Electric Vehicles

SEOUL, Aug 27 (Reuters) – LG Chem shares fell to a nine-month low on Friday, as assurances from General Motors of a continued relationship with it failed to calm investor worries stemming from GM’s recall of electric vehicles (EVs) powered by the South Korean firm’s batteries.

LG Chem Ltd (051910.KS) shares slid as much as 3.9% to the lowest since November and were on track for their worst week since early last year with a 14% decline.

General Motors Co’s (GM.N) CEO Mary Barra signalled on Thursday the automaker would continue its relationship with LG Energy Solution (LGES), the battery supplier at the heart of its $1.8 billion vehicle recall, Bloomberg News reported.

She also said that the automaker had “multiple pathways” to secure a leading position in the transition to EVs.

GM last week expanded its recall of Bolt EVs due to fire risk from what it called battery manufacturing defects, saying the recall would cost $1 billion and it would seek reimbursement from the South Korean firm. read more

GM, LGES and LG Electronics Inc (066570.KS) are still investigating the cause of manufacturing defects.

The on-going investigation and media reports that speculate the cause of battery fire have created uncertainty, leading to a drop in LG Chem shares, analysts said.

In April, GM and LGES said they would build a second U.S. battery cell manufacturing plant in Spring Hill, Tennessee. Their first joint U.S. battery plant is under construction in Lordstown, Ohio. read more

In July, GM initially recalled 69,000 Bolt EVs for fire risks, resulting in a recall of a total of 142,000 vehicles at an estimated cost of $1.8 billion. read more

GM has since said it would indefinitely halt Bolt sales.

Shares of LG Electronics, which assembles LGES cells into battery modules and packs, were trading down 0.7% as of 0305 GMT, versus the broader market’s (.KS11) 0.3% rise.

LG Chem was down 2%.

Reporting by Heekyong Yang; Editing by Himani Sarkar

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Eugene Reichmann is not worried that his new electric car could electrocute someone.

“[The car] is touted amongst the community as being probably the safest vehicle on the market, in terms of crash survivability of the occupants,” he said.

But he was surprised to find that his new car needs warning labels.

“It was just an annoyance more so than anything else,” he said.

“I bought the car from a dealer, the dealer should have told me, the registration papers that I received should have mentioned that there needs to be a tag on these things.”

That will not take long to sort out.

“It’s probably going to take me all of about five minutes and taking the license plate on and off is going to be the longest part of that process,” he said.

From October electric and hybrid cars in Queensland need small blue warning tags displayed on the number plates.

Battery power packs in these vehicles can kill someone

Queensland’s Department of Transport and Main Roads (TMR) said this was so emergency services do not get a shock when responding to crashes involving electric cars.

“The battery power packs in these vehicles can kill someone, they have that much power in them,” TMR safety and regulation general manager Andrew Mahon said.

In a car crash, that can be a risk to firefighters and paramedics attending the scene.

“So we’ve got to make sure that we look after our emergency services personnel … when they’re doing the thing that we want them to do, which is save people’s lives, and make sure that everyone’s safe at the scene of an accident,” Mr Mahon said.

TMR has written to the owners of Queensland’s 35,000 electric and hybrid cars, notifying them that the tags need to be fitted.

The reflective tags may seem small but firefighters say it helps them identify at a glance that they are dealing with a car that has a powerful battery.

“It’s an easy identifier, so we don’t have to go around and try and find a vehicle badge or something that says it’s a hybrid or electric vehicle,” station officer Paul Omanski said.

Technology helping to identify and avoid dangers

If the crash is so bad that both number plates are unrecognisable, firefighters also have new technology to help them.

A mobile phone application allows them to identify specific cars and any dangers they may pose.

“So anyone who needs to attend to a vehicle crash involving an electric vehicle, or any other vehicle for that matter, can have access to this and it will show us all the hazards involved with that particular vehicle,” Mr Omanski said.

The app has been loaded onto more than 400 devices carried by Queensland Fire and Emergency Service units across Queensland.

Once the danger is identified, crews can work to remove the risk of electrocution.

Mr Mahon said the tags on the cars are needed for now because most of the cars on the road are still petrol powered.

“But at some stage in the future, most of the vehicles on our road may be electric or some other kind of power source and we may not need the tags anymore,” he said.

LONDON, Aug 26 (Reuters) – Net zero emission targets will require widespread adoption of fully electric vehicles by private motorists but there are significant social and economic barriers that will have to be overcome to make this a reality.

