This week on Electrek’s Wheel-E podcast, we discuss the most popular news stories from the world of electric bikes and other nontraditional electric vehicles. This time, that includes the launch of the Lectric XPedition 2.0, Yamaha e-bikes pulling out of North America, LiveWire unveils an electric scooter concept, PNY readying its cargo e-scooters for pilot testing, Royal Enfield’s first electric motorcycle, and more.
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In other words, PAO is “assuming the customer is obligated to pay the corporate utility the retail rate” for the power customers generate and use themselves — “and anything they do otherwise is stealing,” McCann said.
In terms of assessing who owes whom, that’s little different from saying that a customer who uses less electricity by insulating their home or switching to more efficient appliances owes the utility money for the electricity they’re no longer consuming, he said.
“If you’re growing vegetables in your garden, you don’t pay the grocery store the retail rate for those vegetables,” he said. “You own those vegetables — and you own the solar you generate.”
PAO’s calculations also ignore the reality that solar-equipped customers still pay utility bills, McCann said. His review of PAO’s work indicates that its cost-shift calculations fail to include the average of $80 to $160 per month that solar-equipped customers pay to the state’s three big utilities. Including that amount shaves another $1.4 billion off the PAO’s total.
Nor does PAO calculate the value of rooftop solar for low-income customers using special-assistance rates, he said. The lower rates for these California Alternate Rates for Energy (CARE) customers, whose annual earnings are at or below the federal poverty level, are subsidized by additional surcharges on all other utility customers’ bills. Not having to collect that money for the solar power those CARE customers generated themselves will save about $720 million in 2024, he said.
PAO’s analysis also contains some fundamental errors in calculating the true average costs of electricity paid by customers of the state’s three major utilities, McCann said.
For example, about $2.46 billion of the PAO’s $8.5 billion total is derived from assuming that solar-equipped customers are being charged significantly more than the true average rates they pay, and that their solar panels are generating more power on average than what official state-distributed generation data shows. That inflates PAO’s valuation of how much money those customers are saving from not using utility power.
How distributed solar can make the grid cheaper for everyone
One of the most glaring errors in PAO’s analysis is that it fails to account for how the state’s enormous rooftop solar resource has reduced the amount that utilities would have needed to spend on purchasing energy and building out their grids, McCann said.
That’s an important point, because utility cost-shift arguments are inextricably tied to the idea that solar-equipped customers aren’t paying their fair share for the power grids, power plants, and purchased energy that are bundled into utility costs.
McCann’s analysis finds that since California launched its Million Solar Roofs initiative in 2006, distributed solar has displaced about 15,000 megawatts of peak load compared with state forecasts from that time. Peak load — the maximum amount of power needed to serve every customer on the grid — is a key determinant of how much utilities have to spend on their power grids and on purchasing expensive peak energy resources.
Utilities in California earn back the cost of the energy they purchase — and earn a guaranteed rate of profit on the capital investments they make — through the rates they charge their customers. Many of those costs are spread out for years or even decades after they’re incurred, which means that money saved in not buying energy or building grid infrastructure years ago translates into lower rates today.
McCann’s analysis found that this rooftop solar cost reduction adds up to $2.17 billion in 2024. That final benefit pushes the calculation for rooftop solar firmly out of the realm of extra costs for utility customers at large, and into the realm of net benefits for all customers.
To be clear, these benefits are backward-looking, he said. Since 2006, the peak loads on California’s grid, which are largely driven by air-conditioning use during heatwaves, have shifted from the midafternoon into later in the evening, which is when California has faced its most significant grid emergencies in the past few years.
In the years to come, California needs more batteries to soak up its ample solar resource to meet the state’s new evening peaks. That’s why the state’s new rooftop solar policy rewards customers who add batteries — although rooftop solar groups fear that those rewards aren’t rich enough to balance out the cuts made to the old net-metering rules.
But rooftop solar should still be credited for having helped reduce the grid costs from 2006 to today, McCann said. And state agencies shouldn’t use faulty estimates of past costs to undermine Californians’ ability to buy solar panels and batteries to save money and help combat climate change in future years.
A growing body of research indicates that distributed solar and batteries play a vital cost-cutting role in achieving a clean grid, compared with relying solely on large-scale solar and wind farms alone. Rooftop solar can also help people afford the electric vehicles and electric heating needed to cut carbon emissions from transportation and buildings — especially in California, where utility rates make electrification a tougher proposition.
