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EU Parliament confirms 2035 ban on new petrol and diesel cars

Posted on February 20, 2023 by dishanth

The law, which requires that manufacturers achieve a 100% reduction in CO2 emissions from new cars sold in the EU by 2035, received 340 votes for, 279 against and 21 abstentions.

It sets an intermediate target of a 55% reduction in CO2 emissions for cars compared with 2021 levels and a 50% reduction for vans by 2030.

Low-volume manufacturers – those producing 1000 to 10,000 new cars or 1000 to 22,000 new vans per year – may be given an exemption from the rules until the end of 2035.

Those registering fewer than 1000 new vehicles annually will continue to be exempt thereafter.

By 2025, the European Commission will present methodology for assesssing and reporting the lifetime CO2 emissions of new cars and vans. Every subsequent two years, it will publish a report to evaluate the EU’s progress towards zero-emissions road mobility.

Then, by December 2026, it will monitor the gap between the legally determined emissions limits and real-world fuel and energy consumption data; and draw up methodology for adjusting manufacturers’ specific CO2 emissions.

Existing incentives for manufacturers selling more zero- and low-emissions vehicles (0-50g/km of CO2) will be adapted in line with sales trends, said the EU Parliament in a statement. These are expected to fall as uptake of battery-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles increases.

The legislation was agreed in October 2022 and will now be sent to the Council of the European Union for formal approval. This will take place in the coming weeks.

Jan Huitema, the EU Parliament’s lead negotiator for the law, said: “This regulation encourages the production of zero- and low-emission vehicles. It contains an ambitious revision of the targets for 2030 and a zero-emission target for 2035, which is crucial to reach climate-neutrality by 2050.

“These targets create clarity for the car industry and stimulate innovation and investments for car manufacturers.

“Purchasing and driving zero-emission cars will become cheaper for consumers and a second-hand market will emerge more quickly. It makes sustainable driving accessible to everyone.”

Numerous manufacturers have existing electrification targets that put them on pace to comply with the new legislation.

French brands Renault and Peugeot also aim to go all-electric in Europe by 2030, while Volkswagen aims to reduce its carbon emissions per vehicle by 40% compared with 2018 levels by 2030.

Premium makers have also made headway on electrification: 41% of Volvo’s 615,121 new car sales in 2022 were plug-in hybrid (23%) and electric (18%), while Mini’s best-selling model was the Mini Electric.

Other manufacturers, such as Dacia, have plotted a different course: the Renault-owned company plans to meet CO2 targets by building lightweight, fuel-efficient ICE cars, critical to maintaining the brand’s price advantage.

Nonetheless, its sole electric car, the Dacia Spring, was one of Europe’s best-selling EVs in 2022, beating the likes of the Cupra Born, Hyundai Ioniq 5 and Polestar 2.

Source Autocar

Vattenfall and electric bike firm Cake team on ‘fossil-free’ motorcycle

Posted on October 4, 2022October 17, 2022 by dishanth

European energy giant Vattenfall and Swedish electric bike manufacturer Cake have teamed up to build an entirely “fossil-free” electric motorcycle using an innovative production process that will deliver “the cleanest dirt bike ever.”

The companies said they plan to use the project to highlight the climate impact of producing one of Cake’s Kalk OR electric off-roaders by presenting it in an 8.6 meter cube — creating a space equivalent to the CO2 emissions the bike will save.

According to the companies, the 8.6-meter cube reflects the volume of carbon emissions emitted during the production process, which comes to 637 cubic meters, equal to 1,186 kilograms of carbon dioxide, or the same amount of emissions produced from someone taking a flight from London to New York and back twice.

Vattenfall and Cake are teaming up to decarbonize the production process for Cake’s Kalk OR dirt bike. Image courtesy of Cake

In order to make the bike “fossil-free,” the companies said that they are exploring the use of alternative materials such as green aluminum, steel, plastic and rubber, as well as looking at how they can reduce the carbon emissions of the bike’s motor, battery, brakes, suspension and electronics.