Motorists’ fears about the availability of charging points, running out of power on long journeys, and lengthy waiting times to top up the battery (collectively known as “range anxiety”) are often cited as the main obstacle.

But the bigger problem is the high upfront capital cost of buying fully electric vehicles compared with hybrids and traditional gasoline and diesel-fuelled cars, which is a major barrier for middle and lower-income households.

Seventy years of research into the diffusion of innovations and new technologies has shown early adopters usually have more social and economic advantages (“Diffusion of innovations”, Rogers, 1965 and 2003).

For most innovations, individuals and households with more years of education, higher incomes, greater wealth, and more occupational prestige are more likely to be early adopters than counterparts without these advantages.

Larger corporations, schools and farms are also likely to be early adopters of innovations than their smaller counterparts because they have a greater capacity to shoulder risk from the inevitable innovation failures.

Like many other innovations, fully electric vehicles require a large capital outlay in exchange for longer-term reductions in operating costs, and that may put them beyond reach of many middle and lower-income groups.

In Britain, for example, the price gap between purchasing a zero-emission vehicle and a conventional one did not narrow much between 2011 and 2020, according to a report from the National Audit Office.

Purchase prices for zero-emission vehicles before subsidies were still 13,000 pounds ($16,700) higher on average in 2020, down from 16,000 pounds in 2011 (“Reducing carbon emissions from cars”, NAO, Feb. 19).

In the interim, electric vehicle manufacturers focused on extending driving range by installing larger and more expensive batteries, which has kept capital costs higher, and acts as a barrier to more widespread diffusion.

USED CAR MARKET

Widespread adoption of fully electric vehicles will require a well-supplied market for second-hand and third-hand used vehicles to make them affordable to a much wider cross-section of the population.

In Britain, fully electric vehicles accounted for 7% of new cars sold in 2020, though their market share was temporarily boosted by collapsing sales of internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles during the pandemic.

But more than 97% of new fully electric vehicles were purchased by business or fleet buyers, rather than private motorists, according to a recent report by the Transport Committee of the House of Commons.

Private motorists are much more likely to purchase a used vehicle. In the typical life cycle, a vehicle is initially sold to a business or fleet customer, then resold to private motorists after a few years.

In 2019, 2.3 million (22%) new cars were registered compared with 7.9 million (78%) used car sales, according to the committee (“Zero emission vehicles”, Transport Committee, House of Commons, July 28).

Fully electric vehicles have remained significantly more expensive to buy than internal combustion engine (ICE) equivalents, deterring private purchasers, even if there are long-run savings from cheaper energy.

Crucially, fully electric vehicles are still more expensive than ICE and hybrid equivalents when they enter the second-hand market, which continues to discourage more widespread uptake.

But there are fears that their value could also collapse in future when a flood of used electric vehicles enters the market in the middle of the decade, exceeding buyers willing to pay current residual prices.

The possibility of a sudden drop in residual values means new electric vehicles remain significantly more expensive at present as finance companies incorporate the potential loss in resale value into current leases payments.

“A healthy used electric vehicle market is critical to ensuring that electric vehicles are not the sole preserve of people who can afford new models,” the Transport Committee concluded.

Fully electric vehicles sold to business and fleet buyers will eventually reach the second-hand and third-hand market at affordable prices, but there is likely to be a lengthy delay.

Diffusion is also hampered by the mismatch between expensive upscale vehicles being produced and sold to businesses, fleets and wealthy private buyers and the smaller, cheaper versions that will be needed in the second-hand market in a few years.

CHARGING COSTS

Lower income households are likely to face significantly higher electricity costs for charging their vehicles because they are likely to rely more heavily on public charging points rather than charging at home.

Policymakers expect most fully electric vehicles will be charged at home overnight, taking advantage of cheap off-peak electricity, and possibly allowing owners to earn further discounts by providing grid balancing services.

But 30% of British households do not have access to off-street parking, which means they will have to rely on public charging points, which are likely to remain more expensive, and cannot participate in grid balancing.

Public charging points are currently two to four times more expensive than charging at home, and likely to remain more expensive, given the need for providers to earn a return on their investment.

Reliance on expensive public charging will therefore disproportionately hit lower-income and other households in densely populated inner-city areas where many residents do not have off-street parking.