Del Chiaro said M.Cubed’s new findings are yet more evidence that California policymakers and regulators need to push back harder against the utility-led cost-shift argument.
“They’ve gotten themselves into this weird mindset that all of the electrons” that solar-equipped customers are “generating and sharing with their neighbors are the property of the utility,” she said.
But the past two decades of rooftop solar growth show that “if we give customers a little bit of a boost, they’re going to meet us more than halfway with their investments,” she said.
Tesla has announced that it will finally deliver 500 kW charging as it is about to install its long-awaited V4 Supercharger cabinets.
The rollout of Supercharger V4 has been a strange one, to say the least.
Tesla has been deploying the new charging stations for two years and calling them “Supercharger V4”, but it has only been deploying the charging stalls.
Supercharger stations are made of two main parts: the stalls, which are where the charging cable is located, and the cabinets, which are generally located further back and include all the power electronics.
For all these new “Supercharger V4”, Tesla was actually using Supercharger V3 cabinets. This has been limiting the power output of the charging stations to 250 kW – although
Today, Tesla officially announced its “V4 Cabinet”, which the automaker claims will enable of “delivering up to 500kW for cars and 1.2MW for Semi.”
Here are the main features of the V4 Cabinet as per Tesla:
Faster charging: Supports 400V-1000V vehicle architectures, including 30% faster charging for Cybertruck. S3XY vehicles enjoy 250kW charge rates they already experience on V3 Cabinet — charging up to 200 miles in 15 minutes.
Faster deployments: V4 Cabinet powers 8 posts, 2X the stalls per cabinet. Lower footprint and complexity = more sites coming online faster.
Next-generation hardware: Cutting-edge power electronics designed to be the most reliable on the planet, with 3X power density enabling higher throughput with lower costs.
Tesla reports that its first sites with the new V4 Cabinets are going into permitting now. The company expects its first sites to open next year.
We recently reported about Tesla’s new Oasis Supercharger project, which includes larger solar arrays and battery packs to operate the charging station mostly off-grid.
Early in the deployment of the Supercharger network, Tesla promised to add solar arrays and batteries to all Supercharger stations, and Musk even said that most stations would be able to operate off-grid.
While Tesla did add solar and batteries to a few stations, the vast majority of them don’t have their own power system or have only minimal solar canopies.
Back in 2016, I asked Musk about this, and he said that it would now happen as Tesla had the “pieces now in place” with Supercharger V3, Powerpack V2, and SolarCity:
It took about 8 years, but it sounds like the pieces are now getting actually in place with Supercharger V4, Megapacks, and this new Oasis project.
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Source link by Electrek
Author Fred Lambert
#Tesla #announces #charging #finally #delivers #Supercharger #cabinets
New clean energy construction should be prioritized in downstate New York, DeRoche adds, a region that houses most of the state’s population yet relies heavily on fossil fuels compared with the largely hydro- and nuclear-powered upstate areas. The state will also need to address transmission and interconnection backlogs that make it harder to connect new power generation to the grid. Earlier this year, lawmakers passed the RAPID Act to expedite that process for clean energy projects and transmission lines.
Some activists argue that the state itself should take a leading role to develop more clean energy.
Last year, an amendment to the state budget granted the New York Power Authority the ability to build, own, and operate renewable energy projects for the first time. Organizers at the grassroots coalition Public Power New York say that government leaders have yet to capitalize on the change, commonly referred to as the Build Public Renewables Act. In October, NYPA released its first strategic plan for developing renewable energy projects, proposing the installation of 3.5 gigawatts of new clean energy in the next several years.
“This is only the first tranche of NYPA renewables projects,” the report said, with potentially “further projects for consideration.”
Andrea Johnson, an organizer with the New York City chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, a member group of Public Power New York, called that number “measly.” Public Power New York is rallying for the authority to commit to 15 gigawatts of new clean power by 2030, an amount based on research commissioned by the group.
Expanding clean power at a faster rate would fulfill NYPA’s responsibilities under last year’s expanded authority, which calls on it to build projects when the state falls short on its climate mandates, Johnson said. “When the private sector fails — and the private sector is failing — the state needs to step in and actually fill the gap.”
Leveraging NYPA can also allow New York to meet its climate goals at a lower cost, Johnson said. As a nonprofit, public institution, NYPA can access more favorable financing. It also owns and builds transmission lines, allowing it to plan for both energy generation and distribution at the same time, she said. NYPA is also required to provide utility bill credits to low- and moderate-income households for any clean energy produced from its projects.
