Electric Vehicles
While electric scooters are considerably cheaper and easier to park than electric cars, many people are still put off by the idea of having to balance on two wheels. Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering is addressing that problem, with its leaning three-wheeled Electromobile City Scooter. Read More
Volvo's electric roads concept points to battery-free EV future
While quick charging technology installed at strategic points along a planned route might be a good fit for inner city buses, it's not going to be of much use to electric vehicles that stop infrequently. Volvo sees our future long-haul trucks and buses drawing the juice they need from the road itself, making large onboard batteries a thing of the past. Read More
Tesla Motors, makers of fine electric performance vehicles, recently surprised the mainstream with news its Model S performance sedan had surpassed Mercedes S-Class, Audi A8 and BMW 7-series in sales for the first quarter in the US. For a company that only released the Model S last June, news of this exponential interest was not only surprising but worked to further validate consumer interest in a fully electric vehicle. On top of the surprising sales figures, media sources like Consumer Reports proclaimed Tesla’s Model S to be one of the “best cars they'd ever tested”. With positive feedback and increasing sales of the Model S, Tesla has identified an expansion of its Supercharger networks as a critical next step. Read More
Ever since it was first unveiled in 2007, many people were captivated with the sleek, futuristic looks of the Aptera. When Aptera Motors went out of business in 2011, not having commercially produced a single vehicle, those same people were understandably disappointed. Now, word comes that a new company may be manufacturing and selling Apteras as soon as next year. Read More
The electrified version of the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG put some emphasis on the green side of Green Hell last week, circling Nürburgring's northernmost circuit in record time. According to Mercedes, its SLS AMG Coupé Electric Drive is the first electrically-powered series production vehicle to shoot around the world's most famous piece of track in under eight minutes. Read More
A solar-powered wheelchair designed by students at the University of Virginia has won first prize in a competition, Change My Life in One Minute, to mark World Cerebral Palsy Day. Entrants to the competition were asked to come up with an innovation that could make a significant difference to a person with a disability. The solar-powered wheelchair can run continuously powered only by the sun. Read More
When you think of an electric bus, you probably either picture a vehicle that has to stay constantly connected to overhead trolley cables, or that attempts to run its entire route on one charge of its onboard batteries. In Geneva, however, they’re trying something else – a system in which an electric bus takes 15 seconds to receive an energy boost at selected stops. Read More
Technically, the combustion engine in any hybrid vehicle is a range extender, but the term commonly refers to gasoline-fueled generators that are used to charge an electric vehicle’s battery pack but aren’t used to directly power the wheels. This is the set up used in “series” or “inline’ hybrids like the Chevy Volt, which differs from parallel hybrids like the Toyota Prius, where the wheels can be driven by the electric motor or the internal combustion engine (ICE). Researchers at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) have developed a new type of range extender that can be powered by a range of different fuels. Read More
When Drayson Racing Technologies and Lola Cars introduced the B12 69/EV last year, the electric race car promised to be one of the fastest of its kind. Six months later, it set a record at the Goodwood Hillclimb, and it's now gunning for an even bigger record. Drayson announced this week that it plans to make an attempt at an FIA electric land speed record within a month. It will try to best the 175 mph (282 km/h) mark that was set back in 1974. Read More
Working with Minddrive mentors, a group of at-risk teenagers has restored a beat up 1967 VW Karmann Ghia and converted it to battery-electric power. The newly-painted and freshly-buffed vehicle will shortly begin a rather interesting journey from Kansas City to Washington. The car has been fitted with a device that monitors social network traffic relating to the project and for every tweet, like or share registered, battery juice points are generated. If there's no social buzz, the car doesn't go anywhere. Read More
