Residual value is how much a car is worth after you have used it for a while. If it's hard to know this, it can make buying or leasing electric cars tricky.
The federal tax credit is money the government gives back to people who buy electric cars to help make them cheaper. When this credit ends, fewer people might buy electric cars.
The Lucid Gravity is a new electric car that looks like a big SUV and uses electricity instead of gas. The company often updates its software to make the car work better and add new features.
The kilowatt hour number tells you how much power the car's battery can hold, which helps decide how far the car can go before needing to be charged again.
A self-charging hybrid is a type of car that uses both a gas engine and a battery. It charges its battery by using the engine and when you brake, so you don't have to plug it in. But it still needs gas to keep going.
LIVE
Welcome back to EV news daily today pump prices rise the Coupre born is refreshed and Ford
EV sales crater plus stay tuned because later in the show I'll tell you why you'll get more
money off an EV in the future by buying locally over on EV news China today we're talking about
BYD's great Tang the SAIC Huawei shooting break and Lee also troll VW on social media and join me
later for a bonus show called BYD's megawatt moment the new cars the new batteries and most
importantly the new charging hardware that just destroyed the argument that EVs can't fuel faster
than a gas gobbler it'll be live tonight for patrons and if you're on the free feed you've
only got to wait seven days it's one of the benefits of being one of the patreon supporters
you don't have to this podcast will always be free we reach far more people on the free feed
and spread the word about EVs but lots of people want to do the patreon thing it's how I earn
living and you can get little bonuses as well like being ad-free and also getting the shows first
let's kick off conflict in the Middle East has pushed oil prices higher with experts warning
UK drivers face steeper costs at the pumps Brent crude surged past $84 per barrel on Wednesday
its highest point since the US struck Iranian nuclear facilities last June
four court prices will briefly lag the RAC said the full impact on UK four court prices will only
be delayed by a week it urged fuel retailers not to pass on the price rises for fuel that they already
have however petrol and diesel prices famously as the saying goes rise like a rocket and fall like
a feather describing how petrol producers will raise prices when conflicts break out
but claim they can't reduce them when their costs fall because the petrol in the system
was made at a higher cost during the peak of Russia's invasion of Ukraine Brent crude was
$119 per barrel and UK petrol prices were £1.91 per litre UK drivers paying about 31 pounds or
$39 more per tank on average than before the conflict now I've seen a lot of websites a lot
of EV blogs a lot of EV social media people and a lot of general media talking about this topic
all week long as the prices have crept up may I perhaps offer my own editorial on this and then
I'll go away again maybe now's not the time to do a lap of honor if you're an EV driver
there is a human cost to conflict which I think we all know all too well plus if you really want
to bring people into the the big tent that is driving an EV I always tell people I bought I
bought an EV because it's better I mean it's better for the environment yes and it's a lot cheaper
overnight but I just wanted to buy one because it was so much better than the alternatives well
I don't know if poking and pointing fingers and laughing as you drive past the pumps at those
people who have to go about their business and do their jobs and their errands and go about their
life but through no fault of their owner paying more at the pump is that really the best way to
endear them to EVs hey I mean you do you but I I saw a lot of that kind of narrative this week
from generally very good EV media places that you know I learned from all the time so maybe I'm
outlier here but not how I saw taking advantage of a human conflict anyway let's move on now
electrifying corporate fleets in Europe could yield up to 246 billion euros in savings by 2030
according to a new report from e y and your electric full fleet electrification would cut
by a billion tons also by the end of the decade the report named fleet forward powering the
transition to electric mobility argues that cheaper running costs alone will not deliver mass EV
incentives and delays in charging infrastructure where it's needed the author's call for action
across fleet operators manufacturers policymakers the grid energy companies and finance as well
to match vehicles to the duty cycles they do oh my gosh this is something that I've been saying
for the last eight years of this podcast use case use case use case if you have an EV that's
12 000 pounds that's got a range of 150 miles and someone says oh but my diesel car goes more than
150 miles congratulations I mean you're absolutely right but that's not why that vehicle exists
like you know I don't know going to the shop to get a pint of milk in a bin lorry right
I mean you could do but it would be a sledgehammer to crack a nut right so this is what this says
you know educate fleets on what are the vehicles that you need going EV is very doable you just
need to engage some of the brain cells in the old noggin which some people are more capable of doing
than others kupra has unveiled a facelift for the borne it's MEB based compact built in zvickau
the update sits inside a wide around of changes inside the groups line up at volkswagen the styling
shifts probably most of the work kupra adds the new shark nose front end new bumpers new lights
continuous light strip at the back and new fabrics inside the under the skin the range is either a
58 kilowatt hour base variant and then two variants which is 79 kilowatt hours there's the range topping