Beyond building more clean energy, the state should also take steps to ease growing power demand, including strengthening building efficiency standards and accelerating the installation of heat pumps, said Michael Gerrard, faculty director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia Law School.
That includes addressing the rapid growth of crypto mining and AI electricity use and its effects on residents, said DeRoche. State officials noted that those rising energy demands have made it far more difficult to reach clean energy targets. But agencies have policy tools available to understand and reduce unabated growth — and they should start with making sure that discounted electricity rates for cryptocurrency and AI companies aren’t being subsidized by residents, DeRoche said.
Offshore wind’s uncertain future
Any effort to accelerate New York’s adoption of clean energy will need to grapple with challenges in the offshore wind sector, a cornerstone of the state’s strategy that is likely to face even more setbacks under the incoming Trump administration.
New York aims to install 9 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2035, but in the past four years, inflation, high interest rates, and supply-chain issues led developers to pull out of contracts in the state.
That challenging economic environment is now improving, however, according to Atin Jain, an offshore wind analyst at the energy consulting firm BloombergNEF. As inflation has started to ease and interest rates have begun to come down, “We have probably passed the worst of it,” Jain said. State officials have been quick to respond to the industry’s economic pressures, he added, expediting auctions to renegotiate previous agreements and adding language in contracts to allow for inflation adjustments.
Two new projects, Sunrise Wind and Empire Wind 1, with 924 and 810 megawatts of capacity, respectively, are currently moving forward in New York. The 132-megawatt South Fork Wind farm went live in March off the coast of Long Island.
But Trump’s reelection casts a new uncertainty over the industry. Trump has vowed to stop offshore wind development “on day one” and to “terminate” the Inflation Reduction Act. If those declarations end up translating to real policy, then offshore wind, which relies heavily on federal tax credits and requires federal approval and permits to build and operate, could suffer — in New York and beyond.
Still, New York has enshrined a legal mandate to decarbonize its economy — meaning no matter the headwinds, the state has an obligation to follow through, DeRoche said.
“We hear from the governor that the CLCPA is the nation’s leading climate law,” said DeRoche. “Well, it’s only the nation’s leading climate law if we’re implementing it.”
Rate of acceleration for global EV adoption has slowed, firm suggests focus beyond early adopters
Study relates EV adoption to Strategist, Individualist, Carer, Conservative, and Frugal psychographic profiles
Prior to “reset,” 43% of non-EV drivers are already considering an EV next
Automakers stand to substantially grow global EV sales over the next 10 years, but only if they refocus from tech-savvy early adopters to mainstream buyers, argues a new study from consulting firm Accenture.
The study predicts that 57% of drivers will have switched to EVs within the next 10 years, with 43% of non-EV drivers already considering an EV for their next vehicle purchase. And 47% of drivers “are convinced that the future belongs to electric vehicles,” according to the study. That’s based on a survey of 6,000 car buyers in the U.S., China, Italy, Germany, France, and Japan.
EV sales growth isn’t happening at as steep of a rate. While global EV sales saw a 35% year-on-year increase in 2023, that was down from 55% in 2022 and 121% in 2021, the study noted. That should still be seen as a feat after the pandemic catch-up years of 2021 and 2022, but analysts believe automakers will need a “strategic reset” to generate more EV sales.
2024 Tesla Model S. – Courtesy of Tesla, Inc.
Instead of focusing on tech features, which has been effective in attracting early adopters, Accenture believes automakers should focus on the more practical concerns of mainstream buyers. The majority of car buyers (80%) prioritize reliability, safety, and affordability, so automakers should prioritize those factors as well, the firm argues.
Accenture assembled psychographic profiles of different types of potential EV buyers. While the “Strategist” and “Individualist” value things like luxury and technology features, respectively, the “Carer” views cars merely as tools, the “Conservative” emphasizes reliability, and late-adopting “Frugal” car buyers will only make the switch to an EV once costs reach a certain threshold.
2025 Volkswagen ID.4
Other studies have come back with similar findings on lagging EV interest. A Gallup poll last year underscored that fewer Americans are aspiring to EV ownership than had been the case just a year earlier. And a 2023 J.D. Power study found that U.S. EV adoption is becoming more polarized by state.