The Transport Committee called on the government to “explain how it plans to tackle the potential price differential faced by people who cannot charge their vehicles at home.”

Public charging points are also unevenly distributed, with an averaging of 34 per 100,000 residents across the country but ranging from 80 per 100,000 in London to just 20 in the Yorkshire and Humber region.

Huge numbers of additional public charging points will be required over the next decade and policymakers will have to resolve uneven local coverage.

Policymakers will have to tackle provision in both densely populated urban areas (where households will be highly reliant on them) and sparsely populated rural ones (where the low number of users may not make them economic).

LEFT BEHIND?

Technological innovations almost always create winners and losers, and the last adopters are often among the poorest groups in society, with the most limited financial resources and high levels of risk aversion.

The rollout of fully electric vehicles could entrench disadvantages for already deprived groups that cannot afford to upgrade and get stuck with ICE vehicles for an extended period.

There is a risk of entrenching inequalities if policymakers favour fully electric vehicles while penalising ICE users without protecting those who cannot rapidly adopt the new technology for financial or practical reasons.

John Kemp is a Reuters market analyst. The views expressed are his own.

Related columns:

– IEA’s roadmap shows difficult journey to net zero (Reuters, July 30

– Oil price spike would accelerate U.S. shift to electric vehicles (Reuters, July 1)

– Who will pay for the energy transition? (Reuters, April 27)

– Ensuring the energy transition is equitable (Reuters, April 8)

Editing by David Evans

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

President Joe Biden’s push for more Americans to use electric vehicles is creating angst amongst some Iowa ethanol advocates who argue the single-track goal could come at environmental and economic costs.

Why it matters: Electric vehicles create more competition at the gas pump, potentially hurting Iowa farmers’ pockets who rely on corn and ethanol sales.

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Driving the news: This month, Biden released an infrastructure plan that aggressively pushes electric vehicles as a way to cut carbon emissions and boost domestic car and battery manufacturing.

• It sets a goal that 50% of all new cars sold in 2030 should be zero-emissions models.

• Yes, but: The plan scarcely mentions biofuels, which has led to criticism from Iowa Republicans and Democrats, as well as ethanol advocates.

What they’re saying: Ethanol can also help reduce carbon emissions, but not if the federal government undermines it by primarily funding the electric vehicle industry, said Monte Shaw of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association.

Change is happening whether Iowa likes it or not, but liquid fuels still aren’t going anywhere, said Matt Russell of Iowa Interfaith Power & Light.

• But an ethanol vs. electric debate is highly partisan, which leaves no winner at the end, Russell said.

• Instead, they should coexist like Des Moines’ fleet of electric cars and biodiesel dump trunks.

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The funding round, participated by existing investors as well as new ones, enables e.GO to accelerate its effort in transforming the urban electromobility, by enhancing the production of its e.GO Life platform, driving the development of additional models and offering unique value adding features to the customers including the battery swap.

The funding round also highlights the investors’ confidence in e.GO’s successful trajectory and the progress it has made in becoming one of the only western independent Battery Electric Vehicle companies that are actually in production and delivering cars to customers.

“We are very pleased with the success of the Series C funding but, above that, with the vote of confidence from our investors. The team at e.GO is determined, more than ever, to drive the much-needed transformation to carbon-free urban mobility by offering an electric vehicle like no other.” says Ali Vezvaei, Chairman of the Board at Next.e.GO Mobile SE.

Next.e.GO Mobile SE

Next.e.GO Mobile SE, headquartered in Aachen, is a manufacturer of electric vehicles and sustainable mobility systems. Around 400 employees of Next.e.GO Mobile SE are working in agile teams on various cost-effective, particularly durable and sustainable electric vehicles for short-distance traffic.

ND Group B.V.

nd Group B.V. is a Private Equity and Holding company, headquartered in the Netherlands. Founded in 2008, the firm is primarily focused on EV, Alternative Energy, Fintech, HealthTech, Industrial assets and real estate.

Contact:
Next.e.GO Mobile SE
Public Relations
Lilienthalstraße 1
52074 Aachen                                                                                                                                        
T +49 241 47574-227                                                                                                   
[email protected]

ND Group B.V.
Public Relations
Flight Forum 880
5657 DV Eindhoven,
The Netherlands
Phone: +31 40 30 40 50 1
[email protected]

SOURCE Next.e.GO Mobile SE

Australia’s largest electric vehicle (EV) charging network, Chargefox, has celebrated the 20,000^th user of its app, a particularly impressive milestone in a country that is not currently known for its forward-thinking EV adoption and policy support.

