autonomous vehicles Archives

Uber’s new partnerships and Pittsburgh test project revealing the next phase of autonomous vehicle technologies

Uber autonomous vehicle test project Have you ever wished you could ride in a passenger seat during a self-driving car test? You might want to go to Pittsburgh and skip Mountain View, Calif.

You can ride in an autonomous Ford Fusion as part of Uber’s self-driving car test project in Pittsburgh; and that will soon include a Volvo plug-in hybrid. Google has kept its test runs in its corporate hometown of Mountain View controlled to allow for only employees and strategic partners to participate.

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick told the press last week that development of autonomous vehicles is essential to the future of the six-year-old ridesharing company. Much of it has to do with eventually eliminating the cost of paying drivers, which would allow Uber to drop the cost of a ride down and make it even more attractive to customers who don’t want to make a car payment or pay for a taxi ride.

“We’ve got to be laser-focused on getting this to market, because it’s not a side project for us,” Kalanick said. “This is everything. This is all the marbles for Uber.”

Uber is no longer involved with Carnegie Mellon University’s self-driving car research for reasons that were never explained. That alliance with the Pittsburgh-based university, which is considered to be the leading university R&D center for autonomous vehicles, ended in the spring after being formed a year earlier. Uber did hire away four faculty members and 36 researchers and technicians, but Uber never collaborated with CMU on a single project. The ridesharing company did provide the $5.5 million gift to the university that it committed to.

Uber does have its own drivers behind the wheel to reduce the risk factor and protect passengers and other vehicles on the streets; and the company is working with authorities in Pittsburgh and the state of Pennsylvania to make sure safety rules are followed in the test cars. Tesla Motors is continuing to back its semi-autonomous Autopilot system even after a fatality and several collision incidents related to the Autopilot system. Safety will continue to be the key issue to be addressed by all parties rolling out self-driving car technologies.

Last week was significant for the next phase of autonomous vehicles with announcements from Uber and two major automakers. Plug-in electrified and hybrid vehicles have typically been used in self-driving test projects.

Purchases of plug-in electrified vehicles are expected to reach the 10%-to-20% of U.S. new vehicle sales mark, from their current less-than-1% level, in the next 15 years, according to a few industry analysts. Being connected to self-driving technologies and mobility services is expected to support that sales increase.

Uber will be adding Volvo cars to its test project. The companies will be investing $300 million to put 100 self-driving Volvo XC90 plug-in hybrid SUVs on the streets of Pittsburgh in less than four months.

Self-driving hardware and software will be added jointly, and tech support will be provided by Volvo. Uber will be adding Lidar, radar, additional cameras and sensors. Uber will allow customers to summon the self-driving vehicles from their phones. The fleet will be supervised by Uber staff in the driver’s seat for the time being.

Uber said it is buying the XC-90s from Volvo and is adding the self-driving hardware and software for the specific needs of its ride-hailing service. Uber is developing the technology in its Pittsburgh tech center, opened just 20 months ago. Volvo will provide technical support.

Sherif Marakby, Uber’s vice president of global vehicle programs, is leading the project. He joined Uber in April after a 25-year career at Ford in numerous senior engineering management positions. In his most recent role with Ford, Marakby served as the automaker’s director of global electronics and engineering, a position where he was responsible for electrical components on all Ford vehicles globally, including infotainment, driver assist, and connectivity.

He said that Uber’s deal with Volvo isn’t exclusive. The ridesharing company will roll out the test project to other cities and there could be other automakers and technology suppliers joining in. As for now, working with Volvo makes a good deal of sense for Uber.

“The foundation of the collaboration is Volvo’s strength in safety and vehicle development, and Uber’s strength and commitment to autonomy and autonomous technology,” Marakby said. “A significant part of that is the software. All of that is developed in house.”

Uber also announced last week that it had acquired Otto, a 90-person start-up company providing self-driving truck systems that could bring more of that technology to shipping and cargo transport. The acquisition is taking place for an undisclosed cost.

Uber plans to open a 180,000-square-foot facility in Palo Alto, Calif., to house the trucking tech company. Otto will operate as a stand-alone company focused on upending the long-distance trucking industry. Otto had previously hired former Google and Carnegie Mellon engineers. After the acquisition is complete, Otto engineers will also work out of offices in San Francisco and Pittsburgh.

Uber’s chief said the strategic alliance will team up with hardware manufacturers, Otto’s software expertise, and Uber’s large network of more than 50 million monthly riders as potential customers for a wide range of delivery services. It places Uber in the best position to be competitive with Silicon Valley giants like Google, Kalanick said.

Ford Motor Co. is tapping into Silicon Valley talent as well, said CEO Mark Fields, last week while visiting the automaker’s Palo Alto research facility. Fields announced that the company will offer a fully automated driverless vehicle for ridesharing services in 2021.

Fields said Ford is increasing its investments in Silicon Valley technology firms, tripling its investment in semi-autonomous systems, and more than doubling the size of its Palo Alto research team while expanding its campus in Silicon Valley.

Ford’s chief said he was not concerned that rival General Motors had made a high-stakes play in ride services with its $500 million investment in Lyft in January. “We’re not in a race to be first,” Fields said.

Ford does not yet know whether it will partner with Uber, Lyft, or other ride-hailing and ridesharing service providers. Fields said Ford may choose not to partner, and roll out such services on its own. The automaker has been rolling out carsharing and ridesharing in Europe and the U.S. in test projects in recent years. Fields does see Ford going toward fully autonomous vehicles, similar to the strategy Google has taken.

Ford Chief Technical Officer Raj Nair said the company likely will not offer a fully autonomous car without steering wheels or pedals to consumers until 2025 or later. Launching a self-driving car first for ridesharing is a better way to reach the mass market and make the cars more affordable, he said.

Uber CEO Kalanick isn’t speculating on when Uber might be ready to dispense with the human driver, saying that full automation can only be used now in limited places light in traffic. Uber and Lyft riders are anticipated to be more open to using driverless cars. Studies show that younger, Millennial consumers make for most of the Uber and Lyft customers. They’re less interested in car ownership and want to tap into the most efficient, advanced technologies to meet their mobility needs. Many of them have taken ridesharing trips and enjoy the reduced cost and socializing. They prefer it over driving their own car home from work, being absorbed and stressed out over getting through congested traffic at slow speeds. Whether it’s a human or machine driving the car, their main purpose for using Uber and Lyft is accomplished.

Electrified vehicles are expected to play a role in the future of self-driving, shared rides in urban settings. Their cost efficiency is valued, and growth in the charging infrastructure is expected to take away fear of being stranded in an electric car. Evercar, a provider of shared EVs for on-demand drivers (like Uber and Lyft), reported in the spring that it has been growing quickly in Los Angeles. By applying innovations in electric vehicles and carsharing technology, the company is making it possible for nearly anyone to access a vehicle to drive for the on-demand economy, Evercar said.

Navigant Research sees a global trend developing with on-demand mobility programs sprouting up, which indicates that transportation is moving toward a future that is both shared and electric. Automakers and tech partners are testing projects to examine its potential.

BMW recently announced that it will be expanding its ReachNow carsharing program to cover Portland, Ore., after successfully bringing the service to Seattle earlier this year. The service attracted more than 13,000 members within its first month of operation. BMW uses a mix of vehicles for the program that includes Mini Coopers and the BMW i3.