More than a decade ago as some paid nearly $40,000 for versions of the Nissan Leaf and other early EVs with sub-100-mile range, it was underscored that those EV pioneers and early adopters are night-and-day different than mainstream auto buyers—in many respects. Focusing on what matters for mainstream shoppers—practicality and cost—may be the obvious direction if automakers truly want to get serious about upping their EV sales.
Source link by Green Car Reports
Author news@greencarreports.com (Stephen Edelstein)
#Study #years #requires #quotstrategic #resetquot #automakers
All-electric aircraft developer BETA Technologies has shared another important milestone in bringing its first two vessels to market. Most recently, BETA’s founder, CEO, and test pilot Kyle Clark took the production version of its ALIA eCTOL up for its first flight, as seen in the video below.
BETA Technologies is a fully integrated electric aircraft and systems developer based in Vermont. Three years ago, it debuted its first electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, the ALIA–250. That BETA vessel has since been renamed the ALIA VTOL and completed a piloted test flight transitioning mid-air this past April.
In addition to the ALIA VTOL, BETA has also been developing an electric conventional takeoff and landing (eCTOL) plane called the ALIA CTOL. To date, it has flown tens of thousands of test miles en route to evaluation flights for FAA certification. That aircraft is targeting full approval for commercial operations by 2025.
As BETA moves closer to bringing the ALIA CTOL to the public, it has completed its first bonafide production build in South Burlington. Following a Special Airworthiness Certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), BETA has successfully taken its production-ready ALIA CTOL up for a test flight, piloted by its founder and CEO.
Watch BETA’s founder complete a CTOL test flight
BETA Technologies shared details of its first successful production CTOL test flight today alongside the images above and the full video below.
Once the production-intent build of the ALIA CTOL was complete, the FAA inspected the aircraft for safety and compliance before granting BETA a Multipurpose Special Airworthiness Certificate for Experimental Research & Development, Market Survey, and Crew Training, signing-off approval for test flights.
On November 13, BETA CEO, founder, and test pilot Kyle Clark conducted the first test flight of the ALIA CTOL aircraft, which lasted nearly an hour. The test included a conventional runway takeoff before the aircraft climbed to 7,000 feet.
While in the air, Clark tested the aircraft’s handling qualities, stability, control test points, and initial airspeed expansion before completing several approaches ahead of a normal landing. Clark spoke following the successful flight:
This start of our production CX300 flight test campaign is a result of years of hard work and focus on studying customer requirements, hard engineering, manufacturing, production, quality and test. It represents a significant milestone for BETA, and is the beginning of an exciting new phase for the business. With this, we’re one step closer to putting this technology into the hands of our customers.
We learned a lot from this first production build. We weren’t just building an aircraft company, we were building and refining a system to build high quality aircraft efficiently. This first build allowed the team to collect data and insight on manufacturing labor, tooling design, processes, yields and sequences, all of which are being used to refine our production systems.
With its production test flight campaign now underway, BETA says it will continue testing the ALIA CTOL aircraft for the standard 50 hours required before qualifying for a Market Survey and Crew Training certificate. That next certificate will enable BETA to fly outside of Burlington and Plattsburgh and continue training additional pilots on the aircraft.
The company shared it will also continue production of additional aircraft, including ALIA CTOL and ALIA VTOL configurations, the latter of which was recently teased in October. You can view footage of BETA’s CTOL flight below.
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Source link by Electrek
Author Scooter Doll
#Beta #Technologies #founder #completes #test #flight #productionintent #eCTOL #Video
Battery materials producer Integrals Power has begun distributing samples of its Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) and Lithium Manganese Iron Phosphate (LMFP) battery cathode materials to customers in both Europe and the US. This milestone follows the successful production of these materials at Integrals Power’s UK pilot plant.
The LFP and LMFP cathode materials were fully manufactured in the UK. “This not only underscores Integrals Power’s commitment to advancing domestic manufacturing capabilities but also ensures the highest purity, quality and performance standards,” the company said.
“The fact that these materials were manufactured on our UK pilot line is a proud achievement, and we are excited to see how they perform in the real-world applications of our customers in the EV, battery manufacturing and energy storage sectors,” said Integrals Power founder and CEO Behnam Hormozi.
LFP chemistries are accounting for a growing share of the global battery market, thanks to their safety, long cycle life, low-temperature performance and sustainability benefits. The International Energy Agency reports that in 2023, LFP supplied more than 40 per cent of global EV demand, more than double its share in 2020.
