By mmillikin Members of the hydrogen and fuel cell industry formally announced a new alliance to effect rapid deployment of zero-emission hydrogen fuel cell electric trucks, buses, locomotives, vessels, aircraft and off-road equipment throughout the Western United States. The Western States Hydrogen Alliance (WSHA) is made up of leading figures in the heavy-duty hydrogen fuel…
By mmillikin Verisk, a leading data analytics provider, announced that Ford Motor Company has joined the Verisk Data Exchange. Owners of eligible Ford and Lincoln vehicles will soon have easy access to usage-based insurance programs from the many US auto insurers that connect to the Exchange—including three of the ten largest US carriers. Usage-based insurance…
By mmillikin by Michael Sivak, Sivak Applied Research. This brief analysis examines the relative cost of the energy from milk and gasoline. The unifying approach involves the use of a common measure of energy—British thermal units (Btu). A cup of whole milk contains 150 Calories of energy. Thus, there are 2,400 Calories in a gallon…
By mmillikin As the global energy market shifts from coal, petroleum fuel, and natural gas to more environmentally friendly primary energy sources, hydrogen is becoming a crucial pillar in the clean energy movement. Developing safe and cost-effective storage and transportation methods for hydrogen is essential but complicated given the interaction of hydrogen with structural materials….
By mmillikin California Governor Gavin Newsom has issued an executive order requiring sales of all new passenger vehicles to be zero-emission by 2035 and additional measures to eliminate harmful emissions from the transportation sector. Following the order, the California Air Resources Board (ARB) will develop regulations to mandate that 100% of in-state sales of new…
By mmillikin Volkswagen of America revealed the all-new ID.4 electric SUV—the brand’s first long-range EV to be sold in the US. This compact SUV, which will be available in rear-wheel drive 201-hp 82 kWh (launching first) and all-wheel-drive 302-hp 82 kWh configurations, offers three years of fast charging with Electrify America for no additional cost….
By mmillikin LG Chem plans to spin-off its global battery business. LG Chem will seek approval from an extraordinary meeting of stockholders on 30 October and officially launch the spin-off—tentatively named LG Energy Solution—as a new corporation exclusively in charge of the battery business from 1 December. This will be a physical division in which…
By mmillikin General Motors announced that it will design, develop and manufacture a family of five interchangeable electric drive units and three motors, known collectively as “Ultium Drive.” GM said that Ultium Drive and its modular architecture will help it transition to a fully electric lineup, and provide significant advantages over GM’s previous EVs in…
By mmillikin Nikola Corporation and General Motors Co. announced a strategic partnership that begins with the Nikola Badger and carries cost reductions through Nikola’s programs, including: Nikola Badger, Nikola Tre, Nikola One, Nikola Two and NZT. As part of the agreement, Nikola will utilize General Motors’ Ultium battery system and Hydrotec fuel cell technology, representing…
By mmillikin A team at UCLA is introducing a biological yet non-photosynthetic CO2 reduction mechanism that has the potential to yield environmental and economic benefits via CO2-derived high-value products. Their paper is published in the journal Joule. Most of us naturally associate biological CO2 conversion with photosynthesis in plants and algae. While engineering photosynthetic hosts…
By mmillikin General Motors and Honda today signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding (MoU) following extensive preliminary discussions toward establishing a North American automotive alliance. The scope of the proposed alliance includes a range of vehicles to be sold under each company’s distinct brands, as well as cooperation in purchasing, research and development, and connected…
By mmillikin Researchers at UC San Diego, with their colleagues at other institutions, have developed a new anode material that enables lithium-ion batteries to be safely recharged within minutes for thousands of cycles. As reported in a paper in the journal Nature, the disordered rock salt Li3+xV2O5 can be used as a fast-charging anode that…
By mmillikin by Michael Sivak, Sivak Applied Research. In a recent analysis, I have shown that in March 2020 (the first month with the pandemic), the decrease in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the states with preference for Democrats was greater than in the states with preference for Republicans. The present analysis examined whether the…
By mmillikin In a study published in the journal Joule, a team from the US Naval Research Laboratory find that of the two main approaches to designing structural batteries—monofunctional materials with de-coupled functions vs. multifunctional materials with coupled functions—decoupled structural batteries (relying on monofunctional materials) generally achieve higher elastic moduli and specific-energy values than coupled…
By mmillikin Researchers at the University of Cambridge, with colleagues at the University of Tokyo, have developed a standalone device that converts sunlight, carbon dioxide and water into formic acid, a carbon-neutral fuel, without requiring any additional components or electricity. The device is a significant step toward achieving artificial photosynthesis—a process mimicking the ability of…