Bengt Halvorson, Senior Editor
Articles
-
As Ford prepares the first of several fully electric vehicles, for what amounts to a rapidly expanding niche, the automaker is also working on rolling out electrified versions of its existing...
-
Audi e-tron electric SUV buyers can leave the charger installation to AmazonGiven how often automakers expect electric-car drivers to charge at home—80 to 90 percent of the time, by most estimates—it’s surprising that more attention isn’t paid to making sure that those drivers can get the most out of home charging. With its e-tron electric SUV...
Bengt Halvorson -
Cadillac to become “lead electric vehicle brand” for GM to rival Tesla (Updated)General Motors’ Cadillac brand has fought to restore its luster as a brand for technology and innovation, with repeated attempts that fell short of a resounding success. Finally, it appears that Cadillac might be turning toward a future that may have a better chance of restoring the...
Bengt Halvorson -
2019 Nissan Leaf Plus vs Leaf: A first look at the differencesEarlier this week, at an event coordinated with the Consumer Electronics Show, Nissan introduced the Leaf Plus, a new longer-range of Nissan’s compact electric car. The 2019 Nissan Leaf Plus, which will reach dealerships this spring, finally offers more than the 200 miles that many Americans...
Bengt Halvorson -
2019 Nissan Leaf Plus revealed: 226-mile range, quicker accelerationNissan unveiled Tuesday a new version of the 2019 Leaf electric car, called the Leaf Plus or Leaf e+, that can go well over 200 miles on a charge. Although such a model has been a long time coming, the 2019 Nissan Leaf Plus stands as strong evidence that in the eight years since the first...
Bengt Halvorson -
Byton brings its big-screen electric SUV back to CES, a step closer to productionThe China-based electric vehicle maker Byton brought a close-to-production prototype version of its M-Byte SUV to the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show this week. The debut of the vehicle, still headed for a starting price of around $45,000 and an available driving range of up to 325 miles, marks...
Bengt Halvorson -
Tesla has confirmed that it plans to start making deliveries of its Model 3 sedan to China in March.
That will complement an export strategy that’s ramping up in multiple ways. With the volume...
-
Future Model 3 rival: Volvo Polestar 2 electric performance car teasedVolvo’s Polestar sub-brand has released a teaser picture and revealed a little more about its first electric car, to be called the Polestar 2. And the fledgling tech-performance brand doesn’t miss a beat in mentioning the Tesla Model 3. The Polestar 2, which will be the first fully...
Bengt Halvorson -
Hyundai sets lease terms for Nexo fuel-cell vehicle, makes first deliveryHyundai last week made the first U.S. delivery of its Nexo fuel-cell vehicle—to a customer in Southern California. Although the customer, Todd Hochrad, picked the Nexo up from a dealership in Van Nuys, he lives in Ventura, which could place him about equidistant from hydrogen fueling stations...
Bengt Halvorson -
Some used electric-car prices start tracking higherYes, really. Used electric cars have appreciated in value, in some cases. Call it a market adjustment or a momentary blip. You have one more thing to toast this new year: that the value of your electric vehicle probably isn’t plunging as rapidly as it was. It may, actually have gone up in...
Bengt Halvorson -
Tesla cuts prices $2,000, almost hit 250,000 vehicles in 2018Tesla and its CEO Elon Musk made a multi-layered end-of-year push, focused on Tesla's final days and weeks of $7,500 federal EV tax credit eligibility. And with more than 90,000 vehicle deliveries in the fourth quarter of the year—a new record for the California electric-car maker—it...
Bengt Halvorson -
Volkswagen tests mobile DC fast charging station for urban network gapsAutomakers face some daunting challenges in selling electric vehicles to urban apartment-dwellers, who are often without a home charging point. As a partial response, Volkswagen has shown a portable DC fast charging unit aimed at urban environments or temporary use at events or in parking...
Bengt Halvorson -
Tesla announced Friday that it has added two independent directors to the company's board: Kathleen Wilson-Thompson and Larry Ellison.
Yes, it’s that Larry Ellison—the Oracle founder, and...
-
Subaru Forester Hybrid teased in Japan, in sporty STI formSubaru’s STI performance skunkworks has helped enable some very fast, exciting versions of the Japanese automaker’s vehicles. And with its 2019 Crosstrek Hybrid, Subaru has shown it can engineer a full hybrid—a plug-in with a 17-miles range rating. However, the Forester STI...
Bengt Halvorson -
Would a Porsche Taycan Turbo confuse the Mission for sports-car brand's electric car?The Porsche Taycan—since way back in its early 2015 Mission E Concept days—has been discussed by Porsche in two distinct ways. On one hand it’s a Tesla rival, capable of meeting higher standards of performance than the Model S or Model 3. And on the other hand it’s at the...
Bengt Halvorson -
UX small crossover could spawn fully electric Lexus, trademark move suggestsAlthough Toyota isn’t in any big hurry to develop and push out electric vehicles to its dealerships—especially in the U.S., as recent executive comments have suggested—there might be a different trajectory planned for electrifying Lexus showrooms. In a trademark filing earlier...
Bengt Halvorson -
Forget big V-8s and diesels: Why electric trucks will be great for towingPickups in the U.S. are often sold on the bragging rights of numbers—not the Olympic-sprinter acceleration times and top-speed numbers that sell performance cars, but in how high they can tip the scales in strongman-contest pulling and hauling tasks. For that, the electric pickups on the way...
Bengt Halvorson -
Report: Home electric-car chargers vulnerable to hackersConnected home chargers can bring a higher level of convenience to the electric-car ownership experience, allowing more flexibility with remote access, charge scheduling, power-output adjustment, and even data displays. But according to the cybersecurity company Kaspersky Lab, they can also bring a...
Bengt Halvorson -
The Michigan-based electric-vehicle hopeful Rivian claims that its upcoming R1T pickup and R1S sport-utility vehicle, both revealed last month around the LA Auto Show, will be able to recharge up to...
-
Chinese electric sports car Qiantu K50 might be made in U.S., with Coda connectionThere's quite a list of Chinese automakers that are relatively unknown outside China yet have grand plans to enter the U.S. market. The latest is China’s Qiantu Motor, which has developed an all-electric luxury sports car called the K50, The K50 went on sale in China earlier this year and...
Bengt Halvorson -
GM battery facility discharge suggests no immediate successor for Chevy VoltWill the Chevrolet Volt get an immediate successor, or will any other model soon carry on with the potential of its brilliant Voltec plug-in hybrid system? Considering what General Motors announced yesterday, both of those possibilities are now looking less likely. GM said that it will cut 50 jobs...
Bengt Halvorson -
Former Porsche CEO backing company with TDI-like emissions claimFormer Porsche AG CEO Wendelin Wiedeking, who waged a failed takeover of the Volkswagen Group ten years ago, is reportedly one of the backers of a new venture that, at face value, is making claims that sound very much like those made of what was then the favored tech for VW and Audi: TDI diesel...
Bengt Halvorson -
Independent group aims to be for emissions what NCAP or IIHS is for crash safetyA newly formed organization called Allow Independent Road-testing (AIR) wants to make impartial emissions ratings available to vehicle shoppers. Using a simple rating from A (best) to H (worst), they would tell you, at a quick glance, how much you’re endangering the health of your family with...
Bengt Halvorson -
German automakers commit to massive battery purchases, sidestep some hard realitiesDaimler, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz, last week revealed that it will be buying $23 billion in battery cells by 2030. What it didn’t fully reveal—its sources for those cells—says as much, if not more about a point of unease among German automakers. Battery packs—and...
Bengt Halvorson