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Nissan teases electric ute and solid state batteries in new 2030 EV targets

Japanese carmaker Nissan has announced a new plan to launch 23 new electrified options, including 15 new pure electric cars and potentially an electric ute.

The “Ambition 2030” vision unveiled by Nissan includes a target of 50 per cent electric sales by 2030, which doesn’t sound all that much compared to other car companies and country targets, but the eye-catcher is the all-electric ute that would be modelled as a Navara EV, along with an electric sportscar and crossover, and a lifestyle-oriented people mover.

In Europe, where strict vehicle emissions limits are pushing carmakers to reduce fleet carbon averages, Nissan will aim to sell 75% electric vehicles by 2026.

In Japan, China and the US the targets will be lower, with 55% targetted in its domestic market and just 40% in the latter two.

Nissan was once at the forefront of the electric vehicle revolution, having introduced its iconic Leaf in 2010, and rolling out vehicle-to-grid capabilities in its updated version.

“We are proud of our long track record of innovation, and of our role in delivering the EV revolution,” said Nissan COO Ashwani Gupta in a statement.

“With our new ambition, we continue to take the lead in accelerating the natural shift to EVs by creating customer pull through an attractive proposition by driving excitement, enabling adoption and creating a cleaner world.”

It will also look to expand its Propilot driving assistance technology to 2.5 million vehicles by 2026 including its premium Infiniti brand, and look to further develop autonomous driving technology, it said.

While the carmaker did not elaborate on what new electric vehicles it would be bringing to market over coming years, a number of images that were shared with the release include some interesting additions to its electric offerings.

https://thedriven.io/


Toyota’s new electric SUV: Everything you need to know about the 2023 bZ4X

…Including why its name is such a mouthful

Toyota has recently unveiled its newest all-electric vehicle, and with it comes a broader preview of the automaker’s electrified future. The model making its introduction is the 2023 Toyota bZ4X, a 5-passenger compact SUV.

Details about the Toyota bZ4X have been trickling out for months, and the automaker recently introduced the Japanese-market version of this electric SUV.

We’ve already written about that model, and much of its details carry over for the U.S. version, but not all.

Now we can answer some questions, while others will have to wait until the vehicle gets closer to sale.

Let’s begin with the basics.

What is the Toyota bZ4X?

Beyond just a mouthful of a name, the Toyota bZ4X is an all-electric SUV that is roughly the size of Toyota’s bestselling SUV, the compact RAV4.

Oh, and about that name: The “bZ” stands for “beyond zero,” which points to Toyota’s goal of carbon neutrality by 2050.

The “bZ” moniker will also be used for future models, though we can’t promise it will get any easier to say.

Is this Toyota’s first electric vehicle?

Not technically.

Toyota last made an electric SUV roughly a decade ago, in the RAV4 EV.

(Fun fact: It was developed with Tesla!.

Even before that, in 1997, it also made an electric version of the RAV4. But both of those were highly limited models.

The 2023 bZ4X will be a far more advanced electric vehicle (EV) that aims for mainstream appeal.

What took so long for Toyota to make an EV?

Keep in mind that Toyota has been building electrified vehicles for decades, such as the Prius hybrid and even hydrogen-powered cars like the Mirai.

But the bZ4X marks Toyota’s major foray into all-electric.

The company is known to take its time to get things right, but when its products arrive, they often become benchmarks.

Think of these past years as Toyota doing its homework.

Related: Tesla still dominates the EV market in the U.S., but these rivals are catching up

Is Toyota making more EVs?

Oh, yeah. In reality, every automaker is preparing for a future that centers around battery electric vehicles.

Toyota is taking an even broader approach.

Along with EVs, hybrids, and plug-in hybrid vehicles, it’s also still developing hydrogen-powered vehicles as part of its wider plan for carbon neutrality in the decades ahead.

In the short term, Toyota plans to have roughly 70 electrified models globally by 2025, with 15 dedicated battery electric vehicles.

www.marketwatch.com


“Tesla tidal wave:”

Hundreds of Model 3 “unicorn” EVs line up at Fremantle port

Hundreds of so-called “unicorn” Model 3s have been captured lined up at Fremantle Port in Western Australia, just part of a predicted “Tesla tidal wave” for Australia’s western-most state comes to fruition.

The arrival of the Model 3s was first flagged by Tesla shipping tracker @Vedaprime on Twitter, who noted that, “Tesla Perth will be using a much larger capacity delivery location this quarter.”

By the end of 2021, it is thought that Tesla will have shipped as many electric cars to Australia as it has in all its previous years combined.

For Western Australia, it is expected around 800 will be delivered to customers this quarter from a new warehouse just 3km from its new service centre.

“The King Edward Road delivery facility will provide Tesla customers a smooth and efficient delivery experience without bottlenecks and interruptions,” said TOCWA secretary Harald Murphy in a note to The Driven.

“Like all tsunamis, the magnitude of what’s coming can’t easily be seen at the start.

While a single shipment of 461 is a lot of cars, that number will be eclipsed over and over again.

“Back in 2017 when there were less than 100 Teslas in Western Australia, a single shipment of over 460 cars seemed laughable.

Four years later, no one’s laughing. We are all simply in awe of how profoundly people’s demand for Teslas has exploded.”

The vehicles – all 461 of them – are now lined up at the Fremantle docks, shared on Youtube by TOCWA in a drone video on Saturday (see the bottom of this article).

This is the largest shipment of Tesla Model 3s to WA according to Vedaprime, and it will not be the last. But what is also significant about this shipment is the fact that all of these vehicles are of the “unicorn” variety, so named because they will have the original acceleration of the 2021 Model 3, but also with the extra range of the 2022 Tesla Model 3.

In early November, Tesla started making Model 3s in Shanghai with a larger 62.3kWh battery, giving the base variant electric sedan (now stripped of its Standard Range Plus moniker) 491km WLTP range instead of the former 448km range (noting that real-world range is less than WLTP lab tests).

While 461 Model 3s is a relatively modest number of vehicles compared to legacy automakers, TOCWA’s Rob Dean who argues that when you compare Tesla’s marketing budget – which is basically nil – to that of incumbents like Toyota, the Californian upstart is doing a spectacular job.











Food for thought on the Road to Mining Manono and that Battery Factory in Future


Cheers

Frank