What Tesla Model 3 question seems to preoccupy quite a lot of people right now? How might the Trump Administration plan to justify slashing corporate average fuel-economy rules for future new vehicles? This is our look back at the Week In Reverse—right here at Green Car Reports—for the week ending on Friday, February 16, 2018. Friday... Tesla Model 3 production, California vs EPA, plug-in Subaru plans, Ram diesel fines: The Week in Reverse
What Tesla Model 3 question seems to preoccupy quite a lot of people right now? How might the Trump Administration plan to justify slashing corporate average fuel-economy rules for future new vehicles? This is our look back at the Week In Reverse—right here at Green Car Reports—for the week ending on Friday, February 16, 2018. Friday...
Today, we've got a pricey plug-in BMW, some numbers on the Tesla Model 3, news on Trump and gas taxes, and Renault's new electric-car-only showroom. All this and more on Green Car Reports. The new Roadster soft-top version of the 2019 BMW i8 plug-in hybrid sports car is now the most expensive car in the BMW lineup. The number of Tesla Model 3...
How sell electric cars in these early years poses a quandry for all automakers. Tesla chose to avoid existing franchised dealerships and set up its own "stores," where shoppers can learn about plug-in electric vehicles, and their advantages, and have questions answered by Tesla representatives. Buyers then order online. Other makers have had less...
The federal gas tax, which was supposed to pay for repairs and expansion to roads maintained or funded by the national government, now does nothing of the kind. Congress last raised the U.S. federal gas tax a quarter of a century ago in 1993, to the 18.5-cents-per-gallon level it remains at today. Diesel fuel is taxed at 24.4 cents per gallon...
It's clear that incentives to buy specific cars work best when they can be applied directly at the time of sale. That's why purchase rebates are widely preferred by electric-car advocates to tax credits, which may take up to 15 months to be usable, depending on the timing of the purchase and tax filing. While the federal electric-car incentive is...
Production numbers for Tesla electric cars have always been slightly murky. The company announces deliveries only quarterly and refuses to break them down by country, meaning there are no sales figures that directly compare with those routinely issued by other makers. The Tesla Model 3 has endured a long, painful, and somewhat public "production...
Today, we've got half a billion dollars reportedly backing Faraday Future, a possible 'war" between California and Trump's EPA over loosening emission rules, and much more electric-car charging last year. All this and more on Green Car Reports. Struggling electric-car startup Faraday Future reportedly has $1.5 billion of new backing, and plans to...
Seven years and almost 800,000 cars after the first modern electric cars went on sale, there's still a lot wrong with the national charging infrastructure in the U.S. There's little central planning, little standardized signage or public signposting, virtually no awareness among non-EV drivers, and roaming among networks with a single membership...
With the release of proposed new and lower fuel-economy rules expected from the NHTSA by March 30, many eyes have turned to the powerful California Air Resources Board. The state's pioneering role in reducing emissions and cutting air pollution predates even the existence of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. That agency, now run by Scott...
Starting a car company is not only very, very hard—as Tesla, Fisker, and many others testify—but requires breathtaking sums of money. Now struggling Faraday Future, the electric-car startup firm whose entrepreneurial Chinese backer is facing legal action in his home country, appears to have found a well-heeled savior. The new investor...
Today, $10K off a BMW i3, what it would take to get more electric-car buyers, details on the coming Subaru plug-in hybrid, and the unlikely reason the Trump administration may use to slash fuel-economy requirements. All this and more on Green Car Reports. What would it take to get more shoppers interested in electric cars? We polled our Twitter...
How badly do you want to buy a BMW i3 electric car? Badly enough to move to areas of California where Southern California Edison will be your electric utility? If so, a new program offered through April 30 will give residential customers and SCE employees $10,000 off the purchase of any model of the i3. DON'T MISS: How to buy or lease an electric...
It's been clear that under the Trump administration, the NHTSA and EPA plan to roll back linked fuel-economy rules and emission limits on new vehicles. Now a possible justification that will be used has emerged—and it's not the one many advocates had expected. According to a Bloomberg report on Monday, the fuel-economy proposal due March 30...
In June 2013, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced he would drive a Tesla Model S electric car across the U.S. to show off the company's new Supercharger fast-charging network. Indeed, two Tesla Model S sedans successfully completed the run from Los Angeles to New York City in February 2014. Last year, Musk decided to repeat the stunt, but with a twist...
When Toyota and Mazda said last September they would form a joint venture to produce electric-car parts, that answered the question of where Mazda's future plug-in vehicles would get their electric running gear. But it sparked another question: Where did that leave Subaru, another small automaker in the Toyota orbit? A week ago Monday, we learned...
Just shy of 200,000 plug-in electric cars were sold in the U.S. last year, their seventh year on sale. That's the highest number yet, but still just a little more than 1 percent of the market. And it's far from clear that the general car-buying public at large is aware that electric vehicles exist, much less that they're viable and practical...
One of the reasons I traded in my 2013 Tesla Model S 85 last summer for a new Model S 100D was to get extra range. The newer car’s 100-kilowatt-hour battery gives it an EPA-rated range of 335 miles—70 miles more than the old car’s rating of 265 miles. Over four-plus years and 76,000 miles of driving, the 85-kwh battery in my...
Today, we've got a new state fee proposed for hybrids and electric cars, a 2018 Fiat 500e preview, a Tesla cross-country road trip, and a chart explaining the challenge for hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. All this and more on Green Car Reports. Take our latest Twitter poll, which asks where you think we'll see the most electric-car innovation in...
Today, there are roughly 750,000 plug-in electric vehicles on U.S. roads and about 3,800 powered by hydrogen fuel cells. Proponents of each type of vehicle argue strenuously that their powertrain is a better way to produce vehicles with zero emissions from the tailpipe. Electric cars can be charged at home overnight, and electricity in many areas...
When the Fiat 500e electric minicar launched in 2013, its range was rated at 87 miles, but its most distinctive feature was its wickedly fun-to-drive character. Six years later, the fun driving remains the same—and the range has fallen slightly to 84 miles, based on changes to EPA test calculations. Meanwhile, every other electric model from...