Tesla is reportedly planning to produce its affordable $25,000 Model 2 at its Shanghai plant to regain market share from Chinese EV makers. Stellantis is experimenting with battery swapping technology in Europe through a partnership with Ample, while also challenging California's CARB over emission agreements. Political tensions rise as Republicans push to revoke Biden's EV mandates. Renault aims to drastically expand AI use to cut costs and emissions, and Honda teases bold new EV designs ahead of CES. Additionally, rising repair costs are shifting service patterns, Toyota expands battery recycling in the U.S., and GM's Hydro Tech advances fuel cell tech for heavy-duty trucks. The market sees a decline in low-cost models, potentially opening opportunities for Chinese vehicles.
Topics:tesla model 2 productionbattery swappingcalifornia emission regulationsus ev political debaterenault artificial intelligencehonda ev designvehicle repair trendsbattery recyclingfuel cell truckslow cost vehicle market
- Tesla Model 2 May Be Built in China - Stellantis Jumps Into Battery Swapping - Stellantis Files Petition Against CARB - Republicans Attack Biden EV Mandates - Renault Says AI Will Transform Manufacturing - Honda Teases New EV Series - Car Dealers Lose Service to Lack of Trust - Toyota Announces New Battery Recycling Deal - GM Hydrotec Lands Deal with Autocar - Bye-Bye Low Cost Cars
"... growing faster. It says that the Model three and Model Y just aren't as competitive as they were when they..."
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So this is Onderline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry. Tesla may start making its twenty five thousand dollars car at its plant
in Shanghai. A media outlet in China called Late Post reports that Tesla will
boost production at the plant to two million cars a year from one point one million today, and that extra production will likely be for a cheaper car, which many people are calling the Model two. Late Post says that Tesla really
needs a new model in China because it's losing market shared to Chinese EV makers who are growing faster. It says that the Model three and Model Y just
aren't as competitive as they were when they launched, and that's why it believes that additional production capacity will be for the twenty five thousand dollars car. Well,
here's a fascinating development. Stillantis wants to get into battery swapping for its
electric vehicle. It's working with a Bay Area startup called Ample to swap batteries
in the Fiat five hundred ease that are part of Stalantis's free to move car sharing service in Europe. They're also talking about expanding that to its other EV
models in other regions, presumably in North America. AMPLE says its charging stations
can be built quick and cheap and can be located just about anywhere. AMPLE
uses a modular battery that it says can fit into any EV and that it can swap out batteries in less than five minutes. The first swapping stations will
open in Madrid next year to service one hundred Fiat five hundred ease. And
speaking of Stalantis, it's really upset with the California Air Resources Board. It
accuses the agency of favoring several of its competitors, which is leaving it at a competitive disadvantage. It accuses CARB of retaliating against it with a quote underground
regular litory scheme. CARB forms separate more flexible emission agreements in twenty nineteen to
twenty twenty with Ford, BMW, Honda, Volkswagen, in Volvo. Stillanta
says it was excluded from getting a similar agreement because it joined the Trump administration's effort to revoke krb's waiber from the EPA that allows it to set stricter emission standards than the federal government. Stillanta says CARB violated state law by not giving
public notice about the agreements and not allowing the public to comment on them.
The Automaker is also accusing the agency of violating its First Amendment rights, so it filed a petition with the California Office of Administrative Law for it to take legal action against CARB And we'll have to watch and see how far it gets with this, and to show you how political evs are becoming as we get closer to next year's presidential election, Republics in the US House of Representatives want to revoke the Biden administration's EVY mandates. Two hundred and sixteen Republicans and five
Democrats voted to prevent emission regulations that would result in two thirds of vehicles being electric by twenty thirty two. The White House has threatened to veto the legislation,
which says it would quote catastrophically impair the EPA's ability to issue autoregulations.
Automakers, dealers and the UAW have also urged the administration to set less stringent standards and so this is clearly going to be a hot button topic in next year's election. At sees January ninth through twelve, twenty twenty four, and
treppid's looking forward to seeing you at our booth three six sixty sixth Las Vegas Convention Center in the West Hall. We'll be demonstrating the latest and greatest in
the software defined vehicles and jornal architectures, automotive ethernet technologies like ten base two on us and I'll take a gibbit CUSCS twenty twenty four Las Vegas Convention Center in West Halpbooth three sixty sixty six or visit interpidcs dot com slash sales.