It’s been a good year for Chargefox, the Melbourne-headquartered EV charging network that completed the first phase of its national ultra-fast EV charging network in May, commissioning the 22^nd DC fast charger in Cooma, NSW.

The Chargefox ultra-fast EV charging network now stretches from Cairns in northern Queensland down the eastern seaboard to Melbourne, and across the south coast to Adelaide. Chargefox also operates two ultra-fast chargers in Western Australia, not to mention managing the Queensland Electric Super Highway.

And these are just the company’s ultra-fast chargers, with Chargefox’s entire network consisting of over 850 chargers located across the country.

Chargefox continued its momentum in June, announcing that it is targeting 5,000 EV charging points across Australia by 2025 – a target which will include at least 2,000 fast and/or ultra-rapid charging speeds.

“In 2018 Chargefox built Australia’s first-ever ultra-rapid station, and since then our network has grown to over 850 plugs,” said Marty Andrews, CEO of Chargefox, speaking in late-June. “Our goal is to connect the infrastructure needed to help mass EV uptake and reduce road transport emissions.

“We’ve made significant progress over the past few years, having powered more than 5 million carbon-free kms and abating around 1500 tonnes of carbon emissions.”

The good news continued for Chargefox, which announced on Wednesday that it had topped 20,000 users on its Chargefox app – available on both the Google Android store as well as the Apple App Store.

We’ve just welcomed our 20,000th Chargefox app user and to celebrate, we’re giving away a year of FREE fast charging. To enter, make sure you’ve downloaded the app and created an account before midnight on Sun 29 Aug – simple! More info: https://t.co/YmNy6KKVQG pic.twitter.com/BFbBsdeONd

— Chargefox (@Chargefox) August 24, 2021

“It’s a huge milestone for us, and means that over 80% of all BEV drivers in Australia have a Chargefox account!” the company said on their website.

The news that Chargefox has reached 20,000 registered Chargefox app users is good news – though, exactly how many of those users are “active” users is another matter.

Chargefox clarified in private communication that it’s figures showed over 20,000 registered users, but whether or not “over 80% of all BEV drivers” in Australia are actually using Chargefox is potentially another matter altogether.

A recent “State of Electric Vehicles” report published this week by the Electric Vehicle Council reported that 8,688 electric vehicles were sold across Australia in the first half of 2021 – already a 25% increase on the total number of electric vehicles sold in 2020, and 30% up on the number of EVs sold in 2019.

But before 2019, EV sales in Australia barely topped 2,000, so while it is certainly likely there are by now over 20,000 EVs on Australia’s roads, it’d probably be a close-run thing.

Nevertheless, in celebration of whatever metric Chargefox is using to measure 20,000 app users, the company is running a competition to give away 12 months of free fast charging. To be eligible to enter, you must be an Australian resident aged 18 years and over and have downloaded the Chargefox App and created a user account before 11.59pm on Sunday 29^th August, 2021 – so there are still a few days left for EV owners to enter.

BOULDER, CO — As many Coloradans continue to deal with unhealthy pollution levels, some are looking for ways to cut down on their vehicle use. One solution is parked in Boulder’s 1500 Pearl parking garage — an all-electric Colorado CarShare vehicle, now ready for use.

“We are thrilled to partner with Colorado CarShare to offer an all-electric shared vehicle to our community,” said Erika Vandenbrande, the city’s director of transportation and mobility.

“We’re working to build a mobility future that’s connected, shared and electric. This effort is a glimpse into that future.”

Colorado CarShare, a nonprofit organization, already has several shared cars in Boulder, and dozens of vehicles in Denver’s metro area.

“We thank the City of Boulder for supporting car share,” said Peter Krahenbuhl, CEO of Colorado CarShare. “Downtown Boulder is a great location to demonstrate the benefits of a car-light lifestyle. Since one car share vehicle replaces up to13 individually owned vehicles, using a fully electric shared car amplifies those benefits.”

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The city is providing one reserved parking space for the nonprofit, which will pay the costs to charge the new electric vehicle and pay one-third of the costs for the vehicle’s annual parking pass, the city said. The city will fund the remaining portion of the parking pass.

You can sign up to become a Colorado CarShare member here, and then reserve the car, pay associated rental fees and return the car to the same spot.