Nissan recently announced its collaboration with San Francisco-based electric scooter-share company Scoot Networks. The two companies will deploy 10 mobility concept cars (the Renault Twizy) in the Bay Area.

On August 2, startup company Green Commuter launched a carshare and vanpool fleet in Los Angeles using Tesla Model X SUVs. And there are several other two-wheel and four-wheel electrified vehicles being used in demonstration projects around the world.

Navigant says that companies looking to capitalize on this rapidly evolving business will need to offer high levels of vehicle accessibility, affordable hourly usage rates, and differentiating product options. As for autonomous vehicles, a recent Navigant leaderboard rating placed Daimler, BMW, Audi, and General Motors as the top automakers in the field. Ford, Volvo, Toyota, and Honda followed in the leaderboard ratings. All of these companies are investing heavily in connected, electrified, advanced technologies.

What you need to know about connected car technologies

Mcity If you work in the auto industry, staying informed can be all-consuming these days – with the Takata airbag recall, the Volkswagen diesel car scandal, automakers striving to become the first one selling self-driving cars, and the impact low fuel prices is having on green car sales. There is one topic I would advise you to stay current on, as it touches upon all the rest – connected car technologies.

Connected cars is what we have now with mobile device connectivity to our dashboards for entertainment and driving directions – such as Bluetooth bringing Pandora from your smartphone to your car’s sound system; the deployment of safety features like lane departure warning systems, backup cameras, and driver assistance systems that are considered stepping stones to autonomous vehicle technologies eventually becoming the norm; intelligent transportation systems coordinated by the U.S. Dept. of Transportation with its goals of making roads safer and more efficient; and mobile apps on devices that lead you to the closest electric vehicle charging station and other features that make your car your own personal mobility device.

Here’s an overview of what’s happening lately in connected car technologies……..

Hacker threat: Automakers and suppliers think we’re very close to seeing connected car technologies being added to all new vehicles sold. A survey of OEM and supplier managers says they think it will take one to three years to secure the technology, according to a new study by International Data Corp. and commissioned by security company Veracode. The study came from test study last year showing by professional hackers taking over a Jeep Cherokee, raising the flag on the possibility of hackers making cyberthreats that they can carry out. The auto industry is aware that adopting these systems widely may bring privacy and safety problems, but companies are working hard and resolving and moving the technologies forward.
Fuel station of the future: At the Geneva Motor Show, Nissan showed a video presentation on it 12-month long project examining the role electric cars, autonomous vehicles, and vehicle-to-grid technology could play in the city of the near future. Nissan Europe has been collaborating with noted architects Foster + Partners on a project that imagines electric cars that can recharge themselves wirelessly both at home and elsewhere. What Nissan calls “The Fuel Station of the Future” integrates electric autonomous vehicles, the internet, and renewable energy.
Mcity: Along with Silicon Valley r&d labs, the University of Michigan’s Mcity project in Ann Arbor, Mich., has become the epicenter of connected car technology development. The University of Michigan Center for Entrepreneurship just created a partnership with the U-M Mobility Transformation Center to launch the pilot of the TechLab at Mcity. TechLab is a training ground for student interns to experience the process of transforming a lab innovation into a company, which will prepare them for the real world of product development. The Mcity test facility was launched last year, and comes from an alliance over several years between automakers, technology companies, the U.S. Department of Transportation, and the university. The full-scale, 32-acre urban environment provides real-world road scenarios – such as running a red light – that can’t be replicated on public roads; vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technologies are part of testing grounds. Last fall, Ford became the first automaker to launch an autonomous vehicle test program at Mcity. The Ford Fusion Hybrid Autonomous Research Vehicle merges today’s driver-assist technologies, such as front-facing cameras, radar and ultrasonic sensors, and adds four LiDAR sensors to generate a real-time 3D map of the vehicle’s surrounding environment.
Connected car trade group: Connected car technology is becoming enough of an industry norm to create a trade group and a few conferences. The Connected Vehicle Trade Association (CVTA) announced that Paul Laurenza has been promoted from vice chair to chairman of the organization. Laurenza head national law firm Dykema’s motor vehicle and consumer product safety federal regulatory practices. Laurenza has advised clients on connected vehicle legal and policy issues for more than a decade, and is a frequent speaker and author on emerging intelligent vehicle technologies. CVTA was created to facilitate the interaction, and advance the interests, of the entities involved in the vehicle communication environment and developing bidirectional vehicle communications.
Conferences: Automotive Megatrends Magazine is hosting three events in Detroit this year combined into one. On March 15-17, day-long conferences will cover connected cars, autonomous vehicles, and fuel-efficient vehicles. All three will take place at The Henry in Dearborn, Mich. Connected Car Expo will take place again at the beginning of the LA Auto Show on Nov. 15-17, 2016. Keynote speakers will include John Zimmer, co-founder and president of Lyft, Inc.; and Arwed Niestroj, CEO of Mercedes-Benz Research and Development North America in California.
Who’s right – Musk or Zuckerberg? In an interview with Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner for the German newspaper Die Welt am Sonntag, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t agree with Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s concerns over machines being stronger than humans, taking over and wreaking havoc. Musk and colleagues have serious fears that artificial intelligence could one day dominate and take over the human brain. They’ve poured money into a Y Combinator-led project to make sure it doesn’t happen. Zuckerberg thinks it’s more hysterical. “I think that the default is that all the machines that we build serve humans so unless we really mess something up I think it should stay that way,” Zuckerberg said.
Fiat Chrysler and Apple? Fiat Chrysler Automobiles CEO Sergio Marchionne, who describes himself as an “Apple freak,” would love to partner with the technology giant on building a car. Apple Inc. would be well served to partner with an established global automaker, given the complexity of auto manufacturing, Marchionne said at the Geneva Motor Show. Besides, Marchionne loves Apple’s technologies and owns every kind of product the company makes. Marchionne has been spending a great deal of time in the past two years looking for a major corporate partner to merge with – to eliminate Fiat’s debt and boost its profits. FCA has been behind its OEM competitors in electric vehicles, advanced connected car technologies, and mobility services. Partnering with Apple could be ideal, since that technology has invested in electric and autonomous vehicle technology projects – and would be better partnering with one or more OEMs.

This Week’s Top 10: More on VW diesel scandal, San Diego Gas & Electric installing 3,500 chargers

by Jon LeSage, editor and publisher, Green Auto Market

Here’s my take on the 10 most significant and interesting occurrences during the past week…….