Renolta's artificial intelligence is going to completely transform its industrial base. Right now,
the group uses over three hundred AI applications, mostly for the analysis of images and sound, which is done for things like predictive maintenance. It says this
has already helped it save two hundred and seventy million euros and cut energy consumption at industrial sites by twenty percent. However, by twenty twenty five, Renault
wants to bump its number of AI applications to three thousand. It says that
will reduce energy consumption at industrial sites by twenty percent more by twenty twenty five, result in production costs per ice vehicle dropping by thirty percent and fifty percent for EV's by twenty twenty seven, allow it to cut vehicle development time by a full year, slash vehicle delivery time by sixty percent, and cut the carbon footprint of vehicle production by half. Looks like Honda is going in a
bold styling direction with its future evs. It showed off this teaser image of
a new EV model series that will debut at CES in about a month.
I would guess this is the front end of the vehicle which has a very steep slope, and also notice how far forward the wheels are shoved. But
this is all we have to go on right now. We'll learn more on
January ninth at CES, where Honda will also reiterate its plans to introduce thirty new evs by twenty thirty and go fully electric with its automotive sales by twenty forty, which will include both beevs and fuel cells. Higher new car prices
are causing owners to hold onto their vehicle's lone and that means more trips to the repair shop. According to Cox, automotive owners had to take their vehicle
in for service two and a half times on average this year, which was up from two point three times in twenty twenty one. Worse, they're paying
forty five percent more for that work than they were in twenty twenty one.
The average trip to the dealer cost owners two hundred and fifty eight bucks.
You might think that would be a contributing factor to more people going to independent repair shops for work, but the average price to go to a non dealer service center was two hundred and forty nine dollars, so less than a ten dollars difference. Cock says the biggest reason for total dealership service dropping from thirty
five percent down to thirty percent is lack of trust, and because of that, change stores like Quick Oil change Places entire replacement centers now controlled nearly the same amount of the repair market as dealers. But one advantage for dealers could
be evs. They're hiring more technicians that know how to work on electrics,
and Cox's study showed that EV owners actually had to go in for service more than IC owners, an average of two point eight times for evs versus two point three times for ices. I think this is probably related to automakers still
working out the kinks with new evs, which should get better in time, but for now it could be a way for dealers to gain it advantage.
The only way that evs make environmental sense is if their batteries get recycled at the end of their life. That's why Toyota is joining forces with Servia Solutions
to greatly expand its battery recycling network in the United States. Serba will collect
batteries from use Toyota hybrids, pehabs, and battery electrics and recycle them at one of its facilities in Lancaster, Ohio. That plant will concentrate on recycling
batteries from the East coast in Midwest. Service says it can recover ninety five
percent of the materials in a battery and process them to go back into the supply chain to make new batteries. GM's hydro Tech business unit, which makes
fuel cells, is going to supply them to a company called Autocar Industries.
It makes customized work trucks like cement mixers, dump trucks, and tractors for depots. Autocar will start installing fuel cells in a Class eight semi and a
front end loader at its plant in Alabama in twenty twenty five. While the
fuel cells will be made by hydro Tech in Michigan. Each fuel cell will
produce seventy seven kilowatts of power. Charlie Freese, the executive director of Hydrotech,
says fuel cells are better suited than batteries for towing, hauling heavy loads, and driving more than five hundred miles at a time. Hydrotech also says
it has a major announcement coming next month Monday, and we'll let you know more about that as soon as we get the info. The number of low
cost models in the US and Europe is dwindling. According to SMP Global Mobility,
the number of vehicles priced under thirty thousand dollars fell from fifty percent in the US market in twenty seventeen to about twenty five percent today, and the same thing is happening in Europe, where the number of A and B segment models drop from one hundred and ninety and twenty fourteen to one hundred and sixty today and will probably go to one hundred and twenty four next year. And
we think it's because it's so difficult to make a profit on those small cars, but SMP says that could open the door for more low cost Chinese vehicles and that brings us to the end of this show. However, don't forget
to check out Autoline After Hours, which goes live at three pm Eastern Time on our website and YouTube channel. Auto Line Daily is brought to you by
Bridgestone Solutions for your journey and by Intrepid Control Systems over the air engineering boost your game.
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