Great Wall ORA Test Drive

Although Great Wall Motor has marketed a whole litter of “Cats” in China (Good, Black, White, and IQ), Australia is only receiving one version. It will be marketed as the GWM ORA. I hope that the other versions will make it here eventually. In the meantime, we went for a Great Wall ORA test drive! […]
Source: CleanTechnica Car Reviews RSS Feed

Ford patent describes drone moonroof pad allowing take off and landing from moving vehicles

It admittedly isn’t the kind of invention marking a radical departure from its previous drone-related innovations, but a recently published US patent application by the Ford Motor Co. does offer additional evidence the automotive giant is intent on integrating UAVs into its future cars and trucks.

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Source: Charge Forward

Will California’s bidirectional EV charging mandate bring Tesla on board with bidirectional charging?

California Governor Gavin Newsom is just one of many who have called bidirectional charging a “game-changing” technology. Going bi enables vehicle-to-grid applications, which not only provide nifty features to EV drivers, but are widely seen as an essential tool for smoothly integrating large numbers of EVs into the electrical grid.

That’s why the California legislature is considering a bill that would require all EVs sold in the state to be bi-capable by 2027. In fact, most EV-makers are moving in that direction already—with one glaring exception.

The bill was making its way through California’s legislative process before Ford and GM shook up the EV infrastructure world by announcing that they would support Tesla’s NACS charging system. As the technical implications of this development begin to sink in, some have pointed out that Tesla doesn’t support bidirectional charging. In fact, the company’s CEO has been dismissive of all things bi. At a presentation in March, Senior VP Drew Baglino said that Tesla had “found ways to bring bidirectionality while actually reducing the cost of power electronics in the vehicle,” and added that the automaker could add bidirectional charging to its vehicles within the next two years. The company’s mercurial CEO stepped in to say that he didn’t think very many people would want to use the feature.