More on the Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal……… Frank Tuch, previously head of VW’s group quality control, has left the company with details yet unknown beyond Tuch leaving “to take on new responsibilities elsewhere.” Tuch was appointed in 2010 by former CEO Martin Winterkorn, who did take partial blame for the scandal and left the company in September. Current CEO Matthias Mueller has been overhauling senior management positions in the wake of the emissions test-rigging scandal……… VW will be offering compensation packages to about 600,000 Americans who own one of these TDI diesel cars violating emissions limits. The U.S. attorney is finalizing the package and it’s not yet clear whether this will be a buy-back, cash, car replacement, repair, or some combination……… The European Union has become more flexible about considering new emissions rules soon after a protest measure was rejected by lawmakers. The new rules may be flawed, but lawmakers believe they will at least provide some greater regulation of emissions testing, according to Giovanni La Via, chair of the EU’s Environment Committee. Members of the European Parliament recently rejected a proposal to require on-road emissions testing for new vehicles.
SDG&E installing 3,500 chargers: San Diego Gas & Electric has received regulatory approval to install up to 3,500 electric vehicle charging stations at 350 sites. The California Public Utilities Commission has approved its Electric Vehicle Grid-Integration pilot project, which may cost SDG&E $45 million to construct. The power utility thinks it’s a great opportunity to maximize use of renewable energy to charge EVs and reduce the need for new fossil-fuel power plants. That follows Southern California Edison winning CPUC approval for its $22 million “Charge Ready” initiative. SCE says it’s a pilot project installing up to 1,500 charging stations in its service territory.
Incentives for fleet EV acquisition: Nissan’s Marc Deutsch and GNA’s Joe Annotti will be covering critical issues fleets face in deploying plug-in electric vehicles. ACT Expo is hosting a complimentary, one-hour webinar, which will highlight key incentives that help to substantially buy down the cost of electric vehicles, charging, and other costs of traditional vehicle ownership to maximize fleet deployment. Deutsch will be talking about significant fleet incentives; and Annotti will go over GNA’s Funding 360° Program that helps companies, municipalities, and organization track, evaluate, and apply for funding programs throughout North America. Click here to register for the free webinar, “Making Cents of Electric Vehicles: Key Incentives for Fleet Deployment,” which takes place tomorrow, Feb. 10, 2016, at 10:00-11:00 a.m. PT.
Leaf turns around in used values: The Nissan Leaf has seen a reverse in its used vehicle valuation dilemma. During the fourth quarter of 2015, Kelley Blue Book Auction Values on model-years 2012 through 2015 Leafs were up three percent from where they were in the third quarter. That was while gasoline prices continued to plunge – 14.2%, or 32 cents, during that time period. “This rebound could be attributed to consumers now finding the current value of electric vehicles more attractive at their current price point following months of steady declines,” KBB analyst Sean Foyil said in the latest edition of Blue Book Market Report. That was during a time period when most used vehicles saw prices dropping as off-lease vehicle returns oversupplied the market.
Goodbye Cadillac ELR: Cadillac won’t be building the next-generation version of its plug-in hybrid luxury ELR model. It has been released as a 2016 model year car, but General Motors hasn’t announced when it will be pulled off the market. It gained a lot of attention when launched as a 2014 model year electric vehicle with a $76,000 price tag. It was the only competitor out there, at the time, to the Tesla Model S. GM didn’t produce very many of them, and sales numbers were slight. It runs off a powertrain similar to the Chevrolet Volt, and it did get a lot of raves when it was first launched.
More Google driverless car testing: Google is adding to its testing grounds for self-driving cars with a new route added in Kirkland, Wash., later this month. That follows six years of road testing in Mountain View, Calif., near its corporate campus; and Austin, Texas, which allowed for autonomous vehicle testing last summer. So far, 1.4 million miles of testing has been done. The company said that going up the Pacific Northwest provides “different driving environments, traffic patterns, and road conditions.”
Oil tax in budget: President Obama today will be proposing a tax of $10 per barrel on oil in the 2017 budget to Congress. The goal is to create “a clear incentive for private-sector innovation to reduce our reliance on oil, and at the same time invests in clean energy technologies that will power our future,” the White House said. Tax proceed would go to the nation’s transportation infrastructure and to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide from transportation. That proposal could be killed off in the Republican majority House. “President Obama’s proposed $10 per barrel tax on oil is dead on arrival in the House,” House majority whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) said.
RMI on fuel price increases: As we’ve seen clearly in the past year, rapidly declining gasoline and diesel fuel prices can hurt sales of, and support for, plug-in electric, hybrid, and alternative fuel vehicles. Amory Lovins, chief scientist at Rocky Mountain Institute, thinks that these market conditions are set to turn around. Read on for his perspectives.
Army testing autonomous vehicles: The U.S. Army is going back strong to its R&D efforts that started in the 1980s. The Army recently has been testing convoys of autonomous vehicles that follow a truck driven by a human. These tests have included up to 10 vehicles equipped with cameras, radar and onboard computers to identify potential road hazards. The equipment is costing the Army about $175,000 per vehicle; the Army thinks this will go down to one tenth that cost once it becomes mass produced.
Uber taking heat for changing logo: Along with increasing “surge pricing” that is driving up the cost of Uber trips, the latest controversy on the ridesharing giant is that its emblem has been changed dramatically. The title of a Washington Post piece tells the story, “Why everyone hates Uber’s new logo.” Riders has grown accustomed to its grey “U” logo. At the beginning of this month, the logo on the mobile app transformed into a circle with a thin line through the left side; and it rests within an aqua green background with etchy, thin lines in some sort of diagram. It could be the logo for any company, and the iconic U has gone away.

Personal mobility and advanced vehicle technologies moving beyond theory into reality

There have been a few news breaks in recent weeks about automakers expanding technology offerings and acquiring new partners. They reinforce the idea that OEMs are moving beyond building and selling cars to offering a wide range of transportation services.

Faraday Future: This Chinese startup has been getting a lot of attention in the past few months, with that culminating at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The company is backed by Chinese billionaire Jia Yueting and plans to build a 900-acre, $1 billion factory in Nevada in the near future. Faraday Future unveiled the Batmobile-like FFZERO1 in Las Vegas, which has four electric motors (one at each wheel) combined that deliver more than 1,000 horsepower, enough to send the car from 0 to 60 mph in under three seconds and to a top speed of 200 mph. What’s been most interesting about Faraday is the platform architecture that it’s built on. It’s very flexible – Faraday can add or remove batteries, shorten or extend the chassis depending on the body that will be attached, or other applications. It’s a much faster process than what traditional OEMs go through – new vehicles can be production ready in 18 to 24 months, the company said. There’s talk about Faraday Future vehicles being deployed in Uber-like ridesharing services and as autonomous vehicles. Wherever this new startup is heading, it gained a wave of buzz and news coverage at CES and the Detroit Auto Show.

Maven: General Motors Co. has raised eyebrows in the auto industry since the beginning of this year with its $500 million investment in ridesharing company Lyft and acquisition of the assets of Sidecar, the third largest ridesharing company in the U.S. after Uber and Lyft. The story is getting even better. GM has just launched Maven, a carsharing service allowing users to access a Chevrolet vehicle on the new Maven mobile app for as little as $6 per hour, similar to what Zipcar offers. Services will start up in Ann Arbor, Mich., and will expand over to New York City, Chicago, and a peer-to-peer sharing program in Germany, serving residents of Frankfurt and Berlin. This will be in addition to ridesharing services (and eventually autonomous vehicles) through its relationships with Lyft and Sidecar. GM expects 25 million customers to use ride-sharing services globally by 2020, up from between five and six million today.