LMFP adds manganese to the mix, which can increase energy density by up to 20% while maintaining the safety and cost-effectiveness of LFP. Integrals Power says it has achieved a manganese content of 80 percent, improving on the 50-70 percent typically found in existing blends. This offers greater performance in EV applications such as EVs, and makes LMFP more competitive with Nickel Manganese Cobalt (NMC) chemistries. (For more information about LFP and LMFP, see our July 2024 feature article on Wildcat Discovery Technologies.)
“By offering these high-quality, UK-manufactured cathode materials, Integrals Power provides its customers with the opportunity to review, test, and ultimately, integrate the materials into their battery and energy storage solutions,” says the company. “This close collaboration will help foster innovations that are essential to meeting the world’s growing demand for clean energy technologies and reduce reliance on China for these strategically important assets.”
That’s bad for biofuels. But it’s also bad for public EV-charging stations that earn LCFS credits for every kilowatt-hour of electricity they sell and for the charging capacity they provide. The drop in credit prices has also depleted an LCFS-funded program administered by California utilities to assist first-time EV purchases.
The amendments CARB approved on Friday aim to address this problem by raising the carbon intensity (CI) values of fossil fuels sold in the state over the coming years. That will require companies that refine and sell those fossil fuels to purchase more credits from LCFS-approved alternative fuels to make up their increasing deficits, driving up credit prices to support investments needed to reach the state’s clean transportation goals, according to CARB staff.
(CARB)
But ratcheting up the demand for credits for fossil fuels without restricting the supply of credits from biofuels and biogas creates several risks, critics say.
The first is that it fails to address the fact that, unlike EVs, vehicles burning biofuels continue to emit carbon and air pollution that are harmful to the environment and to people living in communities with heavy vehicle traffic.
“The LCFS is a failed policy, and the communities most impacted by air pollution in California will be the ones breathing the price for it,” Adrian Martinez, deputy managing attorney at Earthjustice, said in a Friday statement. “Most of the program’s billions will go to combustion fuels.”
Privileging biofuels over electricity also provides fossil-fuel companies a pathway to have their cake and eat it too, so to speak. Fossil-fuel companies happen to be some of the biggest investors in renewable diesel refining and in dairy gas projects eligible for LCFS credits in California and across the country. The more biofuels they produce, the more they can use the credits generated by them to offset the rising costs of continuing to sell fossil fuels in the state.
California already has some of the highest fuel prices in the country, which oil companies blame on state regulations. Today, the role of the LCFS in California’s higher prices is relatively small at about 10 cents per gallon, according to prior CARB analysis. But under the newly approved higher carbon-intensity targets, that impact could quickly escalate, critics say.
“If you approve this measure, California drivers will pay over $2 more a gallon than other drivers across the country,” state Assemblymember Tom Lackey said at Friday’s meeting. Lackey, a Republican, represents a district centered on the city of Palmdale, where many residents commute about 120 miles per day to jobs in the Los Angeles region.
CARB staff have refused to offer projections on the new rules’ potential impact on prices at the pump, despite growing pressure from the media and lawmakers. In an October online press conference, Steven Cliff, CARB’s executive officer, said that agency staff are “not aware of economic models that can accurately predict gas prices with any certainty for many complex reasons.”
CARB board member Florez pushed back against this stance in his op-ed explaining his opposition to the new rule. “One of the most pressing issues is the projected economic impact,” he wrote. “A former CARB branch director has warned that, while program-related costs to consumers are currently modest, they could rise sharply as stricter targets are enforced.”
Florez was referring to Jim Duffy, a 13-year veteran of the agency who submitted a letter to CARB last month. Duffy served as branch chief of the LCFS program from 2019 to 2020 and retired in 2022.
“Claims that the regulation does not and/or will not increase the cost of gasoline are, in my opinion, absurd,” Duffy wrote. In his letter, he provided his own estimate, using a “reasonable bound for future credit prices” from “a low of $60 to a high at the current program price cap, which is approximately $260.”
“Using this credit price range and the minimum targets to be set by the proposed amendments,” he continued, “I estimate pass-through ranges of $0.15 to $0.64 in 2025, $0.19 to $0.84 in 2030, and $0.34 to $1.47 in 2035.” An adjustment mechanism built into the new rule, which Duffy described as “both poorly written and poorly designed,” could trigger even higher increases. “Under such a scenario, pass-through costs near $1.50 per gallon by 2032 are quite possible.”
