in-house for the first time, will make its debut on the race track during the test in... Read more →

SEAT has invested more than €30 million in recent years to create the most advanced powertrain test center in southern Europe. The facilities are equipped with nine multi-energy test benches, which enable different types of tests to be carried out on internal combustion, electric, hybrid and CNG engines, with the... Read more →

Volkswagen’s new Arteon and Arteon Shooting Brake are available in Europe as plug-in hybrid models. Prices in Germany start from €51,064.37 (US$60,800) for the Arteon eHybrid with a hatchback and from €51,927.06 (US$61,900) for the Arteon Shooting Brake eHybrid. Volkswagen now offers the Golf, Tiguan, Passat, Passat Estate, Arteon, Arteon... Read more →

At the beginning of October, series production for battery-electric city buses started successfully at the MAN plant in Starachowice, Poland, beginning with the Lion’s City E in the 12-meter solo version. The first customer vehicles are now rolling off the assembly line for the Hamburg Holstein transport company (VHH). The... Read more →

Researchers at the University of Bristol in the UK and Harbin Institute of Technology in China have built tiny droplet-based algal factories that produce hydrogen, instead of oxygen, when exposed to daylight in air. An open-access paper on their work is published in Nature Communications. Normally, algal cells fix carbon... Read more →

Nissan launched the all-new Note compact car in Japan, with sales planned to begin 23 December. The new Note will come exclusively with Nissan’s e-POWER electrified powertrain (earlier post). As the company’s best-selling model in its home market, the car continues to play a key role in the Nissan NEXT... Read more →

Groupe Renault is creating the REFACTORY in Flins, the first European circular economy site dedicated to mobility. By 2030, it will employ more than 3,000 people in dedicated professions. The implementation of this industrial and commercial ecosystem will take place gradually between 2021 and 2024, replacing the production of new... Read more →

Operator Transdev has signed a contract with Solaris Bus & Coach to supply two hydrogen buses. The vehicles will roll out onto the streets of the Swedish city of Sandviken in autumn 2021. Solaris Urbino CNG (in yellow and red), operating X-Trafik Gävle—the hydrogen buses in Sandviken will have the... Read more →

The Volkswagen 2021 ID.4 electric SUV 1st Edition and Pro models officially have an EPA-estimated 250 miles of range on a single charge. The EPA-estimated fuel economy for city driving is 104 MPGe; highway driving is rated at 89 MPGe, and combined city/highway at 97 MPGe. The first models to... Read more →

TTTech Auto—a provider of software and hardware platforms for automated driving and beyond, applicable in series production programs—has expanded its development scope and altered its structure based on three distinct pillars. These include a newly set-up Car.OS unit that will focus on forward-looking technology; a scaled-up customer programs unit; and... Read more →

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 →