Ford: CEO Mark Fields described Ford’s continued commitment to urban mobility during a keynote speech at CES and at the Detroit Auto Show – and now there’s also FordPass. Fields thinks that transportation services are the biggest area of potential growth for automakers following a year of sales the industry may never surpass (and that will eventually shrink). Ford Motor Co. just launched a new app-based platform called FordPass. It lets users access a variety of transportation services including paying for downtown parking or sharing their vehicle. The app has four main service categories: a marketplace for mobility services; “FordGuides,” who are accessible through texts or phone calls for guidance and needed information; “FordHubs,” which are actual buildings across the globe where customers can experience Ford technology; and a loyalty program in which app users can earn points and rewards. These services are being carried out through partnerships with mobility companies and Silicon Valley-based startups. Last year, Ford tested a carsharing program in six U.S. cities; this may be one of the FordPass services announced in the future.

Daimler: In September 2014, Daimler acquired ridesharing apps RideScout and myTaxi. It was part of Daimler’s continued push beyond car manufacturing and into developing technology for urban mobility. Along with its major carsharing division, Car2go, Daimler has been looking into a wide spectrum of personal mobility services to offer in global markets. Complications have come up for Daimler with a German court ruling this month that heavily discounted fares offered to customers who paid electronically via the myTaxi app were illegal. The case was file by German taxi operator group Taxi Deutschland, which offers a competing app. MyTaxi operates in 40 European cities, including in Germany, Austria, Italy, Poland, Spain, and Switzerland. The app has more than 10 million registered users, the company says.

Tesla Motors has been tweaking safety features on its Autopilot connected car/autonomous vehicle service. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the car will now reduce its speed in anticipation of curves on the highway, but added he was not aware of any accidents caused by the earlier version of the software. The function will now be restricted on residential roads or roads without a center divider, so that the Model S or Model X can’t drive faster than the speed limit maximum plus five miles per hour. There have been several videos on YouTube in recent months showing near-misses on roads with Autopilot, which has pushed Tesla into addressing safety features. Musk said Autopilot was “probably better than human at this point in highway driving,” able to keep to its lane using cameras, radar, and mapping.

Autonomous and electric vehicles steal the thunder at CES

Self-driving cars and electrified vehicles were key themes at the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) last week in Las Vegas. CES has become the leading showcase arena in the U.S. for the coolest, cutting-edge devices for cars and other consumer products. It seems to be evolving into the leading event of the year for the auto industry, slightly surpassing the North American International Auto Show right before it starts up this coming week in Detroit.

Analysts say we’re 15-to-20 years from seeing hundreds of thousands of fully autonomous vehicles on our roads. In the meantime, the concept of self-driving cars appears to be an ideal platform for automakers and technology partners to be rolling out, and testing out, new bells and whistles that will eventually become standard features. Electric vehicle technologies were also shown off by OEMs during CES.

Ford CEO Mark Fields was a keynote speaker at CES, where he announced a deal with Amazon to incorporate the cloud-based voice assistant, Alexa into its vehicles. Using Alexa will allow a driver to not just open a garage door but turn on lights and adjust the thermostat by voice command, among other features. Fields talked about Ford’s commitment to personal mobility through supporting ridesharing and carsharing programs. However, he didn’t mention the alliance with Google on self-driving car technologies that had been announced shortly before CES. Fields did talk about a new light and radar sensor (LiDAR) that can be mounted in the mirrors of a car. Developed by Silicon Valley-based company Velodyne, Inc., this third-generation sensor can extend the LiDAR range by 200 meters, which is essential for the safety of autonomous vehicles. It’s called the “Ultra Puck,” and will enable a driverless vehicle to create a real-time, 3D map of its surroundings, Fields said.
General Motors chairman and CEO Mary Barra, during her keynote Wednesday, confirmed that the 2017 Chevrolet Bolt electric car would be in production this year and would sell, after government rebates, for $30,000. While it will be competing with the Nissan Leaf, it will get about double the range at 200 miles. Barra’s unveiling of the Bolt at CES came just days after GM announced an alliance with ridesharing service Lyft that includes the creation of a fleet of shared GM vehicles available for Lyft drivers to rent. The Bolt will be a key display feature for GM this week at the Detroit Auto Show.
As Volkswagen continues to battle the diesel emissions violations scandal, CES was a platform for showing off its electric people-mover concept. VW’s BUDD-e minivan concept has been designed to show what connected, electric transportation could look like a few years from now. The BUDD-e concept, revealed at CES on Tuesday, offers a new modular platform toolkit designed for electric vehicles that the automaker intends to deploy across its brands. BUDD-e packs a 101-kilowatt-hour battery providing up to 373 miles of range in the New European Driving Cycle, a test cycle designed to assess emissions. It can be recharged to 80% in 15 minutes, the company said.
Automakers and leading automotive suppliers have been taking self-driving car technologies very seriously in recent years – according to a study released during CES by Thomson Reuters. According to the new report from the Intellectual Property and Science business of Thomson Reuters, there were more than 22,000 new inventions related to selfdriving automobiles between 2010 and 2015. Companies such as Toyota, Bosch, Denso, Hyundai, GM and Nissan, have been the global leaders in selfdriving vehicle innovation. Toyota alone has patented over 2,000 new driverless tech inventions in the last five years, double the number two player Bosch, according to the report. LG, Samsung, Google, Boeing, IBM, Amazon, Carnegie Mellon, and MIT also have contributed significant new intellectual property in the category over the last five years.
While Apple is new to the autonomous vehicle game, Thomson Reuters IP & Science analysts predict that Apple will soon make a collaboration announcement with Tesla Motors; while Apple is not a leading innovator in this field like Google has become, a partnership with Tesla would be a predictable move for both companies, based on a thorough review of both companies’ patent portfolios, according to Thomson Reuters.
Nvidia has introduced a new computer for vehicles that includes artificial-intelligence features to make them more autonomous. Volvo will use the new product in its public trials of autonomous vehicles in 2017, the company said. Nvidia designs graphics processing units, as well as system on a chip units for the mobile computing market, and is working on playing a role in the automotive technology market.
Self-driving cars was the topic of several surveys and studies released last week. New data from an Autotrader study reveals 70% of consumers are more likely to consider vehicles with autonomous features such as parking assist, collision avoidance, and automatic braking.
Self-driving cars are involved in fewer crashes on average than vehicles with a driver behind the wheel, according to a study by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute commissioned by Alphabet Inc’s Google unit. It looked only at Google’s fleet of more than 50 self-driving cars, which has logged 1.3 million miles in Texas and California in self-driving mode. The test fleet has reported 17 crashes over the last six years, although none were the fault of the self-driving cars, Google said. After adjusting for severity and accounting for crashes not reported to police, the study estimated cars with drivers behind the wheel are involved in 4.2 crashes per million miles, versus 3.2 crashes per million miles for self-driving cars in autonomous mode.
A survey conducted by Volvo found that 92% of respondents believe that people should be able to take control of self-driving cars at any moment while 81% of the people agree that automakers, not car owners, should take responsibility if an accident occurs while a vehicle is driving autonomously.
While self-driving cars grabbed most of the media attention at CES, Panasonic Corp.’s President Kazuhiro Tsuga says it will be years before autonomous systems contribute meaningfully to the company’s bottom line. Panasonic, which has partnerships with Ford, Toyota, Tesla, forecasts sales in the automotive segment will climb to $17.8 billion in the year ending March 2019. Most of that will come from cockpit infotainment systems and car batteries, Tsuga said.
Kia executives said that said the Korean automaker will offer their first “partially autonomous” vehicle by 2020, with “highly autonomous” technology to follow five years later. The company will invest up to $2 billion in autonomous vehicle technologies, the company said.

