Surging Solar Power, Booming EV Sales, & Robotaxi Safety — Top 12 Stories of the Week

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It’s been a busy week! Below are 12 top stories (or groups of stories) from the week. Check them out and share with friends.

1. Unfortunately, CO2 surged globally in 2024, and it’s not even clear why — aside from the long understood fact that burning fossil fuels leads to more CO2 emissions, but it’s unclear what exactly caused such a big surge in 2024.
2. Uber is rolling out robotaxis more and more with a variety of partners, including with Waymo, with WeRide, and with Volkswagen and its ID. Buzz electric minivans.
3. On that topic of robotaxis, Waymo has been showing how the one big benefit of its robotaxis is safer roads — much safer roads.
4. Solar power continues to grow at a rapid clip around the world — even (or especially) in “Trump states” in the USA. For more fun, this past week, we took a look at the top 5 solar power states in the USA.
5. On that note, a new report out from EnergySage tells us that residential solar system pricing and solar-plus-storage pricing declined to record lows in the second half of 2024. Costs just continue to drop.
6. AcePower has just launched a new 50 kW air-cooled high-efficiency module to accelerate Europe’s fast-charging network expansion which sounds pretty … cool.
7. If you want a laugh, and a cry, Michael Barnard’s takedown of a ridiculous, absurd hydrogen carsharing program is worth a read.
8. Meanwhile, a new study is out of Germany sharing that electric cars are proving to be more reliable than fossil-powered cars.
9. EV sales are booming in various markets, but as a couple of highlights, Sweden’s plugin vehicle share is now at 63% while its BEV share of the auto market is at 35%, and Norway leads the world with more than 97% of vehicle sales being plugins and 97% even being BEVs! Additionally, Costa Rica is a truly fascinating market and is leading South and Central America for share of its auto sales that are electrics.
10. But for the biggest, broadest take, see our two new world EV sales reports — one focused on models and one focused on brands & OEMs.
11. Highlighting a few standout brands (from China of course), NIO sales were up 53% in April, XPENG sales were up 313% in January–April, and BYD full-electric passenger vehicle sales were up 46% in April while the company’s electric truck sales were up 1,249%.
12. Let’s end with one super fun one. Michael Barnard writes that, “Seventy percent of ferries currently on order globally now feature electric drivetrains.” Wow — 70% of ferry orders! Impressive. “There are about 15,400 ferries in operation around the world, new ones are overwhelmingly being purchased with electric drivetrains, and most operators have electric retrofit plans for existing vessels.”

That’s it for this week, but I’m sure I skipped over some other big, hot stories. Chime in down in the comments if you have more to add.

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