vz which is 240 kilowatts of power they say 373 miles or 600 kilometers which is a nice bump
slightly it's up a little bit by a few miles that might just be the the more aero front end
doing the work there there's also a new trim the borne plus is a 58 kilowatt hour pack 140 kilowatt
motor which is down a little bit on the previous smallest motor but also and i'm not sure the
dc charging specs on that borne plus that small battery but will come in at a much lower price
so that's going to match you would think the capri now ford's capri has an lfp battery pack which is
that size and so you think that would probably be translated over the app 350 motor from volkswagen
used in the capri you would think is in the uh kupra careful how i say those two things not
confirmed but you would think so there is also a mention in the press material of a 5050 kilowatt
hour base variant but uh that's in the early press material that wasn't in today's announcement so
hey no no no also what's really i think interesting is the inside is so much better than the first
generation of those vehicles like the first volkswagen id3 good as they were room for improvement
and so the steering wheel has buttons the door panels are nicer fabrics less hard plasticky
scratchy stuff a bigger screen now inside and it's running android as well so really big quality of
improvements uh on that borne um pre facelift german pricing was around 45 000 euros so
wait and see what they come in at ford's us ev sales fell 71 percent last month in february
the steepest drop in its ev history it sold only 2122 evs in all of the us and that was down 71
percent on february from the previous year year to date ev sales are down 70 percent it's the
fifth straight month of year over year declines since uh coincidentally the federal tax credit
ended and they got rid of the ford f150 lightning program so you know as good as the mustang mac e
is ford have nothing new to sell you uh they're talking about hybrids and things like that but
until the new platform arrives there's not much action at ford for at least a year or two is there
really so we're looking forward to what's coming but that's a shame obviously over here we've got
things like the little ford puma gen e it's a cracking little car at mid 20s and then the capri
and the explorer which are cracking cars but i think a little too expensive anyway let's move on
lucid has pushed a software update to the gravity suv following its big january update that they say
fixed 95 percent of the problems this new one focuses on ac charging being boosted under specific
conditions and improving the availability and function of drive assist the pace of updates
hints at why lucid keeps shipping patches since launch gravity has averaged 24 days between
software updates uh but it has gone 134 days between major feature updates and so gravity
software problems drew the attention online on social media uh from very well-known youtube
creators uh things like the key fob recognition the navigation system uh forcing the ceo interim ceo
to admit that they fell short of customer expectations i also spoke with lucid's ima
dalala uh who is now in charge of the software engineering and the vehicle engineering uh
interviewed him for the batteries included podcast a couple of fridays ago and it really
was a kind of a mea culpa of yep we knew we of the things we got wrong we knew the things we
had to fix and largely they have done so i mean stuff like that i think should be celebrated
because how many companies can never admit they did anything wrong either head in the sand or just
refusal to admit it whereas lucid was okay we're not where we should have been they say a lot of
those problems are largely fixed mitzvishy will debut its first all new model since the eclipse
cross in canadian dealerships at least this year the new ev will come from the risa risan reno
nissan mitzvishy alliance which is still holding together nissan will supply the leaf and the
cmf ev platform and on that will be the new leaf based mitzvishy spy shots so it in showing
camouflage the silhouette the roof line very much nissan leaf like the prototype does have its
unique bumpers but you would think this would be otherwise a leaf under the skin and for fans of
mitzvishy they might want to know this is going to be made in japan next to the leaf so you could
buy a leaf or you could just buy one of these mitzvishy leafa likes if you likes all right
a break we'll come back in a minute we'll talk charging and geely and more stick around
all right welcome back to the podcast alpitronic makes some of the best charges in the business
and i always am relieved if i turn up to charge my car and i see some alpitronic hardware generally
very reliable and their series two of their hyc four hundreds is now in production maximum power
doesn't get a bump it's still 400 kilowatts it's splitting 50 kilowatt increments across two charging
cables it's got a new big 22 inch screen up from 15.6 inches and it's on the front of the unit as
well with a redesigned interface it looks really really good and a new payment terminal below the
screen hardware layout depends on the site charging connectors can sit on both sides or just one
side depending on how the site owners want to configure it they've added some floor lighting
which must have been i've never really felt like you know charge my car and thought
can't see my feet but they must have needed had some feedback either way it looks cool in
the pictures so it now lights up the whole area around it as well which will adjust the brightness
automatically and they also hit some new standards for barrier free access which is very important
for accessibility we never talk about that enough we i have done but the general conversation
doesn't talk about accessibility enough under the skin the new series two uses silicon carbide
power stacks they don't spell out all the gains but they do say the continuous output goes from
