MyOpinion

(The Center Square) – Although Initiative 2117 repealing the state’s cap-and-trade program was rejected by Washington voters earlier this month, state planners are still grappling with logistical and practical challenges around transitioning the transportation sector toward electric vehicles, an effort heavily funded by cap-and-trade revenue.

“EVs are going to be a story here and it’s going to be part of both Washington and nationally at different stages in different areas,” COIL, Inc. Founder Bobby Penn told the state Electric Vehicle Coordinating Council at its Nov. 6 meeting. “EVs are not going anywhere regardless of what’s happened with this with the election.”

However, the state will still need to figure out how to meet expected demand for EV charging ports of varying charging capacity. Although the state is meeting the forecast for L2 chargers, it remains behind on DC Fast Chargers. As a result of state funding, Washington is expected to have an additional 7,000 charging ports.

Yet, that’s a small amount compared to the total needed. According to UW Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Don McKenzie, the state will need between 40,000 and 150,000 fast-charging ports alone to support 8 million vehicles, which he estimates could cost $30 billion.

The council estimates the state will need a total of 3 million ports by 2035.

Apple has released a new immersive music video from The Weeknd featuring his latest single ‘Open Hearts’, which is available exclusively on Vision Pro for a limited time.

Captured in Apple’s Immersive Video format, Open Hearts serves up 180-degree immersive views and spatial audio set to eponymous single from the Canadian pop artist’s upcoming album ‘Hurry Up Tomorrow’.

Tesla placed a big bet back in 2020 when it announced that it was developing a new battery cell format. The 4680 battery, as it’s known, powers the Cybertruck and in the past, it made its way into a limited number of Model Y crossovers.

The cylindrical cell was touted as being more energy-dense than the 2170- and 1865-type units found in the Model Y and Model 3 and the Model S and Model X, respectively. It’s also supposed to be cheaper to manufacture and easier to assemble.

Recently, Tesla announced that it produced its 100 millionth 4680 cell. That’s a big achievement and a sign that the company managed to ramp up production of the proprietary cell significantly to reach an average manufacturing rate of 495,000 cells per day. That’s enough for 368 Cybertrucks.

However, the biggest battery maker in the world, Contemporary Amperex Technology Limited, better known as CATL, believes that going down the cylindrical cell route is a dead end. CATL’s founder and head honcho, Robin Zeng, told Tesla CEO Elon Musk this to his face. The reaction was silence.

Zang, who spoke with Reuters, said he had told Tesla’s head honcho that his bet on the 4680 cylindrical battery “is going to fail and never be successful.”

"We had a very big debate, and I showed him," Zeng said. "He was silent. He doesn't know how to make a battery. It's about electrochemistry. He's good for the chips, the software, the hardware, the mechanical things."

But that’s not all. Zang also had some remarks about Musk’s tendency to set unrealistic timelines for upcoming products. "His problem is overpromising. I talked to him," Zeng said. "Maybe something needs five years. But he says two years. I definitely asked him why. He told me he wanted to push people."

With Metro Awakening, Vertigo Games delivers a gripping post-apocalyptic shooter that tells a successful prequel story over twelve chapters. No prior knowledge of the Metro books or games is required, making it easy to jump in.

The interaction with the world and the gadgets works really well. The handling of the weapons is convincing. Most of the fights are exciting, and the soundtrack is well arranged. Plus: There are plenty of scary moments thanks to the great play of light and shadow and the mutant enemies you'll confront.

Graphically, the Quest version performs quite well, without reaching the quality of Batman: Arhkam Shadow. For a visual comparison between the Quest 3 and PSVR 2 versions, take a look at the linked article.

However, I hesitate to give the game a full recommendation. The level design and the locations are not varied enough for me, especially in the later parts.

Other points of criticism include the sometimes predictable actions of the enemies, the unfair distribution of save points, and the fact that there are far too few creative puzzles. However, if you can overlook these flaws, you will be entertained for seven to nine hours at a good level.

Little Cities: Diorama is the first mixed reality version of the cozy city builder. Its creator Purple Yonder developed the Vision Pro version together with nDreams studio Near Light.

Gears & Goo is a tower defense game developed for Apple Vision Pro by Resolution Games (Demeo, Blaston, Racket Club).

In this video we take a look at the complete teardown and disassembly of a BYD Seal by Japanese publisher Nikkei BP. See first hand how the BYD Seal is put together and the efficiencies of BYD's vertical integration

General Motors is teaming up with Reliant Energy to offer free nighttime charging to some Chevy electric vehicle owners in Texas.

Chevy owners who enroll in Reliant’s EV charging plan will receive free nighttime charging through monthly bill credits that offset charges incurred between 11PM. and 6AM, the companies said. Customers must also designate an EV to receive the charging credit through GM Energy’s Smart Charging Portal. (GM Energy is the automaker’s home energy subsidiary, and Reliant is a subsidiary of NRG Energy.)

Global sales of fully electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles rose 35% in October from the same month last year, led by a 54% jump in sales in China, market research firm Rho Motion said on Wednesday.

European sales rose just 0.8%, but were up in annual terms for the second straight month and the research firm expects a good end to the year in the region, data manager Charles Lester told Reuters.

WHY IT'S IMPORTANT

The European auto sector is facing challenges including high production costs, managing the shift to EVs, and an influx of lower-cost vehicles from Chinese rivals.

