Renault is one of the large carmakers that recently announced OEM conversion kits for the Master van, which can allow operators to turn their polluting diesel models into clean and efficient battery-powered versions, albeit for a steep price.

Renault will take in all of the vans send for conversion at its factory in Flins, France, so the conversion will be done by specialized experts. Converted Master III electric vans will be powered by a 52kWh battery, offering a range of up to 200 kilometers and charging speeds will be limited to 22kW on AC power.

Being an OEM transition kit, it will benefit from a 2-year warranty without mileage limit, as well as 4 years or 150.000 kilometers for the battery.

With a price of 26.900 euros per unit, it won't be cheap to convert a fleet of these vehicles, but it might be worth it when you consider that a brand-new E-Tech Master is almost 70.000 euros.

Collaborations for cheaper EVs

Volkswagen recently announced a collaboration effort with US carmaker Rivian. The purpose? Manufacturing EVs faster and with a cheaper cost per unit. Starting this year, Volkswagen will send the first of the three tranches, totaling 5 billion dollars, as its part of the deal.

Volkswagen hopes that this strategy will enable it to achieve a 70% share of EV sales by 2030. Rivian will use Volkswagen's funding to develop more efficient production processes, which will lead to faster manufacturing with a lower cost. The American carmaker will use its proprietary platform for this, which uses less wiring.

At the same time, the financing will allow Rivian to scale-up its platform for EV manufacturing.

Toyota is one of the companies in the automotive industry that doesn't come very often with innovations, but when it does, it usually takes everyone by surprise. The same thing happened recently, when the Japanese carmaker announced that it developed an internal combustion engine that uses hydrogen, instead or gasoline or diesel. This means that no polluting emissions are being released as a result of operating such a vehicle. At the same time, this isn't like a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle, either, because there is no electric motor in play, but rather, a traditional engine that gearheads are more used to.

The company stated that this engine not only offers the benefits of driving a classic car without emissions, but it also offers better performance compared to a traditional EV.

Toyota already offers hydrogen-powered vehicles, in the form of the Mirai, but that only has a power output of 180 HP, whereas the new engine, which replicates an ICE unit, is capable of producing up to 400 HP.

The key in Toyota's success comes from the thermal efficiency of its hydrogen-powered combustion engine, which is rated at 45%, rivaling even the most efficient diesels on the market.

The carmaker will now continue to use the knowledge it accumulated from the production and development of fuel cell vehicles to come up with optimized hydrogen combustion engines for commercial and passenger vehicles.

Fast charging for large trucks

Trucks and buses are not particularly easy to electrify, because they are heavy, need large batteries and very fast charging stations for reasonable to-ups. This latter element is one of the big reasons why they didn't go mainstream so far, but Shell could soon change that.

The oil company recently installed and started operating its first megawatt charging station, made for trucks, buses and even boats. It has a flexible arm, which can allow to charge multiple types of vehicles.

The system is connected to a solar farm with 3.600 rooftop panels and it has separate charging stations, as well, providing up to 350kW of power for slower, but still speedy charging sessions.