Danny Cullenward, a climate economist and lawyer and senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania who serves as vice chair of California’s carbon market advisory committee, wrote in an Oct. 30 op-ed that state legislators “should be particularly concerned that CARB staff are being dishonest about LCFS costs.”
“So are biofuel subsidies really a top state priority, and how many billions of dollars should California drivers be asked to pay for them?” Cullenward wrote. “According to the staff of the Air Resources Board, no one can tell you.”
The road not taken
CARB had other options. Last year, CARB’s Environmental Justice Advisory Committee (EJAC), a group created to advise the board on environmental-justice issues, laid out an alternative proposal that would cap the amount of crop-based renewable diesel eligible for credits, and end the negative-carbon-intensity treatment provided to dairy biogas.
By reducing the expansion of credits from these fuels, this alternative approach could restrict supply, and thus increase prices for credits from other sources such as EV-charging stations and renewable diesel made from waste oils and non-food crops, according to analysis from a team of climate scientists led by Michael Wara, director of Stanford University’s Climate and Energy Policy Program. That analysis also found the EJAC plan would drive greater reductions than the CARB staff proposal of harmful local air pollution from large-scale dairy farms and refineries that produce renewable diesel.
CARB staff rejected the EJAC proposal, saying it would lead to higher price spikes and fail to achieve equivalent carbon reductions. Wara and colleagues involved in the EJAC analysis challenged that finding in comments submitted to CARB in February, and Wara told Canary Media in March that CARB staff have refused to provide information necessary to conduct an independent analysis.
Florez brought up that point as well in his Nov. 7 op-ed, noting that EJAC has “raised strong objections, pointing to CARB’s refusal to conduct a comprehensive assessment of emissions. Without transparent analysis, the air board cannot assure the public that its policies will protect California’s most vulnerable residents.”
(CARB)
Environmental and energy experts say the flawed LCFS program could have ramifications beyond California. Today, two other states — Oregon and Washington — have adopted clean fuel standards largely based on LCFS. New Mexico passed a law this year to establish a clean-fuels program, and eight other states are considering similar legislation. LCFS critics fear those programs will mimic CARB’s problematic biofuels policies.
Source link by Canary Media
Author Jeff St. John
#Californias #cleanfuel #plan #problems #worse
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Losses at Hyzon narrowed in the third quarter of 2024, but the hydrogen fuel cell electric truck maker’s cash reserves continue to erode rapidly.
Hyzon posted a loss of $41.32 million, or $7.74 per diluted share in Q3, down 6.2% from $44.06 million, $8.99, in the year-ago period.
Bolingbrook, Ill.-based Hyzon’s cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments on hand at the end of the most recent quarter totaled $30.4 million, compared with $55.1 million three months earlier and $112.3 million at the start of the year.
As a result, the company’s executives said during a Q3 earnings presentation to analysts that they are looking to raise more funds through the capital markets or obtaining strategic investments.
Hyzon is revolutionizing industries with hydrogen fuel cell technology! We deliver zero-emissions power for tough jobs, starting with commercial trucking. Hydrogen is powerful, accessible, and found everywhere—from water to waste. Refuel in the same time as diesel! pic.twitter.com/unxh6XhgD9
— Hyzon (@hyzon) November 8, 2024
Hyzon raised $4.5 million in working capital in July, but the company’s financial straits have become more dire since then, when it warned that layoffs and filing for bankruptcy protection were possibilities.
In late June, Hyzon hired investment house PJT Partners to carry out an operational review, raise funds and explore the sale of all or part of its assets as it sought to cut costs and slow its cash drain. PJT’s first conclusions from the review emerged in early July, with Hyzon announcing July 8 the shuttering of operations in the Netherlands and Australia.
When releasing its Q3 earnings Nov. 13, Hyzon said the winding down of its Australian and Dutch operations was largely complete.
Company officials remain optimistic publicly.
“I am pleased with the significant commercial and operational progress we have made this year while simultaneously reducing our [spending],” Chief Financial Officer Stephen Weiland said.
