Wires dominate passenger rail, batteries bridge unelectrified gaps, and hydrogen adds a separate fuel-production and refuelling system to an otherwise electric train.
India’s first hydrogen passenger train arrived with an impressive label attached: the world’s most powerful hydrogen train. That’s a genuine engineering accomplishment, but it isn’t the competition railway operators are trying to win. They need trains that leave the depot, cover the timetable, receive fuel or charge reliably, return from … [continued]
Once touted as a possible “Norway of the Pacific,” New Zealand’s electric vehicle transition was stopped in its tracks by a change of government. The new conservative government reversed the generous tax incentives for EVs and brought in a road user charge. EV sales plummeted. Sounds like another country we … [continued]
The race is on in the robotaxi industry to get into new markets, build up customer bases, and edge out the competition before they arrive — or at least at these nascent stages when no one is too massive or dominant. I just covered news of Zoox launching paid service … [continued]
Zoox has been allowed to do self-driving vehicle and robotaxi testing for a long time, but it hasn’t been allowed to charge passengers for them. Now, however, that has changed — Zoox got approval last week from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to deploy up to 5,000 robotaxis … [continued]
Portland, Oregon — Today, the United States District Court for the District of Oregon ruled in favor of clean energy developers in a legal challenge against Donald Trump’s Department of Defense for freezing reviews of wind projects and delaying development for renewable energy. The review freeze created a “de-facto moratorium” on new wind, … [continued]
Washington, D.C. — Today, energy company RWE announced a deal with the Trump administration in which the administration will pay the company $1.22 billion in exchange for the company cancelling three offshore wind projects and doubling down on LNG. This is the fifth time Donald Trump has paid off energy companies in … [continued]
The Chinese government has released new mandatory national standards regarding the safety requirements of autonomous driving systems. Nothing needs to be done urgently, as the new standards don’t go into effect until July 1, 2027. The standards apply to M- and N-category vehicles with Level 3 and Level 4 autonomous … [continued]
Ford is still playing its forthcoming midsized electric pickup truck close to the vest, but the EV finally has a name: Fathom.
On March 6, 2024, Nathan Owen, a resident of the UK, phoned police and told them his Jaguar I-Pace electric car had gone berserk on a motorway in Merseyside, a seaside area that includes the city of Liverpool. He told the police his car had suddenly accelerated and he could … [continued]
It’s been over a year since Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) charged into the US federal government. His team fired thousands of government employees. Then they realized that so many problems emerged that they had to restaff many of those positions. Oops! It wasn’t lack of efficiency … [continued]