This Week’s Top 10: GM and Lyft will offer ridesharing and autonomous vehicles, Justice department files civil suit against VW

by Jon LeSage, editor and publisher, Green Auto Market

Here’s my take on the 10 most significant and interesting occurrences during the past week…….

GM and Lyft forge alliance: General Motors is making its largest single investment ever in another company – $500 million will go to Lyft, Inc. to support advancement of autonomous vehicles and ridesharing. GM has been working on autonomous vehicle technology for several years, and plans to start testing autonomous Chevy Volts in 2016. The deal with Lyft, which is No. 2 in ridesharing services in the U.S. behind Uber, will leverage GM’s experience in autonomous technology and Lyft’s ridesharing service offerings. This deal was made not long after Ford Motor Co. and Google announced an alliance to develop autonomous vehicles. Google Ventures is a major investor in Uber, and that ridesharing company has been testing out driverless cars over the past year with the Carnegie Mellon University research center. Uber may be a channel for Ford vehicles and autonomous vehicle testing, as Lyft will be for GM. As part of the arrangement announced yesterday, GM will become a preferred provider of short-term use rental vehicles to Lyft drivers through rental hubs in various cities in the U.S. Lyft drivers and customers will have access to GM’s wide portfolio of cars and OnStar services, as well.
DOJ files VW suit: The Department of Justice filed a civil complaint yesterday against Volkswagen claiming that nearly 600,000 cars with diesel engines in the U.S. violate emissions laws – and that many were imported in violation of the Clean Air Act. The DOJ and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency may be putting pressure on VW to reach a deal on how to resolve recall issues. Talks haven’t been going very well so far, according to EPA Assistant Administrator Cynthia Giles. The suit was filed in Detroit on behalf of the EPA. VW says it is “working with EPA on developing remedies to bring the TDI vehicles into full compliance with regulations as soon as possible” and with government agencies investigating these matters.
Faraday Future EV supercar: The FFZero1 concept car has been unveiled at Consumer Electronics Show 2016. The Zero1 is a single-seat electric race car. The design is wild – sort of like the Batmobile meets Grand Prix racer. It’s called the “UFO Line” and will become a defining feature of all Faraday Future’s next supercars, the company says. Another news story coming from Las Vegas has been the company losing its chief battery architect ahead of introducing its concept vehicle at CES. Porter Harris lists his current employer as Lotus Research and Development LLC on his LinkedIn page. Harris was responsible for engineering and designing Faraday’s battery packs.
Ford investing in battery technology: Ford Motor Co. may be competing with another automaker, Tesla Motors, as a developer of its own hybrid and electric vehicle battery technologies. Ford will be investing $4.5 billion into electrification R&D, and is adding 13 new EV vehicle nameplates while expanding its electrified offerings into Taiwan, South Korea, and China. When Ford recently announced a range increase for its 2017 Focus Electric, company executives also shared information on battery chemistry research and developing its own battery cells for its future EVs.
Hyundai Ioniq competing with Prius: Hyundai Motor Co. will be rolling out its Ioniq model in U.S. this month, which comes in three electrified versions – a traditional hybrid, a plug-in hybrid, and an all-electric version. The company says that the Ioniq hybrid will deliver better highway fuel economy than the Toyota Prius.
Suggestion to CARB on VW scandal: A collaborative of 15 environmental, conservation, and health organizations issued a rebuttal to a letter submitted to the California Air Resources Board on the Volkswagen diesel scandal. The original letter, signed by Tesla CEO and others last month, requested CARB work to have VW bring zero emission vehicles to the state as a higher priority than fixing non-compliant diesels. That proposal doesn’t deal with the real health impacts, and offers no remedy to purchases of defective VW diesel cars, the letter said. This group is calling for a full investigation and prosecution to the fullest extent of the law.
California ending green stickers: If you’re thinking of buying a plug-in hybrid in California, keep in mind that the green carpool lane stickers for solo drivers will no longer be available. The state has issued all of the 85,000 green HOV lane stickers for plug-in hybrids, unless the state legislature authorizes more of them. They may be going away like the yellow stickers for hybrids went away a few years ago. There are still an unlimited number of “white stickers” for available for battery-electric cars, hydrogen fuel-cell cars, and compressed natural gas vehicles.
New Clean Cities site: The U.S. Department of Energy’s Clean Cities has just launched an all-new website designed around easier navigation and a fresh new look. According to the Clean Cities blog, there are five new features to explore that were designed around offering a bold new look and enhanced user experience.
Top sales mark for Tesla: Tesla Motors passed the 50,000 sales mark for 2015, its best-ever effort and slightly more than the maker had signaled it would deliver for the year. During the fourth quarter, Tesla delivered 17,400 of its cars, including a small number of the new Model X SUVs. That was 75% more than the same quarter in 2014, and a 48% increase over Tesla’s previous quarterly record. In other news, Tesla officials are investigating another Model S fire incident. A mysterious fire destroyed a Model S sedan Friday at one of the company’s Supercharger stations in Kristiansand, Norway, about 200 miles southwest of Oslo, the capital.
Home charger incentive: The South Coast Air Quality Management District is offering a residential electric vehicle charging incentive pilot program to offset Level 2 (240 volt) EV charger hardware costs. This program will be available to residents within the SCAQMD’s four-county jurisdiction on a first come, first served basis. The program provides up to $250 for the cost of hardware for Level 2 residential chargers; and an additional incentive of up to $250 will be available for low-income residents.