500 to 600 amps which is very good news can't wait to see those somewhere in the ground can't
wait to see an aptera one day as well aptera published photos of its first vehicle off the
validation assembly line the hyper efficient solar powered three-wheel two-seater just got a little
bit closer again i've interviewed the aptera guys two times i think over the years and they say
400 miles of range 44 kilowatt hour battery very very highly efficient they've got a lot of people
who are big fans and a lot of people who say the vehicles are never going to arrive well you know
somewhere in between that may be the truth i don't know but the company says its validation
assembly line has 14 dedicated stations and it's moving from hand building these vehicles to a
structured assembly process they want to make 100 cars daily they have 50 000 pre-orders they
always talk a good game at aptera we just want to see them make a vehicle one with a real customer
and then to expand upon that if only for the customer's sake now geely will unveil their off
roader a new four by four pitched at the land rover defender or a total land cruiser they'll
give it an amazing name at least in the uk it'll be called the galaxy battleship i mean it's just
a cool name isn't it if you're going to go buy a total land cruiser but then you go hold on maybe
i'll go test drive the battleship it comes in 2028 it's a little way off which is why the story
is further down the running order of the podcast so at the minute still vaporware but otherwise
this car follows the galaxy cruiser concept shown last year at the shanghai motor show
they say that the battleship will be 95 true to the show car and the shape is well it's a
you know land rover defender total land cruiser blocky build all-wheel drive classic off-roader
kind of shape but from geely so chinese comfort and luxury and lots of high-tech things as well
i mean all the technical specifications are undisclosed at the moment we do know it's going
to be on the gea evo platform so steer by wire capable it's break by wire capable it's got a
plug-in hybrid powertrain where that is used elsewhere or range extender as well so maybe
almost 850 horsepower perhaps would put it in a very high-end uh kind of off-road market but we'll
wait and see when it arrives finally the next ev you buy could get cheaper depending on where it's
made the european commission unveiled their new industrial accelerator act this is not going
into law by the way i'll get on to that in a minute but it's a sweeping set of local rules
content rules pitched as a shield protectionism call it that for the european union and interestingly
they're going to pull in uk made and japanese made vehicles as well because when this was
first announced uh i think the uk car making industry went whoa hang on a minute uh and so uh
there is uh a lot of uh trade between the uk and the european union obviously since brexit
it's had to be spelled out in contracts and things like that and and that would somewhat scupper the
brexit deal if all of a sudden european cars had these massive uh subsidies i'm i suppose they
could do it if they wanted to but uh there'd be ways around it but either way i think the
uk will be pulled into this as well so targeting the bits that go into electric vehicles and how
they're made as well so procurement and things like low carbon steel and the batteries eventually
decoupling from the chinese supply chain they want to stem a projected loss of jobs in the
automotive sector and actually create more uh good high tech jobs as well and so if you want to
access public money subsidies incentives things like that a certain percentage of your next dv
would have to be made here now china obviously is the reason why they're doing that and the european
commission plans to look at the list of parts which we have to become from you know the local area
to access any kind of money off and those kind of things politics inside the block are really messy
france wants the made in e u zone limited to the european countries plus norway iceland
lechtenstein not the world's biggest car market whereas germany for instance would say well no
germany i think wants to include britain as well because we have great ties with the german car
industry we have a lot of car production here as well so a lot still to work out and then some of
car companies will oppose it because they say it hurts cheaper cars and smaller city cars which
might need to be made with a certain set of parts sourced from outside of europe to keep the price
down lots to work out but still critics warn that trade partners may retaliate by closing
their own doors i think that's uh that horse is already bolted but either way um it now comes
with a move to the european parliament and the european governments to negotiate it and
put the final text in place but made in e u could be a thing others want made somewhere else
to keep the price down we'll wait and see how it works out that's a podcast for today thanks to
our premium partners national car charging on the us mainland and the loha charge in hawaii
and test tv have a lose trusted partner for independent ev battery health testing in australia
in new zealand have a good and cinema and remember there's no such thing as a self-charging hybrid
About this episode
Oil price spikes due to Middle East conflict are driving UK fuel costs higher, sparking debate on EV adoption messaging. Electrifying European corporate fleets could save billions and cut emissions, but challenges remain around costs and infrastructure. Cupra unveils a refreshed Born EV with improved range and interior quality. Ford's US EV sales plummet 71% amid tax credit changes and limited new models. Lucid continues rapid software updates to fix issues in its Gravity SUV. Mitsubishi plans a new EV based on the Nissan Leaf platform. Alpitronic launches an upgraded 400kW charger with better accessibility and features. Aptera nears production with its efficient solar-powered vehicle.
