Trade News

FRANKFURT -- Volkswagen requires about 300 gigawatt hours worth of battery cells a year by the end of the decade for its ambitious roll out of electric vehicles in Europe, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The supply chain update is part of the world's second-largest automaker's strategy to raise the share of fully electric vehicles in Europe to more than 70 percent by 2030 at its core brand, details of which were unveiled last week.

So far, Volkswagen, which sources batteries from LG Chem , Samsung SDI, SK Innovation and CATL, expects annual demand in Europe to be more than 150 gigawatt hours from 2025 and to be at a similar level in Asia.

CEO Herbert Diess and Thomas Schmall, Volkswagen's board member in charge of technology, will unveil details of its battery and charging infrastructure strategy during a Power Day scheduled for March 15, the people said.

Volkswagen declined to comment.

The fresh target comes as Volkswagen…

The Department of Energy is readying efforts to support President Joe Biden's ambitious climate and energy goals by focusing on electric vehicles and ensuring the U.S. maintains global competitiveness, newly confirmed Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said Tuesday.

"President Biden is demanding that we get America to that net-zero [carbon emissions] by 2050. The transportation sector is the largest source of those emissions," Granholm said during a virtual event organized by Securing America's Future Energy, a nonpartisan group committed to reducing the country's reliance on oil.

"We need to jam on the accelerator here," the former Michigan governor said.

To aid the administration's clean-energy agenda, Granholm said the department is going to invest billions over the next few years in technologies that will speed the adoption of EVs.

"We're going to double down on our R&D in the technologies that will make EVs easier to manufacture, easier …

SAN FRANCISCO -- LG Energy Solution aims to build advanced battery cells for Tesla Inc. EVs in 2023 and is considering potential production sites in the U.S. and Europe, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Tesla has not yet agreed to a deal that would expand LG's role in its supply chain beyond China, one of the sources said.

Last week, the Korean battery maker told reporters it plans to build a U.S. factory where it would make battery cells for EVs and energy storage systems, to cater to U.S. and global customers as well as startups. It did not identify potential customers then, but one of the sources said it was hoping Tesla would buy the batteries.

In September, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced an ambitious plan to develop new cells in-house, prompting suppliers like LG and Panasonic to embrace the unproven technology or face risks of losing a major customer for the longer term.

The supplier, a unit of LG Chem has made samples for th…

WASHINGTON -- Three U.S. House lawmakers introduced legislation on Tuesday calling on the U.S. Postal Service to freeze a $482 million contract to Oshkosh that would finalize production of the next-generation postal vehicles until the deal can be reviewed.

Rep. Marcy Kaptur, the chair of an appropriations subcommittee, and fellow Democrats Jared Huffman and Tim Ryan urged a halt pending an investigation into whether there was any political influence in awarding the contract and if it is consistent with President Joe Biden's executive order to electrify the federal fleet.

Last month, the USPS rejected a bid from Workhorse Group for an all-electric delivery fleet. Oshkosh and Workhorse did not immediately comment.

Huffman separately introduced legislation on Monday co-sponsored by 18 other House Democrats to provide $6 billion to the Postal Service to buy tens of thousands of additional electric delivery vehicles and charging stations.

U.S. vehicle safety regulators have approved a request by the Alliance for Automotive Innovation to reopen the comment period on whether any test procedures related to NHTSA's federal vehicle safety standards should be replaced, repealed or modified.

NHTSA in December issued an advance notice of proposed rule-making that sought comment on amending its test procedures for any of the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards "for reasons other than considerations relevant only to automated driving systems," according to an unpublished document.

The comment period ended Feb. 8 but, starting Wednesday, will reopen for 30 days.

The alliance — which represents most major automakers in the U.S. as well as some suppliers and tech companies — asked the agency in January for a 30-day extension of the comment period.

The association said the additional time was necessary for it "to conduct a comprehensive review of the extensive number of regulations" and auto …

Shift Technologies Inc. reported record revenue and vehicle sales in the fourth quarter as it continued to dig itself out of an inventory hole brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

The online used-vehicle retailer was more selective in inventory acquisition at the onset of the outbreak last spring. It also furloughed some of its reconditioning staff, relying more heavily on third parties to get its vehicles sale-ready.

This led to an inventory gap when used-vehicle demand began to surge later in the spring and into the summer.

In the fourth quarter, Shift said, the company was able to "steadily and dramatically" reduce its use of third-party reconditioning, and by January, it was back at pre-COVID levels of having just 15 percent of its vehicles processed by outside parties.

In October, Shift was processing about 250 vehicles per week in-house, and it improved that number to more than 500 vehicles by the middle of the first quarter.

The c…

Chipmaker GlobalFoundries said on Tuesday it has partnered with automotive supplier Bosch to develop radar chips for self-driving features.

Under the deal, Santa Clara, California-based GlobalFoundries said it will make high-frequency radar chips for Bosch at the chipmaker's Fab 1 facility in Dresden, Germany. Radar chips are widely used in vehicles for driver-assistance features such as emergency braking, lane-keeping and parking assistance.

The radar chips are designed to operate at higher frequency than previous generations to help the radar detect objects farther away with greater accuracy than lower-frequency radar chips found on many current vehicles. They are not related to the chips currently in short supply that have caused manufacturing disruptions at automakers such as Ford Motor Co. and General Motors.

Rather than source the chips from a third-party company to put inside a radar module, Bosch is working directly with the chip contract ma…

Kia Motors America is recalling just less than 380,000 vehicles because of issues with electric circuitry that could lead to fires in engine compartments.

Vehicle owners will be told to park outside and away from structures until the recall repair is complete.

The recall includes Sportage and Cadenza vehicles from the 2017 to 2021 model years. The circuit in the vehicles' hydraulic electronic control units could short-circuit, upping the risk of fire.

No fires, accidents or injuries have been reported. Dealers will replace specific fuses in the models' electrical junction boxes. Vehicles equipped with an electronic parking brake will also get a software update.

The automaker will begin notifying dealers on April 15 and owners on April 30.