As automakers work to reduce emissions—and the carbon impact of driving—by electrifying their vehicles, the environmental impact of the rest of a car becomes more significant. Audi has joined a growing list of manufacturers looking to mitigate this by using more sustainable materials for car interiors. The effort covers not only the... Audi plans to increase recycled materials in its mainstream vehicles
As automakers work to reduce emissions—and the carbon impact of driving—by electrifying their vehicles, the environmental impact of the rest of a car becomes more significant. Audi has joined a growing list of manufacturers looking to mitigate this by using more sustainable materials for car interiors. The effort covers not only the... 
General Motors is reportedly planning to build the Cruise Origin electric driverless shuttle at its Detroit-Hamtramck plant—the former assembly plant for the Chevrolet Volt, as well as the plant expected to make GM’s electric pickup and some of the 20 electric nameplates due globally by 2023. The news comes via the Detroit News, citing... 
Honda has completed two virtual power purchase agreements (VPPAs) for renewable power to be produced in Texas and Oklahoma. These new agreements will help the company offset carbon from the energy it consumes at its manufacturing facilities. In 2020, Honda will purchase 530,000 Mwh per year from a wind farm in Oklahoma and then, in the fall of... 
Volvo’s Polestar electric performance vehicle brand is, step by step, asserting itself as a standalone automaker. And two of the largest leaps yet were announced by the brand today. One of them is that Polestar’s first production facility, in Chengdu, is now open and making the Polestar 1, a sleek high-performance plug-in hybrid sport... 
Tesla hasn’t yet decided on a production location for its Model Y crossover, which by the carmaker’s recent estimates it hopes to deliver in fall 2020. In today’s quarterly financial call, CEO Elon Musk revealed that it was very seriously considering building the Model Y at the one place that he’d previously ruled out: the... 
As Volkswagen ramps up to build a new generation of mass-market electric vehicles in the aftermath of its diesel scandal, regulators and environmental groups will likely be paying close attention to their emissions—especially the emissions created in making them. The Financial Times, in a Sunday report, presented some interesting pieces of... 
Last year employee parking lots overflowed at Tesla’s Fremont, California, plant. By comparing the headcount of Tesla's factory at present versus historically, it’s easy to grasp why the facility has seemed so crowded. At its heyday, Toyota and GM needed 4,400 people at Fremont. Tesla has an on-site workforce estimated to be... 
The forthcoming diesel-powered 2019 Chevrolet Silverado will, without a doubt, thump with the Heartbeat of America. During the new truck's launch at the 2018 North American International Auto Show in Detroit, GM product chief Mark Reuss hinted at a future announcement regarding the next-generation truck and the Michigan city of Flint, where it... 
When it comes to materials with the most promise in automotive applications, carbon fiber and graphene each rank high on the list. Unlike graphene, however, real-world carbon fiber applications exist today—and they're helping automakers reduce the weight of cars coming tomorrow. There's one big, unfortunate, and somewhat ironic problem with... 
Relatively few auto-company CEOs would publicly mention sleeping on the roof of one of their factory buildings. But Tesla CEO Elon Musk is not like most other chief executives of auto companies. Most also don't break news via tweet, for instance. A tweet by Musk Thursday evening referred to the eighth circle of Hell and suggested he'd slept on the...