Europe's biggest carmaker Volkswagen said in October it planned to shut at least three factories in Germany.

BY THE NUMBERS

Sales of EVs - whether fully electric or plug-in hybrids - reached 1.72 million worldwide in October, Rho Motion data showed.

Sales in China hit a record high 1.2 million vehicles.

In the United States and Canada, EV sales were up 11.4% to 0.16 million, while in Europe, they reached 0.26 million, up slightly on the year but down 14% from September.

In the rest of the world, sales increased 10.9%.

KEY QUOTES

"The Chinese EV market shows no signs of slowing down as it enters the final two strong automotive sales months of the year," Rho Motion said in a statement.

Lester said November and December tend to be seasonally strong months.

Carbon emission reduction goals set in the EU for next year could lead to price cuts as automakers look to boost EV sales to meet targets and avoid fines, he said.

CONTEXT

China's passenger vehicle sales jumped 11.2% in October year-on-year, data from China Passenger Car Association showed last week, led by domestic EV champion BYD.

2023 was an excellent year for VR games, and 2024 will even surpass it in terms of quality and especially quantity.

Since October, the number of releases has increased so much that even we are struggling to keep up. Our inboxes are overflowing with announcements of new VR games and updates to existing titles. At times, it feels like developers have been waiting two years or more to release their products at the same time.

The timing is no coincidence: The low-cost Meta Quest 3S was released in mid-October, and VR studios are naturally hoping for a bumper holiday season. Of course, it would be foolish not to take advantage of this unique opportunity.

There are currently rumors that game sales are not as strong as some established VR studios had hoped for with the launch of Quest 3S. Generally, two factors are being cited: the merging of the App Lab and the Quest Store, which has eliminated curation, and Meta's recommendation system, which is said to prioritize Horizon Worlds content over third-party titles that studios have been working on for years. Both of these factors could have led to lower visibility in the Horizon Store and therefore lower sales.

Another possible factor for the alleged decline in sales could be that Meta is currently throwing so many high-quality VR games at new customers for free that they have no reason to buy new VR games, which of course hurts the ecosystem.

Clone Drone in the Danger Zone (2021), the hit arena battler from indie studio Doborog, is bringing the game’s voxel slice-em-up action in a new VR-exclusive sequel next month, coming to Quest and PC VR headsets.

Called Clone Drone in the Hyperdome, the new single-player VR experience includes a thick slice of the series’ unique combat and action-based storyline, where players fight to the death against killer robots—which just so happen to be very frangible.

Doborog says in Clone Drone in the Hyperdome, players take on the role of Blink, a teleporting robot who is the newest ‘looprunner’ gladiator forced to compete in Crashloop, a deadly roguelike combat sport.

Rivian and the Volkswagen Group's joint venture now has a name and a launch date. Rivian and VW Group Technology, LLC—or, Rivian and Volkswagen Group Technologies, for short—kicks off Wednesday.

The EV startup and automotive juggernaut announced their intentions to make a deal in June. Now the tie-up is actually happening, and the companies have revealed some key details. One big one: Initially, Volkswagen said it would invest $5 billion into Rivian to leverage the startup's expertise in vehicle software and electrical architectures. Now that's up to $5.8 billion.

The venture will be jointly run by Rivian's Chief Software Officer, Wassym Bensaid, and Carsten Helbing, Volkswagen Group's CTO. They'll serve as co-CEOs. It'll be based in Palo Alto, California, to start. Three more sites are in development North America and Europe, the companies said on Tuesday.

Through the deal, Volkswagen's brands will benefit from the underlying technology Rivian has developed—namely, vehicle software and electrical architectures. That's something Volkswagen has struggled to build in-house for years. And it's increasingly important, as automakers look to create "software-defined vehicles" that offer satisfying user interfaces, seamless over-the-air updates and paid subscription features.

Together, Rivian and VW will develop "next-generation electrical architecture and best-in-class software technology for both companies’ future electric vehicles, covering all relevant vehicle segments, including subcompact cars," the companies said in a press release. Rivian's upcoming R2 will use technology from the joint venture. Volkswagen didn't specify any models, but since we know VW is working on an electric ID. Golf, that—and subsequent smaller cars—could make use of this technology.

Nov 12 (Reuters) - Nasdaq-listed electric vehicle maker VinFast said on Wednesday it will get a fresh round of funding worth 85 trillion dong ($3.35 billion) from its founder and its parent firm, Vingroup (VIC.HM) , opens new tab by 2026, when it expects to break even. VinFast began operations in 2019 and has been expanding aggressively into global markets, but the firm continues to report increasing losses as it grapples with softer demand and challenges in the sector.

Approximately 50 trillion dong ($1.97 billion) of the new funding is expected to come from VinFast's founder, tycoon Pham Nhat Vuong, according to a company statement. Vingroup, one of Vietnam's largest conglomerates, intends to lend up to $1.38 billion to VinFast by the end of 2026 through its activities, dividends, and possible divestment, which it said may be conducted at an acceptable price if necessary.

Additionally, Vingroup will convert all existing loans to VinFast Vietnam into preferred shares with dividend entitlements, it said. Vuong, who owns 97.9% of VinFast shares both directly and indirectly, gave assurances of his commitment to increase investment in the automotive unit during a general meeting in April. "VinFast remains committed to raising independent capital to meet its financial needs. The support from Vingroup and Vuong will be utilised only if these independent efforts fall short," VinFast said in the statement.