As a chemical engineer, I am closely following the developments and advances in battery technologies, especially for use in EVs. Many research groups are using different materials in the periodic table as an alternative to lithium. Several electric vehicle battery chemistries are emerging as electric cars .Scientists, battery companies and automakers are trying to develop […]
The share prices of EV start-ups have been rising sharply over recent months. Testa Inc., which produces 500,000 EVs per year is valued at more than US$800 billion. At one point, an EV start-up, Nikola, was worth US$40 billion, more than the market value of the 100-year old Ford Motor. Investors have also taken […]
On February 13th, 2021, the headline of the Times London online was “Britons are at the back of a year-long queue for new Tesla model. Another headline in the Barron’s online reads “Electric vehicles were a non-starter until Tesla comes along. There were a few starts for electric vehicles in the last 100 years. The […]
The first bespoke electric car forecourt was opened on December 7th, 2020, by Gridserve at Braintree, Essex, England. The capital of the county is Southend On Sea at which I studied at a local college in the 1970s. Designed by its CEO, Toddington Harper, the forecourt (which is categorically not a service station) is spacious […]
The London Time s article on 21st November 2020 reported that the thefts of catalytic converters have increased significantly recently. The police had logged in 14,690 incidents across Britain this year, a rise from 2,484 a year earlier and 985 the year before. The rise is believed t have ben driven by a steep rise […]
In the history of marketing, in 1940, Pepsi was credited with an advertising campaign called “twice as Much for a Nickel”. It was based on the fact that Coca Cola was sold in 6-ounce bottles and the new Pepsi bottles were 12 ounces. An article in Wall Street Journal, online edition, on October 27th, 2020, […]
An article by James Hurley in the Times of UK on January 20th, 2020, predicted that British pubs could become an important player in the electric car revolution. A company, Engenie, is installing 400 chargers at 200 of Marstone ‘s sites, a listed brewer and pub chain. This is the first tie-up in its industry […]
Electric car charging stations remain a major hurdle for electric vehicle (EV) adoption, but maybe, just maybe, robots could help overcome that. Volkswagen (VW) last week revealed its concept for a totally autonomous EV charging robot. Essentially, this little robot wanders around parking garages, parking lots and the like and brings a mobile charging pack, called the “battery […]
Patania II, owned by Dede of Belgium Introduction Today we noted two contrasting developments, 1) the price of Brent crude oil had fallen below US$60 per barrel, and 2) a company will start deep sea mining of precious metals. In the 1980’s I worked as a refining planning engineer in ESSO’s refining unit in […]
Background We noted an interesting article by Roger Boyes in the London Times on November 14th, 2018. He predicted that the push to produce electric cars worldwide would alter the dynamic of the existing energy-producing countries. The International Energy Agency has forecast that oil use by cars will peak in seven years because of the […]