Report #87: California bans ICE from 2035 — Lucid Sapphire — Meyers Manx is back
I created this header with DALL·E 2 AI system, with a prompt: "Nikola Tesla in space in a Tesla Model X advertisement, vaporwave, full shot, digital art"
The Model X isn't quite right but I'm still pretty happy with how this turned out.
Here's a teaser of what I've learned this week:
- California leads the way
- Lucid goes after Plaid... kind of
- E-cannonball and 4 other EVents
- Meyer Manx is back, Tesla gets destroyed by hail and Rivian goes for a swim.
Words: 2,091. Time to read: 10 minutes. Feel: electrifying.
- Jaan
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🥳 Milestone: There are now 2,000 of you getting these newsletters!
It feels crazy.
I've now set my eyes on growing the newsletter faster than before. You can help. Just forward this newsletter and/or shout out to our revamped website anywhere and you'll be making a real impact on our planet Universe.
How? The more of us here, the better we can build out the resources I've planned. Which in turn means a bigger impact on EV adoption, and thus, the planet.
We're on a mission, you and I.
Let's go!
PS - to celebrate, I opened up a discount code for a week, which will give you a solid 10% off of our monthly or annual plan to join the Pro. Just enter the code "2000" on the checkout (link) ✔️. There are over 60 of us on the other side already.
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✔️ California bans ICE by 2035
Sounds like old news? It isn't.
The move has been circulating back and forth, but now California follows through and yesterday, the California Air Resources Board unanimously voted to adopt the Advanced Clean Cars II plan, which bans the sales of new ICE cars by 2035. (link, 21pp pdf resolution)
A lot of other states are likely to go along, as at least 15 states have adopted California’s vehicle standards on previous clean-car rules, so states like NY, Massachusetts, Vermont are likely to come along (link). Even Toyota finally backed down from its lawsuit against the Clean Air Act.
The details of the ICE phaseout:
- 20% of sales can still be PHEVs by 2035 (why),
- 35% of sales must be EVs (or hydrogen-powered) by 2026, and
- 68% by 2030.
The current situation
California, which I'd call a Little Norway in the United States (nearest to one, at least in our Universe), currently has a 15.1% EV market share. 29.6% if you would include hybrids. (8pp pdf).
Tesla holds a 10.7% market share of overall sales and Model Y was the best-selling vehicle in the first half of the year with 43,320 registrations. Second place? Model 3, with 38,993 sold.
The only carmaker with a larger market share is Toyota, with 17.9%.
Tesla (82.2%) and Genesis (53%) were the only brands that saw growth year over year, everyone else was in decline.
Jaan's rant: Although the supply chain issues can distort the EV adoption picture quite a bit, I'd bet most institutions underestimate how fast you can jump from 15% to a 50% adoption with this clearly superior technology, combined with current tailwinds. Don't listen to me, but I'll say the first targets set will be reached at least two years before the phase-out plan states.
As a sidenote - Los Angeles Airport (LAX) plans to reach 1,300 (mostly L2) chargers by the end of this year, with 832 already in operation. (link) You can reserve a spot in advance on the website, with a fee of $2 and $0.45/kWh
EV Spotlight
Lucid Motors launched a performance subsidiary called Sapphire, unveiling it at The Quail during Monterey Car Week.
As we guessed, it's a three-motor upgrade of the Lucid Air... but also a little more than that:
- Price: $249,000 (excl taxes and dest. fees).
- Production is planned for the first half of next year, available to reserve now.
- Three motors: twin motor rear-drive unit and single motor front.
- Upgraded battery system for 'higher power and more precise thermal logic', along with chassis and body improvements.
- 0-60mph in < 2 seconds, 0-100mph in < 4 seconds, 1/4 mile in < 9 seconds, top speed over 200 mph (322 km/h).
- Tries to beat Tesla Plaid in every way possible?
Additional Sapphire models will be available for all Lucid models moving forward.
Here's the press release and Lucid's promo video.
Here's Ryan from The Kilowatts riding shotgun of a prototype Sapphire while The Stig takes it for a spin or two on Laguna Seca (video), and Throttle House with the walkaround (never mind the clickbait headline):
I'll likely never own an EV that costs $250k. But the advancements made in these high-end performance vehicles are bound to trickle down for us regular folk too... and that makes me happy about this kind of rivalry.
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Quiz:
It's a weird one this week. How is this planter relevant to the EV industry? Take your wildest guess.
Last week: our caption contest for the Tesla police car in the side mirror yielded a lot of interesting results, with about 140 of them (here). Here are a couple of my favorites:
"The competition in the mirror is closer than it may appear"
"The quietest car chase in history"
"But sir... what am I being charged with?"
" "f*ck f*ck f*ck" — my 16yo playing a game"
Thanks for all the laughs.
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The most clicked link last week was the list of EVs that continue to be eligible for the EV tax credit in the US until the end of this year (link).
Tesla stock ($TSLA) has now completed its 3-to-1 split and closed the first trading day after the split at $296.07 per share.
Measurement Canada is finally about to allow the EV charging networks to start charging customers by the kWh, instead of by the minute. (link)
Why is this important? The charging power you get can depend on several factors, like temperature, state of charge, car specifications, etc. An Ioniq 5 charging at 220kW for 30 minutes shouldn't be charged the same as Nissan LEAF charging at 50kW. From what I've seen, a hybrid approach makes the most sense: bill per kWh at the first hour or so, then add a per-minute billing so there wouldn't be queues because of people topping up the last (slow-charging) bit of the battery.
