Jameson Dow

Extreme E continues its debut season at the Island X Prix in Sardinia this weekend, racing in Europe for the first time.

Each Extreme E venue is picked to bring awareness to one aspect of environmental damage humans are doing to the Earth. In the case of the Island X Prix, the focus is on recent wildfires that tore through Italy this summer, which are exacerbated by rising global temperatures, and on conserving oceanic carbon stores like the ocean seagrass that grows off the coast of Sardinia.

VW, the world’s largest producer of fossil-powered vehicles (by revenue), has produced a graphic comparing its diesel offerings to its electric ones, showing how across several model lines, the electric models come out way ahead in terms of total cost savings.

Herbert Diess, CEO of VW, invited Tesla CEO Elon Musk to call in to an internal conference with 200 VW executives in an effort to spur further innovation from his company. The two auto execs continue to have a beyond cordial relationship after Musk tried to hire Diess to become Tesla’s CEO.

California will ban “small off-road engines” (SORE) primarily used in gas-powered lawn equipment, such as leaf blowers and lawnmowers, in a law signed by Governor Gavin Newsom this weekend.

The province of Saskatchewan in Canada has joined a growing number of regions around the world in levying punitive taxes against electric cars while letting gas cars continue to get away with murder. But a local group has come up with a creative way to show just how dumb their EV tax is: by demanding a tax on people who use sidewalks.

Mazda invited us out for a drive of its upcoming MX-30 electric compact SUV, and some conversations with Mazda’s Irvine R&D folks. We have a lot of thoughts to share about the car and the future of Mazda’s EV programs.

Drive Electric Week kicks off this Saturday with over 200 online and in-person events celebrating electric vehicles. Events will be held for the next two weekends, from September 25 through October 3.

Drive Electric Week is an annual event organized by Plug In America, Electric Auto Association, EVHybridNoire, and Sierra Club. This is the event’s 11th year. It started in the US as National Drive Electric Week, but for the last few years, events have been hosted in various other parts of the globe. This year, there are some events in Canada, Mexico, and New Zealand.

Norway is ahead of the game in EV sales, with gasoline’s share of the new car market vanishing more and more every month, faster than almost anyone outside of Electrek‘s Slack channel could have predicted. This has led Norway to have the earliest target for the phaseout of new gas vehicle sales in the world – 2025.

But gas cars might not even last that long. According to an analysis printed by the Norwegian Automobile Federation’s magazine, Motor, the downward trend in sales for gas cars has been so consistent and steep that the last new gas car sale in Norway could happen just seven months from now, in April 2022.

Cadillac opened reservations for their upcoming 2023 Lyriq electric vehicle at 1 p.m. today, and, in a completely unsurprising turn for our readers, the car sold out almost immediately. By 1:19 p.m., Cadillac stated that all 2023 Lyriq “Debut Edition” vehicles had been reserved.

Other 2023 model year Lyriq trim levels will still be available, but so far, Debut Edition reservations are the only ones that have opened (and 19 minutes later, closed).

This weekend, a Tesla Roadster will make the journey from Lands End to John O’ Groates, an 870-mile drive spanning the full length of the island of Great Britain. This drive has been done by EVs many times before, but in this case, it’s in a special vehicle: the very first car that ever did the drive, the same 2010 Tesla Roadster, still on its original battery, to make a point about EV battery longevity.

The drive also serves as a fundraiser for Zero Carbon World, a UK charity pushing for carbon reduction and EV adoption. Zero Carbon World is chaired by Formula E driver Alexander Sims, who has done a similar drive before in a Model 3. If you’d like to toss in some coins, you can donate to the cause through JustGiving (for £30 you can get your name on the car).

A Plaid Tesla Model S has set a new electric lap record at the famous Nürburgring Nordschleife racetrack in Germany, with a lap time of 7:35.579. This beats the Porsche Taycan’s time by 7 seconds, and is quite competitive with the gas-powered competition as well.

Update: Tesla and Nürburgring have released a statement that 7:35.579 is the official record, despite that being the slower of the two laps on the time slip.

Rivian has released the EPA range rating for their upcoming R1T and R1S electric truck and SUV. For vehicles with the “large pack” configuration, the R1T pickup truck will have a range of 314 miles and 70mpg and the R1S SUV will have a near-identical 316 miles of range and get 69mpge.

California’s planned transition to 100% zero-emission vehicle sales by 2035 could be getting changes soon, as the Executive Board of the California Democratic Party today unanimously adopted a resolution to call for an end to new gas car sales in the state by 2030.

The move comes soon after several California cities, including Culver City, Oakland, and Berkeley, have adopted similar resolutions calling for a 2030 target.

Electric off-road racing series Extreme E will race at Russell Glacier at the Arctic X Prix near Kangarlussuaq in Greenland this weekend, in the first motorsport event ever to be held in Greenland.

Each Extreme E venue is picked to bring awareness to one aspect of environmental damage humans are doing to the Earth. In the case of the Arctic X Prix, the focus is on ice melt leading to global sea level rise.

Ford is planning to double production of their upcoming F-150 Lightning electric pickup truck, according to Reuters. The move comes in response to strong early demand, with Ford already racking up 120,000 customer reservations for the vehicle in advance of its spring 2022 release.

Genesis, Hyundai’s luxury division, has just unveiled interior and exterior images of their first entry into the electric vehicle market. The car takes form of a crossover SUV, designated the GV60.

Mercedes has announced that they will pull out of Formula E at the end of next season, the 2021-2022 race season.

The announcement comes just after the conclusion of this year’s Formula E season, which saw Mercedes win both the Teams’ and Drivers’ championship (via Nyck de Vries) last weekend.

Cadillac invited us out for a chance to get up close and personal with the “production-spec” Lyriq EV that they unveiled back in April.

We’ve got photos and video to share, and you can decide for yourself whether you agree that this thing looks sweet.

Formula E’s season finale is coming up this weekend in Berlin with a doubleheader of races at the Tempelhof Airport Street Circuit. It’s another two-race weekend, but this one is a little different – for the second race, the cars will go the opposite direction around the track to shake things up a bit.

Ford has sent out an email to future Mach-E owners warning of a six-week delay in delivery times for orders produced or scheduled between July 5 and October 1. To compensate affected customers, Ford will provide an additional 250kWh (about 700 miles) worth of complimentary charging to affected owners.

Audi invited us out to LA for a first look at their new Skysphere concept, which they will be showing at Pebble Beach this week. The car, while only a concept so far, gives us a glimpse into the future of Audi design and engineering, and we’re seriously here for it.

Audi invited us out to Los Angeles for a test drive of the Audi e-tron GT and Audi RS e-tron GT on the scenic Angeles Crest highway to get a feel for just how ridiculously powerful and controlled their new electric car is.

Formula E returns to London this weekend for another doubleheader, but at a new venue. This time, the race will be held in and around London’s ExCeL convention center in a unique track layout which Formula E says is the first indoor-outdoor race in motorsport history.

Tesla has dropped the price of their FSD Computer/Hardware 3.0 upgrade to $1,000, from the previous price point of $1,500. This applies to vehicles that still have Hardware 2.0/2.5 computers and want to try the new Tesla FSD subscription service rolled out this weekend.

The move comes after significant criticism from Tesla forums and from us here at Electrek, who pointed out that Tesla is charging owners to upgrade to hardware they were already told they had.