Weekly-ish News - Episode 45 (June 5, 2022)

What's the Alternative?

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Vehicles:

Electric vehicles had record sales in Q1 of 2022 by a significant margin.

There's some interesting data in the article, with the most interesting thing being the chart of EV sales over the last decade, the chart looks pretty exponential.

Around half of the higher-risk Chevy Bolts included in the battery recall have been fixed.

This article discusses whether or not chasing 350kW chargers for an EV that can accept that speed of charging, and the complexity of the article is a clear example of why we really need to find a better way to discuss charging speeds.

The main point of the article is that, since there aren't many 350kW chargers out there, planning a trip around hitting those chargers won't save you time over simply going to slightly slower (150kW) chargers that are closer to your planned route.
The article is more interesting in its discussion around the actual charge rates the author saw while testing the Ioniq 5 and EV6, which were all over the place compared to the stated power of the chargers.

Lucid has increased prices across the board by up to $15,000 for their vehicles effective June 1, 2022, but will honor the prices of current reservation holders.

This puts the starting price of a Lucid Air at $88,900.
They still expect to hit their target of 12-14k vehicles produced by the end of the year.

Volvo's entire 2023 lineup of vehicles will be, at minimum, hybrids.

This is awesome.

We now have a full review by Green Car Reports of the Genesis GV60, which is basically a luxury version of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 that starts at $59,980.

We also now have pricing information for the Cadillac Lyriq, which will start at $62,990.

Freightliner is slated to begin production of their eCascadia electric semi by the end of the year.

The semi will have up to 230mi/370km of range, which is quite close to the number that fleets were asking for at ACT Expo (around 250mi/400km).
It will have up to a 438kWh battery pack.

Both Kia and Tesla have stopped included Level 1 (120V) chargers with their electric vehicles.

They claim usage is very low, which may be true, but it's still absolutely asinine to sell a vehicle without a way to charge the vehicle included in the purchase.
Level 1 charging is a crucial emergency feature that is very low cost on the side of the automaker.
Maybe in 5-10 years this will make sense, but given how immature the market is, this is an absolutely obscene decision.

Lordstown Motors says that they need an additional $150m to get production rolling.

Lordstown Motors has completed the sale of its factory to Foxconn, who will do the actual manufacturing of Lordstown's trucks.

This comes with a $100m investment by Foxconn in a joint venture to engineer new EVs.
They still claim to be on track to begin production in the third quarter of 2022.

Ford has sold more of its shares in Rivian, bringing its investment from 12% to 10% of Rivian's value.

The Rocky Mountain Institute argues that time-of-use charging and smart charging programs can decrease the carbon impact of EVs by up to 18%.

They basically argue that EVs won't increase electricity's carbon impact because smart charging can take advantage of lower carbon electricity at the right times, but this isn't really a guarantee.

Deployment:

Westerville, Ohio has deployed 16 new Level 2 chargers across the city.

The Swedish company, Volta, is planning on bringing 100 electric trucks to the U.S. to be used as a pilot for their "truck as a service" business model, and eventually begin manufacturing trucks in the U.S. by 2025.

These initial trucks will be Class 7 trucks with a range around 100mi (160km).

Chatham Area Transit in Georgia has deployed 6 electric transit buses into their fleet of 62 buses.

The University of Virginia is getting 4 electric transit buses from Proterra, adding to its fleet of about 40 buses.

This is part of a strategy to become carbon-neutral by 2030 and fossil-fuel free by 2050.

Charlotte, North Carolina is piloting light pole-mounted EV chargers that focus on usage data collection and sharing, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy.

The first charger is being used approximately once per day.
Four more of these chargers will be installed by the end of the year.

Energy:

Rivian has financed 1 MW of solar power at the Paris Solar Farm in Tennessee to provide electricity for its Waypoint network in Tennessee's state parks.

The solar farm is still in construction and should begin operations by the end of 2022.
It will produce a total of 6.75MW.

SpaceX is expanding its solar farm in Boca Chica, Texas by about 30%, adding around 750kW of solar power.

The bank OZK has completed construction of a 4.8MW solar plant that will produce enough power to supply 40 of its locations as well as their headquarters.

Houston County, Texas now has 68MW of additional solar power.

The city of Urbana, Illinois has a new 5.2MW solar farm installed on an old landfill.

The Minnesota Department of Commerce has opened a grant program called Solar for Schools which will award grants of up to 95% of project costs for schools to install solar power.

There is $7.5m available through this program.
Each school district can install up to 80kW of solar.

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) issued a finding of no significant impact for the Humboldt Wind Energy Area off the coast of California, which allows a lease sale to move forward for the region.

The area has the capacity for around 1.6GW of wind production.
This is an early step towards leasing the area for development, but it's a very significant one.

The company RiverCap Ventures plans to recycle 200 old wind turbine blades to make benches, planters, tables, and other outdoor equipment.

They begin production in August 2022.
It's apparently hard to grind the fiberglass blades for use in cement and such, so they're avoiding that by simply cutting the blades and utilizing their structural integrity.
They are building two more facilities in the U.S. to do this sort of recycling, which is around a $10m investment.

A seven-year study found that the Block Island Wind Farm did not negatively impact fish habitats.

The study was funded by the wind industry, so some skepticism is prudent.
A link to the study.

The U.S. federal government has announced a plan to use over $12b to modernize Puerto Rico's grid, focusing on renewable energy and resiliency.

Policy:

The U.S. Department of Energy has officially opened up a notice of intent for the $2.5b of funding for grid transmission through the Infrastructure Bill.

This sort of "notice of intent" is important for gathering industry feedback and the allow the industry time to plan for how to take advantage of the funding (such as beginning partnerships, raising capital, etc.).

The U.S. General Service Administration (GSA) has issued new standards requiring lower-carbon cement and asphalt to be used in all GSA projects.

This should result in a 20% reduction in carbon emissions associated with concrete and asphalt for GSA construction projects.

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