Stefan Ytterborn, chief executive and founder at Cake, described “fossil-free” as a production process that has been fully decarbonized, regardless of the fuel that the bike will be running on.

“It’s unlikely that many companies are aware of the carbon footprint of their own products,” he said. “To understand and tackle our own impact, we have measured the emissions from our entire production chain for one Cake Kalk OR and started to decarbonize every step to a minimum by 2025. By doing so, our second most important contribution to the planet is to inspire other manufacturers to step up and do the same.”

Annika Ramsköld, head of corporate sustainability at Vattenfall, added that the partnership was in support of Vattenfall’s vision to enable fossil-free living within one generation, as well as showcasing its dedication to new partnerships that “inspire and break barriers.”

“This is one such project where our main contribution is the broad knowledge in fossil free solutions and electrification of industries we have acquired over decades from our own as well as other industries,” she said.

The partners said that they have been collaborating on the project since 2021 with a view to producing the first “fossil free” off-roader by 2025. They added that they have also been working with a consortium comprising Cake’s existing suppliers, as well as a number of innovative makers of alternative components and materials, which the companies said they hoped would offer the possibility of further emissions reductions.

Source GreenBiz

The bo e-scooter and docking station is a reinvention of a troubled e-thing

Posted on September 28, 2022September 29, 2022 by dishanth

E-scooters are an interesting form of “e-thing,” our term for the devices that are popping up in our Cambrian explosion of micromobility options and devices. As one reader noted recently, “Long live the eThings! This is a wonderful period of exploration.” The Bo e-scooter is a very different beast than the shared e-scooters from Lime and Bird that people complain are begriming sidewalks around the world. Almost all of the problems with e-scooters start with rental e-scooters, where people may not know how to ride them properly and park them anywhere. Nobody who owns a Bo e-scooter is going to abandon it in the middle of the sidewalk—it costs $2,400.

The problems with regular e-scooters are legion: The wheels are small and hard. When I was riding one in Lisbon on their marble sidewalks, I thought my teeth would shake out. Since the rider is standing, the center of gravity is high and this makes them unstable. They are great fun and useful transportation, but it certainly seemed to me that they could be a lot better, and probably a lot safer.

The Bo appears to address many of these problems. According to Bo CEO Oscar Morgan, “We spent 3 years developing the Bo M for everyone who can see the potential of the e-scooter, but who finds today’s scooters too unsafe, impractical for daily use, or simply not well designed.” It has what they call Safesteer, described as “a one-of-a-kind dynamic steering stabilization feature to increase rider safety and enjoyment.” Unusually for an e-scooter, it doesn’t fold.

“Aware that to some it is controversial, we made a conscious decision to eliminate the fold, launching Bo M with an unbroken Monocurve chassis,” said Bo CTO Harry Wills. “Bo M is designed for commuters traveling home to work who value exceptional ride, safety, and reliability above all else. Creating this new category, between a traditional e-scooter and an e-bike, our research discovered that the majority of people seldom or never use the fold. It represented a point of weakness, so that directed us to this final design.”

The Bo has 10-inch pneumatic tires and a special shock-absorbing deck so that it is not teeth-rattling. It has a 31-mile range, a 500-watt motor, regenerative braking, and a top speed of 24 miles per hour, depending on regulation. And of course, there are anti-theft systems and GPS tracking.

One of the big benefits of e-scooters is they are light and fold up, so you can take them wherever you go. The Bo does not fold and it weighs 40 pounds, which makes it a different kind of e-thing. So the company has also designed a different kind of storage. It’s a docking station with a monolithic, vertically integrated solar PV panel that charges an internal 2-kilowatt-hour battery in the day and charges the Bo M at night.

Morgan commented in a statement: “An essential feature of the Bo team is that we are scooter users, as well as designers and engineers. When we compared car ownership to life with the Bo M, security and ease of charging stood out as areas of opportunity to build a great rider experience. Bo M is highly efficient, with energy consumption as low as 15Wh per mile. This opened up the potential for a compact, stand-alone charge and security solution which could deliver meaningful range.”

