Electric-car road trip: lessons learned in Chevy Bolt EV over 1,300 miles

2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV electric car, June 2017 road trip from VA to KY and back  [Jay Lucas]Launched in December, the 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV is the first mass-priced electric car to go on sale with a rated range of more than 200 miles: 238 miles combined, according to the EPA. Most owners use their Bolt EVs for daily commuting and trips, just like any other car. But road trips are an American tradition. We've done several stories about...

Lucid Air electric luxury sedan: a Tesla Model S owner’s take

Lucid Air electric luxury sedan prototype  [photo: David Noland]It’s a cool spring morning in Menlo Park, California, in the heart of Silicon Valley. In a two-story concrete-and-glass building on Constitution Avenue, just down the block from Facebook’s vast fortress, a group of automotive engineers and designers is working to create the next-generation luxury high-performance all-electric sedan. A...

Bentley Bentayga SUV to be luxury brand’s first plug-in hybrid

2017 Bentley BentaygaUnlike rival Rolls-Royce, which may go directly to an all-electric model in future, Bentley has set its sights on plug-in hybrids first—and the Bentayga luxury SUV will be the first one from the brand. The plug-in versions of the Bentley Bentayga is expected to arrive next year, and will be capable of running solely on battery power and...

VW says it needs ’40 gigafactories’ for electric-car batteries by 2025

Tesla Gigafactory battery plant in NevadaVW Group remains one of the world's three largest carmakers, along with Toyota and General Motors, but the German automaker foresees challenges ahead. Specifically, VVolkswagen believes the industry will face a shortage of lithium-ion batteries if new investment is not made soon for additional cell fabrication factories, often referred to using...

Combustion engines: high emissions from short commutes a huge challenge

Chrome exhaust pipeDrivers in the U.S. have longer commutes than those in Europe and Asia, on average. In the U.K., short commutes in vehicles with combustion engines—whether gasoline or diesel—pose particularly tough emission problems. That's because the exhaust aftertreatment systems have to warm up fully before they cut emissions to the levels...

Can we have fully carbon-free electricity by 2100? Predictions vary

Solar farm used by West Hill House B&BThe future of energy production remains in considerable debate, but some new research provides a more optimistic view for a lower-carbon future. Sources for new and replacement energy production remain uncertain, especially the degree to which renewable sources can replace those based on fossil fuels. Even with the newer, optimistic predictions...