Meet the Hyzon HYHD8 200kW – redefining heavy-duty with zero-emission power! Delivering up to 200kW of hydrogen fuel cell energy, this truck is built to perform sustainably and tackle the toughest jobs. Learn more: https://t.co/RvvafpdHQs #Hyzon #CleanEnergy #ZeroEmissions pic.twitter.com/CiNucUN4cM
— Hyzon (@hyzon) November 5, 2024
“We began 2023 with an average monthly net cash burn in excess of $15 million, and through intentional, strategic actions we now have line of sight to a $6.5 million monthly cash burn by year-end. This was enabled through operational efficiencies, footprint rationalization and cost take-outs,” he added.
On the other side of the balance sheet, Hyzon’s revenue pipeline is starting to show signs of increasing flows.
Host Seth Clevenger and Features Coordinator Mike Senatore take you behind the scenes to unveil the 2024 Top 50 Global Freight Companies. Tune in above or by going to RoadSigns.ttnews.com.
Trials of prototypes of the company’s 200-kilowatt Class 8 tractor and refuse truck began in July. Thus far, 10 trials have been completed, and Hyzon is in commercial negotiations with the majority of these parties for potential orders, the company said.
The trial program will continue to expand, Hyzon said, with more than 30 fleets scheduled to carry out testing through February.
Hyzon secured a purchase agreement for 12 refuse trucks from GreenWaste in October, although the order is contingent upon Hyzon meeting certain commercial terms and specifications. Hyzon said the trucks could be delivered as early as the fourth quarter of 2025.
“The third quarter marked the next inflection point in Hyzon’s evolution, completing significant milestones that we previously committed to on the commercial, technical and financial front,” CEO Parker Meeks said. “These achievements mark a pivotal moment in Hyzon’s journey and the broader transition to zero-emission transportation, which is now in active commercialization.”
Hyzon began series production of its 200-kW Class 8 tractor Sept. 16. Production initially will take place at a Fontaine Modification facility in Charlotte, N.C.
The company intends to provide Fontaine with kits for the fuel cell system, battery packs and hydrogen storage systems. Fontaine adds these onto vehicle chassis. The current base chassis for Hyzon’s truck is a Freightliner Cascadia in two day-cab variants.
Hyzon’s milestones continued into the current quarter. On Oct. 8, the company began series production in Bolingbrook of the 200-kW fuel cell system set to power its trucks. The Bolingbrook facility will be able to produce 700 fuel cell systems a year on a three-shift basis.
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Chines battery supplier CATL could build a plant in the U.S.
The decision would hinge on whether Trump’s administration allows the Chinese to enter the market
CATL wanted to invest in the U.S. but to date the government’s said no
Chinese battery supplier CATL is open to building a U.S. factory if the incoming Trump administration allows it, the company’s founder said in a recent interview.
“Originally, when we wanted to invest in the U.S., the U.S. government said no,” Robin Zeng said in an interview with Reuters published Wednesday. “For me, I’m really open-minded.”
CATL has so far limited its U.S. presence to licensing deals with automakers. Ford in 2023 announced a Michigan battery plant to build lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, which the automaker has said are a key to EV affordability. The battery cells produced there would be based on CATL tech, but the factory itself would be owned by Ford. An April report said General Motors may be seeking a similar deal with CATL.
Ford Mustang Mach-E, F-150 Lightning getting CATL LFP batteries
Even before Trump, who launched a trade war with China during his first term in 2017, was elected to a second term as president, that arrangement was already under threat.
Under existing Biden administration policy, vehicles with Chinese-made batteries do not qualify for a federal EV tax credit, nor do vehicles manufactured by entities in whose parent companies the Chinese government has a stake. A Republican bill, opposed by the current administration, would also eliminate tax credits for EVs making use of Chinese battery tech licensed by U.S. automakers.
Yet while Trump wants to prevent imports of cars from Chinese automakers—even if they’re assembled in other countries like Mexico—Reuters notes that in an August interview he was open to Chinese firms building cars in the U.S.
CATL Freevoy plug-in hybrid battery pack
“We’re going to give incentives, and if China and other countries want to come here and sell cars, they’re going to build plants here, and they’re going to hire our workers,” Trump said in August. Zeng appears optimistic that this policy will apply to batteries as well, telling Reuters that “I do hope that in the future they are open to investments.”
It remains to be seen what batteries CATL would produce in the U.S., but the company is currently expanding its commercial-vehicle battery-supply business in its home market, and recently launched a mixed-chemistry battery pack designed for plug-in hybrids.
Source link by Green Car Reports
Author news@greencarreports.com (Stephen Edelstein)
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