Emerging Technologies

You can make a coherent, logical argument for cars that don't burn gasoline without once mentioning global petroleum supply. You can talk about international relations and the power of gasoline exporters (just read the first three paragraphs of this for a bit of history). You can talk about ...

Hybrid electric vehicles are gaining appeal for fleets of all types as more models make it to showrooms bearing a variety of price tags. Even commercial fleets are finding more available products, from pickups and vans to medium-duty trucks. Now, there's a new option. XL Hybrids, Inc., and the ...

Sure, your first response to the idea of Tesla introducing a battery swap system might be, "what, this again?" After all, we heard in 2009 that the Model S was built with battery swaps in mind and, in 2011, Tesla CEO Elon Musk explained the Model S battery swap idea this way: "When people take an ...

China seems to be hedging its bets on meeting stiffening emissions and fuel economy regulations, and addressing consumer demand for cleaner air. Electric vehicles remain part of the strategy, but their high cost, limited range and lack of infrastructure have kept sales at a slow pace. Hmm, that ...

Turns out, the good folks at Audi aren't nihilists. The German automaker has joined up with Columbia University researchers to make predictions about city life in 2050, when 7 billion people will be urban dwellers. The result is five potential future scenarios, and none of them involve world ...

BMW brought 80 software developers and computer programmers together to tackle the themes of sustainability and electro-mobility in a hackathon last month. BMW hosted the Sustainability Hackathon to deal with a widespread problem – electric vehicles that get parked at charging stations ...

Looks like Tesla might be hiding more in its software than blind spot detection and adaptive cruise control. According to Bloomberg, Tesla CEO Elon Musk is "discussing" autonomous cars with Google, specifically the Lidar laser tracking system. Oh, and if you're going to have a self-driving future ...

In February, the world's best-known plug-in battery-swapping network left California. Now, it looks like the state's not too keen on the concept. The California Air Resources Board (CARB), which is leading the effort to increase the number of zero-emissions vehicles (ZEV) in the state in the ...

Lithium-ion battery developer A123 Systems is re-emerging from its bankruptcy and sale to China-based Wanxiang Group as ... well, we're not sure exactly what. Wanxiang is starting a new division called A123 Venture Technologies, Green Car Congress says. The buzzwords are strategic partnerships ...

UK-based transmission engineering and control specialist Vocis wants to take electric vehicles in another direction, one with dual clutch transmissions. Vocis says its dual clutch transmissions provide seamless shifting and up to 15 percent improvement in EV efficiency. Vocis' DCT is currently on ...