Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

Tesla has started pushing a new software update under its Full Self-Driving Beta program and CEO Elon Musk says it could already cut driver interventions by a third.

Just in case you didn’t notice, the US election is next week, on Tuesday, November 3. We at Electrek ran a Climate Crisis Weekly roundup on October 10 with the headline, “Humanity’s future rests on American voters.” Someone on the subreddit r/JoeBiden declared, “Tech website Electrek backs Biden for president.” Our reaction to that? We’ll take it.

And here’s why. Electrek is for electric vehicles, green energy, slowing and eventually reversing climate change, and protecting and renewing the environment. And we’ll hop on whatever e-bus we have to ride in order to get closest to the goal of progressing those things.

So instead of rounding up the week’s climate change stories, we’ve done something different this week. Some of us in the 9to5 network explain — each with a unique perspective, from all over the US (and world) — why we back Joe Biden in the 2020 US presidential election. In short, it’s because he’s the e-bus that gets us closest to our destination. Because we believe, with a passion, in what we write about.

This week on the Electrek Podcast, we discuss the most popular news in the world of sustainable transport and energy, including Tesla’s service push, changes to Tesla’s regen braking, Model 3 2021 gets its EPA rating, and more.

Sponsored by Electrify America: Discover all the new and innovative ways that Electrify America is providing freedom for electric vehicle drivers at ElectrifyAmerica.com.

As we get closer to the start of Mustang Mach-E deliveries, Ford has released more details about the electric car’s hands-free autonomous driving capability.

Today, we take a look at an interesting new video showing Tesla Full Self-Driving Beta’s performance from the sky in a new drone video with a scary near-miss.

In today’s Electrek Green Energy Brief (EGEB):

• Exxon is making big cuts to its personnel, which could be close to 15% of the global workforce.
• Protect the earth and its biodiversity or face deadlier, more frequent pandemics, says a new report.
• A new report from Wärtsilä shows how a net-zero electricity system in the US is possible by 2035.
• Arcadia Power is committed to making clean energy work for the planet and Americans’ bank accounts — all without changing your utility company. Sign up to receive your $20 Amazon Gift Card — *ad.

The latest data shows Tesla (TSLA) still holds an impressive 18% market share of the global electric car market.

That’s about to change, and it’s not going to be a bad thing for Tesla, who is about to get a smaller piece of a much bigger pie.

CAKE has two new race-oriented versions of its electric dirt bikes, and the company is ready to put them to use on the track.

Twenty-two global leading experts held an urgent virtual workshop, convened by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), about the connection between the degradation of nature and increasing pandemic risks.

We are now roughly 100 days into the Tesla Gigafactory Texas construction project, and it is progressing on pace, but the hard part is still to come as Tesla tries to rapidly deploy production capacity at the new facility.

Tesla is apparently starting to test discounted rates at Supercharger stations in order to offset expensive peak demand charges.

Do you think it’s going to work?

Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn, and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

GM has unveiled its 1977 Chevy K5 Blazer-E converted to electric power with its upcoming eCrate conversion kit using Chevy Bolt EV batteries.

Donald Trump hates wind turbines, and he repeats this constantly. He regurgitated his false gripe about the green energy source killing birds yet again last week during the final presidential debate.

So just how threatening are wind turbines to our feathered friends? There are much bigger threats to the global bird population than this green energy source.

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Tesla has now officially increased the price of its Full Self-Driving package to $10,000 in the US.

That’s quite a price for a model that most closely resembles a Kickstarter campaign.

In today’s Electrek Green Energy Brief (EGEB):

• The Trump administration finalizes a plan to open vast portions of the Tongass in Alaska to logging.
• A hydrogen-powered terminal tractor is being tested in the Port of Rotterdam.
• The Environmental Protection Network releases an updated report of EPA environmental rollbacks.
• Arcadia Power is committed to making clean energy work for the planet and Americans’ bank accounts — all without changing your utility company. Sign up to receive your $20 Amazon Gift Card — *ad.

In the late summer, we were given the keys to Audi’s second all-electric car, the E-Tron Sportback, and while there is much to admire, it has taken us a little longer than usual to broadcast. Why? Well, there has always seemed to be more affordable, and in turn more accessible, electric cars to talk about to the public, including the VW ID.4, VW ID.3, Honda e, Tesla Model Y, and most recently the Mazda MX-30.

Slowly but surely, car companies are offering increasingly cost-competitive vehicles, but Audi is going against that grain by offering an even more expensive EV at the second time of asking. We understand that Audi is a luxury carmaker, but we feel compelled to ask, does this strategy stack up? Or could this short-sightedness potentially cost them in the long run? Let’s take a closer look.

Polestar announced today that it is recalling almost all Polestar 2 electric cars that it has delivered globally over an issue with its power inverter and its battery pack coolant heater.

It’s not easy to be an EV startup.

Panasonic announced that it is working with Tesla to build a new prototype production line to produce its 4680 battery cell at Gigafactory Nevada.

The number of electric bicycles with belt drives has been increasing seemingly overnight. What was once a rarity for just the “super nice e-bikes” is now finding its way onto a wider range of e-bike styles than ever before.