Aerial view of electric cars lining up at Kandi Electric Vehicles Group Co., Ltd in Changxing County on Oct. 24, 2017 in Huzhou, Zhejiang Province of China. Tan Yunfeng / VCG
By Jordan Davidson
Electric vehicles will be the stars of the show when the Auto Shanghai 2019 expo opens Tuesday. China wanted cleaner air, reduced dependence on foreign oil and to be a pacesetter in a growing high-tech industry. So, it invested more than $60 billion in electric vehicles over the last decade and plans to keep that investment going over the next decade, according to Quartz.
Mario Roberto Durán Ortiz / Wikimedia / CC BY-SA 4.0
By Grant Smith and Bill Walker
President Trump's proposed budget for 2020 would eliminate the federal tax credit for buyers of electric vehicles. The oil industry is backing the proposal, as well as a bill to impose a "user fee" — that is, a tax — on drivers of electric vehicles and trucks.
A driver planning to make the trek from Denver to Salt Lake City can look forward to an eight-hour trip across some of the most beautiful parts of the country, long stretches with nary a town in sight. The fastest route would take her along I-80 through southern Wyoming. For 300 miles between Laramie and Evanston, she would see, according to a rough estimate, no fewer than 40 gas stations where she could fuel up her car. But if she were driving an electric vehicle, she would see just four charging stations where she could recharge her battery.
A Volkswagen e-Golf electric car in production. Jens Schlueter / Getty Images
Volkswagen plans to go carbon neutral by 2050, the word's current largest vehicle maker announced at a news conference Tuesday where CEO Herbert Diess acknowledged that the company's cars caused one percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, The New York Times reported.
The immediate reason is economics, but it has a lot to do with physics as well: Larger, heavier, less aerodynamic electric vehicles need larger, heavier, more expensive batteries to power them. Our research has looked at the energy needed to move cars and trucks along the road, and has identified the important factors that affect power usage.
Democratic Washington Gov. Jay Inslee with employees at A & R Solar, where he announced his 2020 presidential campaign. Karen Ducey / Getty Images
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee entered the 2020 Democratic primary Friday as the first presidential contender to base his campaign primarily around fighting climate change.
Tesla Model 3 cars arriving at a port in Shanghai. Zhao Yun / VCG via Getty Images
Three years after it was first announced, Tesla's Model 3 is now available for $35,000 in the United States, The Verge reported Thursday.
"We are incredibly excited to announce that the standard Model 3, with 220 miles of range, a top speed of 130 mph and 0-60 mph acceleration of 5.6 seconds is now available at $35,000!" the company announced in a blog post. "Although lower in cost, it is built to achieve the same perfect 5-star safety rating as the longer-ranged version, which has the lowest probability of injury of any car ever tested by the U.S. Government."
Costa Rica launched a plan this week to fully decarbonize the country by 2050, setting a goal of powering its electrical grid entirely with renewables by 2030 and aiming to aggressively increase the use of electric vehicles and buses.
Self-driving minibus in Talinn, Estonia. Arno Mikkor / Wikimedia
By Hana Creger
Everyone's talking about self-driving, autonomous vehicles these days. Late last year General Motors announced that it will shut down production of several conventional car lines, partly to pour resources into its self-driving car unit, and GM is just one of many companies ramping up such efforts, alongside Google, Tesla, Uber and a slew of others. But what kind of transportation future will this autonomous vehicle revolution bring? And who will it benefit? In a country with an increasing divide between rich and poor, what will this whiz-bang technology mean for marginalized groups such as the poor, people of color, the elderly and those with disabilities?
A woman works at a distrubiton station at the 855,000-square-foot Amazon fulfillment center in Staten Island, one of the five boroughs of New York City, on Feb. 5. JOHANNES EISELE / AFP / Getty Images
Amazon will strive to cut carbon emissions from its shipments in half by 2030, the e-commerce giant said Monday. The retailer's plan calls for an increase in the use of electric delivery vehicles and renewable energy as well as pressuring suppliers to use less packaging.