Green Auto Market’s guesstimate on what to expect in 2016

What’s next for VW: The first part of this new year will see details released on the Volkswagen recall by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and California Air Resources Board on a proposed fix for its diesel-engine cars. EPA and CARB will be making an announcement this month regarding solutions proposed by Volkswagen for about 482,000 cars equipped with EA 189 engines; some models will likely require hardware and software updates, while other may require only a software solution. The recall might be tied into the lawsuit the U.S. Justice Department filed in a civil complaint yesterday on behalf of the EPA (see news coverage above). Electric vehicle launches may be a channel for VW to tap into to restore its image as a responsible global corporation. On January 5 at the Consumer Electronics Show, Volkswagen’s new chairman, Herbert Diess, will make a keynote speech announcing VW’s “new era in electric mobility” that will broaden its pre-existing commitment to electrification along with a new all-electric concept car. It’s still unknown whether that new vehicle will be an electric version of its flagship next-generation Phaeton sedan, an electric Microbus, or something else.
Presidential election: The Obama administration has been supportive of U.S. Department of Energy grants for clean vehicles and tax incentives for electric vehicles and natural gas vehicles, among other supportive measures. As that president leaves office in a year, questions are coming up on what leading candidates think about environmental issues, clean energy, and alternative fuel vehicles. On the Republican party side, in the latest voter polls, Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio, have been the leading candidates. On the Democratic party side, Hilary Clinton is the obvious choice now that Bernie Sanders has stepped out of the race. Alternative fuel vehicles hasn’t been a topic of discussion at presidential debates, but the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, released in November, and the issue of climate change, have been. Cruz and Rubio strongly oppose CPP and all three Republican candidates think there’s no real proof climate change and global warming are really happening. Free market economics is a philosophy all three embrace. Cruz opposes the Renewable Fuel Standard as he doesn’t support subsidies and the federal government picking “winners and losers.” As speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, Rubio opposed executive orders limiting greenhouse-gas emissions and setting stricter limits for cars sold in Florida; he thought the state should instead embrace the free-market approach. Trump strongly supports the Keystone XL pipeline and hydraulic fracking. Clinton supports a goal of having at least 33% of the nation’s power generated by clean energy sources by 2027; believes climate change is an urgent challenge; and has been unclear on positions on Keystone XL or offshore oil drilling.
Clean transportation events: Calstart’s Clean Low-Carbon Fuels Summit will be in Sacramento, Calif., on February 23; Green Truck Summit will take place March 1-3 in Indianapolis; NAFA I&E with its Sustainable Fleet Accreditation Program will be April 19-22 in Austin, Texas; ACT Expo will be going back to Long Beach, Calif., on May 2-5; AltCarExpo will take place on September 16-17 in Santa Monica, Calif; and Automotive Fleet’s Fleet Technology Expo will be held October 17-19 in Schaumburg, Ill. And don’t forget Clean Cities coalition events throughout the year.
Fuel prices: Low gasoline and diesel prices have been deal breakers in the past year and a half for fleets investing in CNG and propane conversions and consumers backing away from hybrids and electric vehicles. The global oil supply is expected to eventually feel the effects of growing demand from developing nations; as for now the supply is high enough to keep fuel prices down into 2016.
Autonomous vehicles: Testing programs will continue to put miles on the road in states that have adopted autonomous vehicle road testing (with most of it still in California). Austin, Texas, is working on a test program with Google on its roads, and hopes to see the state of Texas get on board. Watch for automakers to continue rolling out connected car and semi-autonomous features this year. A good example of this trend is Toyota designing a system to improve and accelerate the mapping of U.S. roads needed to put autonomous vehicles on the roads. It will be debuted at CES 2016 for rollout in 2020.
Hydrogen infrastructure: Hydrogen fueling stations are slowly rolling out in California, with construction underway within a few states in the northeast. Check out the federal H2USA collaborative projects for updates on Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, and California.
Crowdfunding capital: As described in Green Auto Market about a year ago, crowdfunding has gone way beyond a funding source for student film projects and startup rock bands. The Securities and Exchange Commission has released rules on the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012 (JOBS Act) that will take effect in May 2016. That’s expected to bring in more investors who will provide more funding than has been the norm in cleantech crowdfunding projects in recent years.
Hybrid Terrafugia TF-X: For those of you fascinated with futuristic vehicles, check out the Terrafugia TF-X, which just received Federal Aviation Administration approval for test flights. This mid-size car has twin helicopter-style rotors at the tips of its wings that fold out of the car and lift the TF-X into the sky. Once it’s up in the air, electric engines teamed with a 300-horsepower engine provide power. The rotors fold back, and a ducted fan pushes the TF-X along. It has a cruising speed of about 200 mph, with a range of about 500 miles.
Infrastructure growth: During 2015, compressed natural gas fueling, electric vehicle charging, and E85 stations had the largest growth curve. CNG went up 98 stations in the U.S., EV charging went up 2,811 stations, and ethanol (E85) increased at 173 more gas stations.
Biofuels: Lux Research predicts that waste oils will dominate next-generation biofuels in upcoming year. Biodiesel made from novel feedstock, specifically waste oils, will lead novel fuels capacity in 2018. Cellulosic ethanol and renewable diesel follow with 19% and 18%, respectively.
The future of Uber: While ridesharing giant Uber is expected to add more investors and will consider going public on the stock market, a big legal question will have even more impact on its future. The question of whether it will be a transportation network linking car owners to riders or a company with employee drivers will be carefully watched by Lyft, Airbnb, and other “shared economy” startups. Boston-based attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan is representing Uber drivers in California who want to be considered employees (or at least have some of those financial benefits). Liss-Riordan thinks it’s a much bigger question with the on-demand, shared economy encouraging misclassification and mistreatment of its workers – and that includes food delivery startups. Liss-Riordan currently has a lawsuit against Postmates pending in federal court in California; and in California state court, she’s filed class-action complaints against DoorDash and GrubHub. The Uber class-action lawsuit, and these other suits, will take much longer than 2016 to see final court rulings, but analysts are paying a lot of attention to these cases. Uber management certainly cares about it as its business model is based entirely on independent contractors – and eventually with driverless cars being in its fleet.

Sacramento and East Bay Clean Cities Forum explores advanced vehicle technology innovations

“Northern California Clean Technology Forum” featured informative speaker panels and introduction to the Toyota Mirai hydrogen fuel cell car. Held at the California Automobile Museum in Sacramento on Oct 14-15, and hosted by the Sacramento and East Bay Clean Cities Coalitions, stakeholders in the region met to mingle, hear the latest on advanced vehicle technologies, and check out exhibited vehicles including plug-in electric school buses; there was also one of the few remaining GM EV1 models on display in the conference room.

The event kicked off Wednesday with a tour of the Sacramento CNG Station and Natural Gas Compliant Shop. A welcome reception started off the evening prior to the East Bay Clean Cities Coalition 2015 Clean Air Champion Awards. Richard Battersby, Equipment Services Manager for the City of Oakland and Coordinator and Executive Director of the East Bay Clean Cities Coalition, handed out awards to: Ben Rutledge, Resident Engineer, Anheuser Busch In-Bev, Fairfield Brewery; Pat O’Keefe, Vice President and Lori O’Keefe, Project Manager, Golden Gate Petroleum; Nina Hapner, Environmental Director and Fred Carr, EV Project Director, Kashia Band of Pomo Indians of the Stewart’s Point Rancheria; Phillip Kobernick, Sustainability Project Manager, Alameda County; and Kent Leacock, Director of Government Relations, Proterra.

On Thursday, Keith Leech, President of Sacramento Clean Cities and Chief, Fleet Division & Parking for Sacramento County, made opening remarks on topics to be addressed during the day. The first speaker panel started with Kerry Drake, Associate Director at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency – Region 9, talking about the gains being made in the Central Valley to meet the EPA’s top priorities, public health and greenhouse gas emissions reductions. Drake compared the museum’s vehicle display of classic cars going back to the 1920s to where we are now; he described his trip to the museum using Google Maps, being a carsharing subscriber, and looking forward to seeing the upcoming Tesla Autopilot.

Mike Tunnell, Director of Environmental Affairs at American Trucking Associations, talked about the trucking industry facing the second phase of the federal regulations on fuel economy and emissions. Technology innovations need to be reached for this to be possible, Tunnell said. Waste heat recovery, 6×2 axle configurations, automatic engine shutoff, low rolling resistance tires, and automatic tire inflation are resources being tapped into for mileage improvements.

Bill Van Amburg, Senior Vice President at CALSTART, gave an overview of 2016 model year roll-outs in clean vehicles. The Mirai, a Japanese word for “future,” was up on the stage with Van Amburg and other speakers; that fuel-cell vehicle is launching this month in California. The 2016 Toyota Prius, with its revamped exterior, is also being anticipated in the market.

