Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share 950km Range, 100 Robotaxis Napping & A Kia That Might Kill the Hiace
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
950km Range, 100 Robotaxis Napping & A Kia That Might Kill the Hiace
This week I cover more ground than a BYD Tang on a full charge ,which, as it turns out, is 950 kilometres. Yes. Nine hundred and fifty. I've never owned a petrol car with that kind of range and I've owned a few.
We kick things off in Europe where Mercedes has decided steering wheels are overrated and gone full steer-by-wire on the new EQS. No mechanical connection between the wheel and the tyres whatsoever. Terrifying? Maybe. Cool? Absolutely. And yes, I do have thoughts about the yoke double standard.
Then Korea drops a bomb, Kia has priced the PV5 electric van at $55,990 and tradies, I'm going to need you to sit down for this one. It might actually kill the Hiace. I said what I said.
China is doing what China does , Zeekr slashed $11,000 off the Zeekr X, Chery dropped the Omoda E5 to $37,990 drive-away, and Forthing is officially launching in Australia in June. Yes, Forthing. It's a real brand. The car is actually good.
Mazda confirmed CX-6e pricing, $53,990 for the GT ,with a 1.2 metre digital display that is genuinely bigger than my first television.
Back home, Wollongong Council quietly got on with it and installed kerbside EV chargers on power poles while everyone else was still talking about it. Good on them.
On the infrastructure front, coastal routes are solid, inland is still a charging desert, and I have genuine concerns about what's going to happen at regional chargers this Christmas when all those record EV orders turn into actual cars on actual roads.
In renewable news, cheap solar and battery deals are everywhere right now. Some of them are genuinely great. Some of them are absolutely not. I'll tell you how to tell the difference.
And in the fun stuff, 100 Baidu robotaxis in Wuhan all decided to stop simultaneously in the middle of traffic for a collective nap. Nothing builds confidence in autonomous vehicles like a group timeout on a busy road.
Also, Fortescue just took delivery of their 15th giant electric excavator in the Pilbara, each one saving a million litres of diesel a year. When Australia's biggest miners are going electric at that scale, the "but what about the big stuff" crowd is running out of arguments fast.
Big week. Grab a coffee. Let's go.
View all episodes
By SydneyEV “SydEV”This week I cover more ground than a BYD Tang on a full charge ,which, as it turns out, is 950 kilometres. Yes. Nine hundred and fifty. I've never owned a petrol car with that kind of range and I've owned a few.
We kick things off in Europe where Mercedes has decided steering wheels are overrated and gone full steer-by-wire on the new EQS. No mechanical connection between the wheel and the tyres whatsoever. Terrifying? Maybe. Cool? Absolutely. And yes, I do have thoughts about the yoke double standard.
Then Korea drops a bomb, Kia has priced the PV5 electric van at $55,990 and tradies, I'm going to need you to sit down for this one. It might actually kill the Hiace. I said what I said.
China is doing what China does , Zeekr slashed $11,000 off the Zeekr X, Chery dropped the Omoda E5 to $37,990 drive-away, and Forthing is officially launching in Australia in June. Yes, Forthing. It's a real brand. The car is actually good.
Mazda confirmed CX-6e pricing, $53,990 for the GT ,with a 1.2 metre digital display that is genuinely bigger than my first television.
Back home, Wollongong Council quietly got on with it and installed kerbside EV chargers on power poles while everyone else was still talking about it. Good on them.
On the infrastructure front, coastal routes are solid, inland is still a charging desert, and I have genuine concerns about what's going to happen at regional chargers this Christmas when all those record EV orders turn into actual cars on actual roads.
In renewable news, cheap solar and battery deals are everywhere right now. Some of them are genuinely great. Some of them are absolutely not. I'll tell you how to tell the difference.
And in the fun stuff, 100 Baidu robotaxis in Wuhan all decided to stop simultaneously in the middle of traffic for a collective nap. Nothing builds confidence in autonomous vehicles like a group timeout on a busy road.
Also, Fortescue just took delivery of their 15th giant electric excavator in the Pilbara, each one saving a million litres of diesel a year. When Australia's biggest miners are going electric at that scale, the "but what about the big stuff" crowd is running out of arguments fast.
Big week. Grab a coffee. Let's go.