EV

Australia has certainly demonstrated its appetite for solar power. Now, with the average lifespan of a solar panel being approximately 20 years, many installations from the early 2000’s are set to reach end-of-life. Will they end up in landfill or be recycled? The cost of recycling is higher than landfill, and the value of recovered materials is smaller than the original, so there’s limited interest in recycling. But given the presence of heavy metals, such as lead and tin, if waste is managed poorly, we’re on track for another recycling crisis. A potential time bomb could present itself as an opportunity, however, if the global EV industry showed an interest in the recovered solar products.

Western Australia’s Renewable Hydrogen Strategy is beginning to make moves with the backing of Hazer Group and the Water Corporation to produce hydrogen from biogas, an Australian-first with a technology developed in Australia.

MIT scientists have suggested used electric vehicle batteries could offer a more viable business case than purpose-built systems for the storage of grid scale solar power in California. Such ‘second life’ EV batteries, may cost only 60% of their original purchase price to deploy and can be effectively aggregated for industrial scale storage even if they have declined to 80% of their original capacity.

Homegrown fast-charging technology company Tritium has launched “Plug and Charge,” a seamlessly simultaneous way to charge your electric vehicle and pay for the pleasure.

According to a new report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, 58% of global passenger vehicle sales in 2040 will come from electric vehicles, yet they will make up less than 33% of all cars on the road.

A new report published on behalf of a majority of Victorian local councils outlines a course of action for large-scale EV charging station rollout across the state. One key finding shows an enlarging gap in charging infrastructure available to those who drive a Tesla and those who don’t.

German electric boating company Torqueedo’s 100,000th sale highlights a shift in leisure and small commuter boating towards the electric.

As part of the NSW Government’s ambition to transition the entire public bus fleet to zero emissions, Transport NSW is seeking out expressions of interest for participants in trials of zero emission buses. 

U.S.-based Bollinger Motors revealed its patent-pending E-Chassis platform last month, a demonstration that the platform from which commercial fleets can transition to EVs is EV platform-technology itself.

A study by the International Energy Agency into the chilling effect of the Covid-19 pandemic on energy demand states renewables will be ‘the only energy source likely to experience demand growth for the rest of 2020’. The slower the economic recovery, the more the fossil fuel industry will suffer.