On the commercial vehicle side, Van Amburg discussed innovations being adopted as increased fuel economy pushes forward in Phase 2 of the federal rules; breakthroughs on this front include a Freightliner model that has increased from 6 mpg to 12 mpg and a Cummins engine with NOx 90% below its 2010 level. Renewable natural gas is coming to market, and Cummins said that the clean fuel can now be used in its 6.6L and 12L engines. Two other innovations that Van Amburg discussed include the Cadillac Super Cruise hands-free system rolling out in 2017 Cadillac models; and the Workhorse battery electric “HorseFly” package delivery drone winning U.S. Federal Aviation Administration authorization for test flights.

Rich Piellisch, Editor of Fleets & Fuels, moderated a panel on renewable fuel sources moving forward as a viable alternative for fleets. Speakers included Teri Rohner, CA DGS Natural Gas Services Program on renewable natural gas; Pat O’Keefe, CEO of Golden Gate Petroleum on renewable gasoline and diesel; Chris Kretz, Business Development Manager at Air Products on renewable hydrogen; and Bill Boyce, Electric Transportation Supervisor at Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) on renewable electricity.

During that same day, the City of Oakland announced its commitment to renewable diesel when the first of its vehicles filled up with NEXDIESEL renewable diesel during a gathering of the Public Works Department, its supplier Golden Gate Petroleum and fuel manufacturer, Neste. Golden Gate Petroleum sells Neste’s NEXBTL renewable diesel under its own brand NEXDIESEL renewable diesel and had display cars outside the automotive museum.

Green Auto Market Editor Jon LeSage moderated a panel on future vehicle technologies and transportation trends. Jean-Baptiste Gallo, Senior Project Engineer at CALSTART; Jason Schulz, Partnership Marketing Manager & Business Development for the 21^st Century at Toyota; and Tim Lipman PhD, Co-Director at the Transportation Sustainability Research Center, UC Berkeley, talked about the “urbanization” trend with traffic congestion and air pollution driving policy changes and increased use of transportation alternatives such as carsharing and ridesharing. Carsharing services such as Zipcar and Car2Go are taking off in membership, and ridesharing services from Uber and Lyft are seeing gains in permission to pick up at airports and in ridership numbers.

With predictions of another one billion people living on the planet by 2025, Toyota is looking at alternatives such as the electric I-Road three-wheeler being testing out in Japan, Schulz said. Automakers are looking at the changing transportation options that members of the Millennial generation who put off car purchases longer than previous generations, and who are looking for practical options in personal mobility in crowded cities.

During the panel’s discussion of autonomous vehicle technologies, Schulz said that for OEMs, safety is the driving force behind supporting test projects such as Mcity in Ann Arbor, Mich. Toyota, Honda, GM, and suppliers are exchanging data from the Mcity project to develop autonomous technologies and take away the 33,000 fatalities per year figure that continues in the U.S. Safety issues and cyber security are being addressed in the autonomous vehicle studies, as is the question of whether driverless cars will take away road traffic congestion, Lipman said. If long commutes become easier for watching TV or reading a book, it can take away the motivation to drive less miles and remove some of the traffic congestion, he said. Lipman and his colleagues have seen a strong convergence between electrified and autonomous vehicle technologies.

Electrification of urban fleets is seeing gains in passenger vehicles and truck options, Gallo said. Energy storage, smart grid technologies, and electricity price planning are being explored by companies. A recent CALSTART study analyzed how fleets are integrating electric vehicles including delivery trucks and transit buses. Managing through demand periods when energy costs rise is still new for a lot of fleets, and they’re testing out solutions in the new vehicle-to-grid systems.

An afternoon session featured fleet success stories using GPS/telematics for sustainability gains. Dave Head, President of NorCalMEMA; David Worthington, Fleet Manager, Sonoma County; Doug Bond, Fleet Manager, Alameda County; and Sam Pence, Heavy Equipment Mechanic Leadworker, CalTrans, participated on this panel.

Toyota working hard at building its image as the leader in safe, connected and autonomous vehicles

Toyota Motor Corp. is striding forward to reestablish its name as a manufacturer of safe vehicles and a forerunner in advanced, autonomous vehicle technologies. Its vehicle communication system, called ITS Connect, will go on sale in Japan this year in the Toyota Crown luxury sedan; it was unveiled on Oct. 6 during a demonstration near the Tokyo waterfront. Toyota said it will deploy autonomous driving systems by 2020 supporting vehicles talking to each other, scanning blind spots, and keeping safe distance from other cars.

Toyota’s work is aimed at supporting developing technologies that could lead the auto industry’s transition to autonomous vehicles. That will come through ITS Connect, which deploys vehicle-to-infrastructure and vehicle-to-vehicle communication systems in its cars; these technologies are also described by transportation planners as “intelligent transportation systems” (ITS). Some experts believe that ITS technologies will be key components in autonomous vehicles. For now, Toyota is considered a leader in connected car technologies that will play a role in the future of autonomous vehicles.

Toyota is continuing to recover from its massive vehicle recall during 2009-2010 for “unintended acceleration,” and was part of the major recall this year with Takata airbags. In February 2011, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, in collaboration with NASA, released findings into the investigation on the Toyota drive-by-wire throttle system. After a 10-month study, NASA and NHTSA scientists found no electronic defect in Toyota vehicles; the crisis wasn’t over in court rooms, but the ruling helped Toyota emerge from the crisis on solid ground.

General Motors seemed to follow Toyota’s lead in 2014 with its massive recall of 39 million vehicles globally over a faulty ignition switch, bringing in outside investigators to get to the root of the problem. Analysts and commentators are encouraging Volkswagen to follow a similar ethical path in its diesel emissions scandal accountability.

Along with hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, Toyota has been investing in safety and innovative technologies that could support development of future autonomous vehicles. Toyota has been testing out its own Advanced Safety Research Vehicle – a Lexus LS used for research at the Toyota Research Institute in Ann Arbor, Mich. It uses forward-looking and side-facing millimeter-wave radar sensors, as well as a 360-degree laser scanner. Onboard computers use data from those scanners, and data collected from the engine and wheels, to collect data on the car’s surroundings, and operate the car’s controls.

Eight automakers – Toyota, Daimler, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Hyundai, Nissan, and Volkswagen – have been developing vehicle-to-vehicle communications (V2V) technology in cooperation with the federal government for several years through a group called the Crash Avoidance Metrics Partnership (CAMP). The V2V transmitters and software are expected to cost an estimated $350 per vehicle in 2020; but automakers so far have supported NHTSA’s objective.

On Aug. 18, 2014, NHTSA released an advance notice of proposed rulemaking and a supporting research report on V2V communications technology. “Safety is our top priority, and V2V technology represents the next great advance in saving lives,” said US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx.

The rules will give drivers early warnings of approaching danger in vehicles built after 2020. NHTSA predicts that V2V technology could prevent 25,000 to 592,000 crashes and save 49 to 1,083 lives annually when the entire US vehicle fleet has adopted the technology; that would come from adopting Left Turn Assist (LTA) and Intersection Movement Assist (IMT) applications.