China: Hainan is the first province to set a phase-out date for pure ICE vehicles — from 2030, only 'New Energy Vehicles' can be sold after 2030 which includes plug-in hybrids. (link) The island province has about 9M inhabitants.
Ford cuts 3,000 white-collar jobs, (link) and as far as I can tell, these are from the ICE side of the business.
That was fast — Tritium's Tennessee, US factory starts production, just five months after the announcement. (link) Reaching full capacity will take time, however, to make 30k DC chargers per year at its peak. Just in time for the NEVI program rollout.
BYD's European expansion will be battery-electric only (in China it sells roughly 50/50 hybrids and BEVs) starting with three models: SUV Tang EV, Han EV and Atto 3. We should see the European versions at the Paris Motor Show in October. (link in DE)
V2G in NYC: Revel, NineDot Energy and Fermata Energy connected the first V2G program into the NYC grid at Revel's Brooklyn warehouse. The three bidirectional chargers from Fermata can export ~45kW back to the grid, currently from Nissan LEAFs.
I'll be covering two more V2G angles regarding battery swap stations and selling to the grid, in today's Pro report (get it here). I frunking love how the rEVolution also makes our infrastructure smarter.
New Guinness World Records, by Zeekr 001 (link):
- Fastest ever drift in an EV with 207.996 km/h (129mph) and
- fastest ever EV slalom with 50 cones in 49.05 seconds.
We've still got ways to go though... fastest ICE car, a Nissan GT-R Nismo, drifted at 304.96 km/h in 2016. (link)
Canoo and Walmart (after we reported Walmart ordered 4,500 delivery vehicles and might take a ~20% stake in Canoo) already launched a pilot for 7-days-a-week InHome deliveries in Dallas Fort Worth metroplex, likely to test the configurations before Q4 production start. (link) (video)
Unlock 33 more noteworthy news of this week, along with my wannabe-EV-expert insights, in the EV Universe Pro report (2,035 words):
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EVents
Electrify Expo, an EV festival with a lot of Ride & Drives and EV expos, in New York tomorrow (27-28th August), in Miami (Oct 8-9th), and in Austin (Nov 11-13th) (register here). It also hosts "Industry Day" on the November event (link)
EVolution, Bank of America hosts a virtual EV show, on September 9th (reg).
The Battery Show, the largest EV battery tech trade show in North America, Sept 13-15th, Novi, Michigan. (link). It is combined with Electric and Hybrid Vehicle technology expo, same place same time. (link)
European Battery Raw Materials Conference by Fastmarkets, for those involved in the production and procurement of battery raw materials. September 20-21th, Barcelona, Spain (link).
E-Cannonball takes place for the 5th year in Hamburg, Germany on 23-25th September. (link) This is a real EV community event, with 70 contestants chosen to participate (list). This looks fun!
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Uh-oh.
Here are the spots where the EV Universe, instead of expanding, is shrinking a little.
🚫 To my surprise, Evergrande New Energy Vehicle went into production with the Hengchi 5 in January this year, regardless of it being in constant financial difficulties and a likely takeover target.
It turns out, the company has only produced 200 over the last 7 months and now stopped production on August 18th due to lack of materials. First suppliers are now insisting on full payment before delivery. (link) It is again speculated that the China real-estate group will find another automaker to sell the automotive arm to.
🚫 Toyota North America's VP of Sales Jack Hollis says "lack of consumer demand" makes the US goal of 50% EV sales by 2030 a "long shot" (link).
Says the company with one BEV model which it fails to bring to market (link) and we all know wants keep its way on hybrids. I wonder if Hollis had said the same thing if hybrids weren't squeezed into the IRA subsidy scheme so well. Toyota should be able to cruise on this for quite a while.
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Stuff I'm...
...watching
The original '63 Dune Buggy comes back as Meyers Manx 2.0 Electric:
The 20/40kWh battery variants will offer a 150/300mi range and is just. the electrified iconic we needed (link). You can reserve one for $500 (here), and you can also apply to be one of the 50 beta testers (here)
👀 POV: Your Tesla glass roof is being destroyed by a massive hail storm in Canada:
with a body overview after the storm (here) and interior (here). This is crazy.
👀 A better look at the DeLorean Alpha5 concept with Supercar Blondie:
(see the new DeLorean concepts on our Pro report)
👀 32 minutes of VW ID.Buzz production line:
Rivian R1T doesn't seem to have problems getting its wheels wet to launch a boat:
...reading
📚 Colin McKerrachers's analysis on how "Electric Car Battery Bottlenecks Have a Way of Being Worked Out" (link). He takes on the example of cobalt, on both supply and demand sides.
I'm fascinated by how the rest of the industry, like the potential lithium supply deficit, plays out in the following decade or so in our Universe. I'm not so hopeful we'll overcome the problems here fast, nor easy.
📚 One in five of the 11,554 EV and PHEV owners surveyed by J.D. Power (using PlugShare as a tool for the survey, it seems) said they ended up not charging their vehicle during a visit to a public charging station. And 72% of those said it was due to the station malfunctioning or being out of service. (link)
...listening
🎧 Switched On podcast (Bloomberg), hosting Irene Feige from BMW. Topic: automotive supply chain, designing a circular economy vehicle. (21 min)
🎧 ChargePoint business model tear down by Business Breakdowns (40 min) via Trucks FoT.
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