Electric car completes gruelling Dakar rally
A car sponsored by Spanish infrastructure and renewable energy multinational Acciona has become the first all-electric entry to complete the gruelling Dakar Rally, now in its 39th year. Staged this year in South America, the Acciona entry is the only one of the more than 18,000 vehicles that have completed the rally over the years to do so without consuming a drop of fuel or emitting a single molecule of carbon dioxide. The goal going in, the company said in a statement, was to prove that renewable energy vehicles can compete in every arena — even the world’s most arduous motor event — and to provide visibility to the fight against climate change in line with the Paris Agreement. Lyft goes long: General Motors’ ride-sharing partner Lyft undertook a major expansion at the end of January when it expanded into 40 new American cities, with the goal to open in a further 100 markets by the end of 2017. The expansion comes after a “strong” 2016 for the service in which Lyft provided 162.5 million rides, three times the number it conducted in 2015. Additional cities will be announced as 2017 progresses, a spokesperson said. This is just the first wave of the Lyft expansion, she said, adding that by the end of the year Lyft will be in 300 U.S. cities with a collective population of 231 million people, up from its current potential customer base of 177 million people. Most buyers are in the dark about electric vehicles: Efforts to educate the public about electric cars still have a way to go, notes alternative vehicle web magazine Green Car Reports. According to a new survey of 2,557 car buyers in the United States conducted by tech consultants Altman Vilandrie and Co., while electric cars have become more common in recent years, they still don’t register on most buyers’ radar. More than half of respondents were unfamiliar with the EVs on the market today. About 60 per cent chose multiple-choice answers saying they’ve never heard of electric vehicles, or that they’ve heard of EVs but know little about them. Eighty per cent said they had never driven an EV, or even ridden in one as a passenger. Diesel cars made before 2000 banned from Paris: In an effort to curb air pollution, the City of Paris has banned diesel cars built before 2000 from its streets and roads, reports The Independent newspaper out of Britain. The ban specifically targets all diesels built between 1997 and 2000 by putting them into the worst polluting of five categories. All other diesels built before 1997 are also banned, but are not assigned to any category. Paris has long struggled with the air pollution caused by its vehicles, reports Road & Track magazine. Previously, Paris attempted to ban odd- and even-numbered cars from the road on alternate days, “but that system was discontinued after it was proven ineffective.” Critics say the ban penalizes those who can’t afford to upgrade to different cars. GM, Honda collaborate on nextgen fuel cell, storage: An agreement between General Motors and Honda will see a combined $85 million US spent toward the mass production of next-generation hydrogen fuel cells. The companies first agreed on a hydrogen collaboration in 2013, reports emerging-technologies web magazine New Atlas, but the four years since have been mostly about establishing an arrangement for the nextgeneration fuel cell and fuel storage technology. The two companies have pooled development resources, and intellectual property has been shared in search of a more efficient powertrain. Using common suppliers and raising economies of scale, GM and Honda hope to push down production costs. Mass production of the new fuel-cell system is expected to start at a plant in Michigan around 2020. In brief: • Self-driving cars will benefit more than two million people with disabilities in the United States by allowing them to enter the workforce, concludes a white paper from think tank Securing America’s Future Energy, devoted to eliminating U.S. dependence on fossil fuels. • An algorithm has been developed in Switzerland allowing “platooning,” in which wirelessly connected autonomous vehicles move in close formation at the same speed on public roads. Because all the vehicles in a platoon are connected, they can travel closer together than their human-driven counterparts, smoothing traffic flow and improving aerodynamic efficiencies. • Lion Bus of Quebec has put more than 50 electric school buses into service across North America since it began commercializing its eLion school bus about a year ago. It announced a new production plant in California in February.