The Ann Arbor test, managed by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI), is testing out several different accident-prevention approaches. The most sophisticated includes 64 cars, three buses and three trucks driven by the public and specially built by the automakers with a sampling of six safety-warning features, along with video cameras to capture traffic incidents.

On the green car front, Toyota is counting on the redesigned 2016 Prius to reestablish the Prius brand as a technology innovator. For fuel cell cars, Toyota will be displaying the Toyota FCV Plus at the Tokyo Motor Show. Toyota is counting on the 2016 Mirai to essentially become the Prius of hydrogen fuel cell cars.

This Week’s Top 10: Ford stepping forward as personal mobility company, Supreme Court rules against EPA on Clean Air Act

by Jon LeSage, editor and publisher, Green Auto Market

Here’s my take on the 10 most significant and interesting occurrences during the past week…….

Ford champions its evolving identity: Ford Motor Co. was highly visible last week in its evolving role as a personal mobility company, and not just as a vehicle manufacturer. “People value access more than ownership. We need to understand customers’ concerns and make their lives easier,” Ford CEO Mark Fields said in an interview. Last week, the company announced a pilot carsharing program where 26,000 Ford Motor Credit Co. customers in six US cities and London are invited to offer their vehicles for short-term rentals. It’s part of the Ford Smart Mobility plan that Fields introduced in January; another offering from Smart Mobility will be electric bikes targeted at urban commuters. The bike is able to be folded up and recharged while being stored inside any Ford vehicle. Ford Motor Co. also announced that it’s in the second of three phases of its autonomous vehicle project. Ford executives have said that a number of driver-assist features that represent steps along the path toward a self-driving vehicle will be rolled out across the company’s vehicle lineup over the next five years. Some of the testing Ford will be carrying out on these advanced technologies will take place at its S ilicon Valley Research and Innovation Center, which opened in January. One development coming out of this center will be a technology that may be able to produce parts 25 to 100 times faster than traditional 3D printing.
Supreme Court rules against EPA on Clean Air Act: The Obama Administration’s health care reform act survived US Supreme Court scrutiny on Thursday, but the 2011 Clean Air Act amendments were overturned yesterday by that same court. In Michigan v. EPA, the court ruled 5-4 that the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) underestimated the costs to utilities and other companies on toxic air pollutants. The EPA had previously estimated its rule would cost $9.6 billion, produce between $37 billion and $90 billion in benefits and prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths and 130,000 asthma cases annually. The court ruling found those estimates to be “unreasonably” interpreted and would be much more costly to industries. The EPA ruling had focused on coal-fired power plants, but there’s also been a good deal of concern that manufacturers would be drawn into the rule’s enforcement. “Manufacturers look to today’s victory as a sign of progress and will continue to lead the way to promote a more environmentally sustainable future, but we need a balanced approach to regulations that considers both costs and benefits to continue to create jobs and economic growth,” said National Association of Manufacturers Senior VP and General Counsel Linda Kelly. The EPA says that several utilities were already well on their way to adopting the Clean Air Act guidelines. “EPA is disappointed that the Court did not uphold the rule, but this rule was issued more than three years ago, investments have been made and most plants are already well on their way to compliance,” EPA spokeswoman Melissa Harrison said in a statement.
GM jabs at Tesla: While not being overt and blunt about it, General Motors CEO Mary Barra said that Chevrolet’s Volt and Bolt are being made “for regular people, not for the elites.” During an unveiling last week of the 2016 Chevrolet Cruze, Barra also made statements about GM electric vehicles. The Bolt EV Concept car has an estimated range of 200 miles, and like the Volt it will be affordable, Barra said. Earlier that day, GM’s executive chief engineer for electric vehicles, Pam Fletcher, said pretty much the same thing during a breakout session on plug-in electric vehicles. GM will make “electric cars approachable to the all, not just the elite,” Fletcher said.
Fuel efficient renewable diesel road trip: History was made by a performance car running on renewable diesel that made its way across the country on one tank of fuel. On June 26^th, CLP Motorsports’ Superlite Coupe crossed the finish line in Santa Monica, Calif., after making it across the US on one tank of NEXBTL renewable diesel. That came from an alliance between Neste, the world’s largest producer of renewable diesel, CLP Motorsports, and multiple time X-Games and Rallycross champion Tanner Foust. “We will continue to promote this great fuel through our fleet-servicing and retail stations and of course through our racing,” said Pat O’Keefe, inventor of this project and CEO of CLP Motorsports. The coupe averaged 67 mpg while traveling an average of 68 mph, and that included a segment of the trip driving over the Rockies.
Clean transportation information resource: South Coast Air Quality Management District’s Mobile Source Air Pollution Reduction Review Committee (MSRC) has published its quarterly Clean Transportation Policy Update. Read all about California’s administration, regulation, funding, research, and legal activities. Examples of topics covered include the groundbreaking decisions in the state on reaching the greenhouse gas emission reduction target of 40% below 1990 levels by 2030 through Gov. Jerry Brown’s new climate target.
More crowdfunding for Elio Motors: As the three-wheeled electric vehicle manufacturer scrambles to survive and thrive in the market, founder Paul Elio’s funding activities have become even more ambitious. Elio needs to raise about $230 million more to start manufacturing its vehicle in a four-million-square-foot former General Motors plant in Shreveport, La. Elio is offering early-stage investments on the Start Engine site. That investment has been made possible through the JOBS Act of 2012. This legislation permits individuals to invest up to $15,000 in startup companies; these companies are allowed to accept up to $50 million from non-accredited investors.
More support for disadvantaged communities: California Air Resources Board (CARB) voted to boost the size of the rebates for low-income buyers to $4,000. At the same time, the board cut out rich car buyers completely, setting an upper limit on the income of people receiving the rebates. To qualify for the low-income rebate, buyers must make no more than 300% of the federal poverty level, which comes out to about $73,000 for a four-person family, or $48,000 for a two-person household. (See the feature article, “Key findings from webinar on fleet incentives for clean vehicles,” in this week’s Green Auto Market for more information on the state’s priority to serve disadvantaged communities, which live in the most concentrated air pollution regions of California.)
Propane bi-fuel system: The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has granted certification to Imega International USA’s GAME bi-fuel propane autogas/gasoline system. The approvals cover the 4.6-liter V8 engine line-up for the model-years 2009, 2010, and 2011 Ford Crown Victoria, Lincoln Town Car, and Mercury Grand Marquis. Imega is in the process of EPA certifying many popular fleet platforms to be available soon, the company said.
More OEM energy storage: Daimler and Nissan are following Tesla Motors’ lead after that luxury electric vehicle maker introduced its PowerWall in late April. Daimler and Nissan say they’ll be bringing similar products to the commercial and residential energy sectors. Daimler is offering a storage plant of up to 20 kilowatt-hours that will begin shipping in September. The next week, Nissan announced it will deploy second-life vehicle batteries for commercial energy storage markets through partner Green Charge Networks.
Sustainable Transportation Day: The US Energy Department’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) hosted the Sustainable Transportation Day at the Energy Department’s headquarters in Washington, DC. Visitors had the opportunity to see first-hand several of these EERE-supported technologies, ranging from high-efficiency internal combustion engines to vehicles that rely on electricity and hydrogen. The Hyundai Tucson and the Toyota Mirai fuel cell electric vehicles were among the vehicles on display.