The Chevrolet Bolt EV

The Chevy Bolt EV came to Europe as the Opel Ampera E around the same time that GM sold its European operation to PSA.

The change affected the rollout of the electric vehicle in Europe, but Opel announced this week that it is bringing an electric Corsa, which is in the same segment as the Ampera E, to market.
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GM’s Chevy Bolt EV sales started significantly down in 2018 on a month-to-month basis, but they remain slightly up over the same period last year.
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GM ended up delivering over 23,000 Chevy bolt EVs in the US during its first full year of production, but availability was limited in other markets.

Despite troubles in Europe where the vehicle is sold as the Opel Ampera-E, 2018 is expected to be a more important year for GM’s only all-electric vehicle sold internationally.

Now, we learn that South Korea could become an important market for the car as GM confirms that it is allocating 5,000 units to the country for the year.
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Google this week announced that it was putting Google Assistant on Android Auto which basically means that your Android phone is now a Google Home/Amazon Echo type of device in your car that you can talk to. This, as opposed to having to push the button on the steering wheel, is great for passengers who want to ruin my music vibe.

Unfortunately, my Chevy Bolt was on an older version of the firmware which apparently isn’t OTA upgradable and cut out Android Auto on my Google Pixel every few minutes. To properly test and use Google Assistant, I was going to need to get a firmware update. Off to the Chevy dealer, right?

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Today, GM unveiled the first image of its upcoming autonomous fourth-generation Bolt EV-based vehicle – the “first without a steering wheel or pedal.”

The automaker also says that it filed a petition asking the DOT permission to deploy the vehicle as soon as next year.
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With the relative success of its Chevy Bolt EV and the hunger for EVs in China, GM is one of the few big automakers actually trying to build a business around electric vehicles. CEO Mary Barra has committed separately to 5 crossovers, 2 minivans, 7 SUVs and 10 new electric vehicles by the end of the decade in China.  But with the Bolt EV reportedly losing up to $9000 per vehicle initially, how does the company get to real profitability with these vehicles?

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Not unlike the Tesla Model 3, the Chevy Bolt EV had a slow production and delivery ramp-up in 2017, but it did finish the year strong by increasing deliveries every month leading to another new record in December.
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Early this morning, the U.S. Senate passed their major tax bill after weeks of debate and according to the latest available information, it looks like the federal tax credit for electric vehicles is still in danger despite some changes since the original introduction of the bill that removed the incentive.

Update: we are receiving other reports suggesting the EV tax credit wasn’t removed from the approved bill with Senator Flake’s amendment, but it is still unclear. We actually don’t know exactly what they passed and most senators probably don’t either if we are being honest.

Update 2: The amendment is now confirmed not to be in the bill that passed in the Senate – document in full further down.
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November was another good month for GM’s Chevy Bolt EV US sales. The electric vehicle hit a new record with almost 3,000 units sold in one month – bringing the total to over 20,000 units to date.
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GM CEO and Chairman Mary Barra elaborated on the automaker’s previously announced electric car plans and battery cost goals at a conference today.
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Around the time GM sold Opel and all its European operations to the PSA Group, then Opel CEO Karl-Thomas Neumann floated the idea of the brand going all-electric.

Currently, Opel’s only EV is the Chevy Bolt EV, which is sold as the Ampera E, but now the company announces that it is expanding its lineup to have 4 electric vehicles (BEVs and PHEVs) by 2020 and a complete electrification of its lineup by 2024.
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The situation with the Chevy Bolt EV in Europe, where it is sold as the Opel Ampera E, is becoming increasingly complicated ever since GM sold its European operations to the PSA Group. They have limited supply while demand is through the roof.

It now looks like they are capitalizing on that since they have announced a price hike for the all-electric vehicle.
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The full GOP House tax bill has been released and as expected earlier this morning, it does include the end of the federal tax credit for electric vehicles.

The official language indicates that the bill, in its current form, will end the $7500 subsidy entirely by the end of the year, which is sure to completely change the EV market in the US over the next few months. If you look at what happened to Denmark or even the US State of Georgia when tax incentives end, it isn’t a pretty picture for the EV market.

Here’s how we suggest approaching buying a new Tesla, Bolt EV, Hyundai Ioniq or any electric car really, with this new potential change.
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GM’s all-electric vehicle, the Chevy Bolt EV, just had another new record month for sales in the US as sales have steadily climbed throughout now its first full year of production.
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The situation around the availability of the Chevy Bolt EV in Europe, where it is sold as the Opel Ampera E, has been even more difficult than in the US.

So much so that Opel has now asked its Norwegian dealers to stop taking orders for the new all-electric vehicle as supply can’t match demand.
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It’s often expected for new models to receive low reliability ratings, but Chevy has bucked that trend with the Bolt.  In Consumer Reports’ new reliability ratings released yesterday, while Chevy as an overall brand scored relatively low (18th place), the Bolt came in as the most reliable car the manufacturer sells, out of 15 models (the highest number of models of any manufacturer ranked by CR).

This is great news, because the Bolt is a great car in pretty much every other way too.  It won Motor Trend’s Car of the Year and many other awards, and we really like it, even though it’s not without its quibbles.  Despite all these awards, sales initially lagged (though they’re picking up as the car is made more available nationwide), so perhaps CR’s rating will help GM sell some more Bolts – if they actually want to. We’ll see if Chevy puts the Bolt, their most reliable car, front and center in its national ad campaign about winning awards for reliability.

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After testing their all-electric and autonomous Chevy Bolt EV prototypes in California, Michigan, and Arizona, GM’s Cruise Automation vehicles are going to New York City to further test their system in a difficult traffic environment.
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On Thursday, GM announced a pretty big move in promoting Pamela Fletcher, who led the team that successfully launched the Bolt EV, to the newly created position of ‘Vice President, Global Electric Vehicle Programs’. Before that, her title was Executive Chief Engineer Autonomous & Electrified Vehicles and New Technology so it can be assumed that this is more of a creation of a new group inside of GM rather than a promotion for Fletcher.  She was also chief engineer behind the impressive Volt Propulsion System (Voltec) so I’d be hard-pressed to find someone more qualified to lead GM’s EV programs.

The creation of the group could be a big deal not just for Fletcher but for GM’s electric vehicle programs and hopefully, it is the first step to bigger changes within the organization. Here’s why…

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GM’s Chevy Bolt EV sales steadily moved higher leading to national availability in August, but last month it got its first more serious jump in deliveries.

The automaker confirmed its September delivery results today and it delivered an impressive 2,632 Bolt EVs.
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While GM has often talked about believing in the electric future, the American automaker had yet to announce specific goals when it comes to its electric car lineup after the Chevy Bolt EV.

Today, GM updated those plans with a more serious commitment to electric vehicles.
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Let me preface this by highlighting the fact that there’s currently no fully self-driving car on the roads and the prototypes currently in test programs are far from perfect and therefore don’t represent the potential of a true level 5 autonomous driving system.

Now with this out of the way, it seems like people just can’t stop crashing into GM’s ‘self-driving’ Bolt EV prototypes.
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