My first reaction was that this is silly. If you have an e-thing that only consumes 15-watt-hours per mile and “can consume less energy in a week of commuting than a single hot shower,” then why bother? I really don’t think it makes much sense to park a scooter out in the rain on an expensive docking station when it is in front of a house with a big garage where you could plug it into a small charger.

However, the docking station doesn’t need an electric outlet so it can be put anywhere. One can imagine many places where this might be useful, including commuter train stations and office buildings that now have vast concrete parking garages. Cities and employers would be better off just giving people these instead of building those lots.

Perhaps the more important feature is the security technology, which is impressive. A secure place to park is one of the three pillars of the e-revolution. The security system is based on its own three pillars: mechanical, e-secure, and service-secure:

Mechanical-secure: Inaccessible, high-tensile steel pins deploy through the Bo M, fixing it securely to the base plate of the Bo E.
E-secure: Tamper sensors trigger high decibel audio alarm, camera filming, and live playback along with 4G notification to your smartphone. This is all synced with Bo M’s onboard alarm, GPS tracking, and audio alarms.
Service Secure: Bo is building the specification for an insurance product that reflects the increased safety of the vehicle when secured with Bo E.
E-scooters are an interesting niche. It is clear we have to separate the issues that come with shared scooters compared to privately owned units. A Swiss study found that shared e-scooters do not replace cars, but trips taken by foot, bike, or public transport. It also found that privately owned scooters last much longer and have a much lower carbon footprint. The Bo E is a very different e-thing.

We have noted before that e-bikes and e-scooters are climate action, and welcome the Bo to the party.

Source Treehugger

Amazon launches e-cargo bike delivery hub in London

Posted on July 5, 2022 by dishanth

The e-commerce giant is aiming to deliver 50% of its shipments using net-zero carbon methods by 2030. As international shipping and aviation are more challenging to decarbonise than road transport, Amazon has been investing in electric road transport for short-term emissions reductions while backing longer term R&D on aviation and maritime. Earlier this year, Amazon launched its first five pure electric HGVs in the UK

Within cities like London, electric micromobility is particularly important, given the Capital’s 2030 net-zero target and its clean air targets. Businesses also see electric mobility as a way to minimise costs by avoiding Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) costs. Around 2,000 e-cargo bikes were sold in the UK for commercial use by the Bicycle Association’s figures.

Amazon’s new e-cargo bikes will be kept at a dedicated micromobility hub in Shoreditch. edie inquired as to how many bikes will operate out of this hub but this information is not being made public. Amazon will be using learnings from this hub to launch other locations in other UK cities in the near future.

With the first e-cargo bike hub, plus its existing fleet of electric delivery vans and on-foot delivery workers, Amazon estimates that it will make more than five million zero-emission last-mile deliveries in central London each year from 2023.

Hackney Council’s cabinet member for the environment and transport, Cllr Mete Coban, said: “Tackling transport emissions is key if we’re to reach net-zero. We’re really pleased to have worked with Amazon to support them to take traditional vans off the streets and replace them with e-cargo bikes. This will help to reduce emissions and improve air quality for people in Hackney and beyond.”

Spotlight on solar

To coincide with the e-cargo bike announcement, Amazon has also confirmed plans to add utility-scale solar panel projects at its facilities in Manchester, Coalville, Haydock, Bristol and Milton Keynes by the end of the year. It has not disclosed the capacity of each project. Amazon is notably aiming to reach 100% renewable electricity for operations by 2025.

This move has been welcomed by Energy Minister Greg Hands who called it a “fantastic vote of confidence in British energy security”, which can be boosted by businesses “taking the lead in moving away from expensive fossil fuels”.

But the UK Government’s Energy Security Strategy notably includes new supporting measures for expanding North Sea fossil fuel production as well as for low-carbon sectors like nuclear and offshore wind. We will find out this month whether the Strategy will also serve as a means for the Government to lift a ban on fracking, which it has said it will do if there is new scientific evidence on preventing tremors.

Source Edie