Is Volvo's new, American-made EX90 a Tesla killer?



Tesla's ludicrous mode — which takes you from 0 to 60 in as little as 2.5 seconds — isn't for everyone. Some of would happily dispense with a short-term boost in torque to have a comfortable, silent ride.

Until Elon Musk offers some kind of "leisure mode," there's always the new, American-made 2025 Volvo EX90, a fully electric premium 7-seat SUV.

You could hear a pin drop in the EX90's ultra-quiet cabin — just the serenity you need to lower stress levels and calm the beast inside. Unlike most of its battery-electric competitors, during acceleration, it does not pipe in a soundtrack that mimics an internal-combustion engine.

The EX90's commitment to safety might also ease some tension when you're behind the wheel. Volvo's new multi-camera driver-monitoring system includes a suite of lidar, radar, eight cameras, and 12 ultrasonic sensors that collaborate to enforce Volvo's "zero crash" intent for all Volvos.

A new computer-actuated dual-chamber air suspension helps the EX90 feel refined, flat, and planted. The computer allows for instantaneous reactions to road imperfections. The hydro-bushings in the front and rear axle enhance longitudinal damping, counteracting suspension-crashing sensations and creating a smooth ride.

A trick torque-vectoring system, new to Volvo, recognizably enhances agility in low-speed or low-traction situations and aids in takeoff performance. As for the suspension and the steering, you can choose soft or firm settings.

Exclusive Scandinavian modern design details add to the premium experience of an intelligent car. Inspired by the Swedish living room, the EX90 cabin showcases a modern, luxurious, and uncluttered interior design with high-quality Nordico or Wool Blend upholstery options.

The backlit bent wood veneers are Alvar Aalto-esque, clutter is vanquished, and storage is multifarious, with bins and cubbies, including a frunk, a handbag shelf beneath the center console, and a sub-compartment beneath the rear cargo floor.

A 14.5-inch screen in the middle controls virtually everything, including simple functions like adjusting the side mirrors and HVAC and opening the glovebox and trunk. The amazing Bowers & Wilkins/Abbey Road Studios premium audio system is most impressive and really stands out.

Volvo says it doesn't intend the EX90 to replace the existing gas-powered XC90; it will continue to produce the latter as long as there's demand. Both 2025 versions of the car will be manufactured in the Swedish automaker's state-of-the-art Ridgeville, South Carolina, plant.

The twin motor trim will run you $79,995 while the twin motor performance comes in at $84,995. American buyers qualify for the $7500 EV tax credit. Our test car was fully loaded and came in at $93,345.

Pros :

  • Elegant interior styling
  • Google-based technology features
  • Strong acceleration
  • Amazing audio system

Cons:

  • The EX90 is not a driver's car.
  • No real leather option — it would increase the luxury
  • Glove box opening separate / manual
  • Rear-view camera

To see the EX90 in action — and to get a better sense of how it stacks up to competitors like the Tesla Model X and the KIA EV9, check out my test-drive video below:

- YouTube youtu.be

Volvo kills plans for all-electric lineup by 2030 amid industry shift



Volvo has declared that it has abandoned plans to sell only electric cars by the end of the decade. The Swedish auto manufacturer is the latest carmaker to walk back ambitious electric vehicle plans.

Volvo was one of the first automakers to promise an electric-only lineup. However, Volvo has scrapped its plan to sell only electric vehicles – just three years after it pledged it would "become a fully electric car company by 2030."

'It is clear that the transition to electrification will not be linear, and customers and markets are moving at different speeds of adoption.'

Volvo said the company needed to "adjust its electrification ambitions due to changing market conditions and customer demands."

"Going forward, Volvo Cars aims for 90 to 100 percent of its global sales volume by 2030 to consist of electrified cars, meaning a mix of both fully electric and plug-in hybrid models – in essence, all cars with a cord," the car company stated in a press release shared on Wednesday.

Volvo noted, "This replaces the company’s previous ambition for its lineup to be fully electric by 2030."

“We are resolute in our belief that our future is electric,” said Jim Rowan, CEO of Volvo Cars. “An electric car provides a superior driving experience and increases possibilities for using advanced technologies that improve the overall customer experience."

Rowan admitted, "However, it is clear that the transition to electrification will not be linear, and customers and markets are moving at different speeds of adoption. We are pragmatic and flexible, while retaining an industry-leading position on electrification and sustainability.”

Volvo blamed "slower than expected rollout of charging infrastructure, withdrawal of government incentives in some markets and additional uncertainties created by recent tariffs on EVs in various markets" for the lower demand for electric vehicles.

Volvo Cars proclaimed there is a "need for stronger and more stable government policies to support the transition to electrification."

The car company said it expects to feature 50% to 60% of its lineup as electrified vehicles by 2025.

Volvo said the share of fully electric cars in its lineup stood at 26% during the second quarter of 2024, adding that this is the highest level among its premium peers. The car company stated that EVs and hybrid vehicles account for 48% of its lineup.

Volvo is owned by the Chinese car company Geely. Volvo and Geely also own the Polestar EV brand.

Last week, Bloomberg reported that Polestar had suffered $242.3 million in operating losses for the second quarter. Polestar admitted that revenue had dropped 17% to $574.9 million due to “lower global volumes and higher discounts.”

Bloomberg reported, "Once a vanguard of the electric-car movement, Polestar is grappling with high costs and increasing competition from new players, including from China. At the same time, consumer demand for EVs is waning amid high inflation and the end of subsidies in key markets, forcing some carmakers to offer discounts."

Volvo's reversal of ambitious goals of electric vehicles comes at a time when other automakers have dialed back their commitments to EVs.

As Blaze News previously reported last month, Ford Motor Company announced measures to scale back multiple EV plans. Ford killed plans to manufacture a large, three-row electric SUV. The American auto manufacturer also developed a new plan to focus on smaller, cheaper EVs as the future, while hybrid technology will be utilized for powering larger vehicles. Ford will also reduce future capital expenditure plans on pure EVs from 40% to 30%. Ford's EV division is reportedly on pace to lose as much as $5.5 billion this year.

Three years ago, Mercedes-Benz proclaimed it would feature an all-electric car lineup in 2030 "where market conditions allow." However, in February, Mercedes backpedaled and indicated it would continue to manufacture internal combustion engine cars and hybrids well past 2030.

"Spurred on by weaker than expected demand for EVs, this about-face was the most recent indication that the global car industry is growing increasingly pessimistic about an all-electric future," according to Forbes.

Reuters reported in June that General Motors downgraded its 2024 EV production forecast from 300,000 units to 250,000.

Porsche watered down its plans to become an all-electric car company in July.

"The transition to electric cars is taking longer than we thought five years ago," Porsche said in a statement. "Our product strategy is set up such that we could deliver over 80% of our vehicles as all electric in 2030 – dependent on customer demand and the development of electromobility."

According to Edmunds sales data, new car sales of electric vehicles in the U.S. were only 6.8% in May 2024.

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NASCAR introduces electric vehicle as part of commitment to 'decarbonization' and 'sustainable' operations by 2035



NASCAR revealed an electric vehicle prototype at a Chicago event and spoke about its plans to "decarbonize" operations.

The racing organization showed off its new EV at the Chicago Street Race and published materials riddled with activist jargon regarding sustainability goals that have been heard ad nauseum from large corporations.

Touting a mission to strengthen its communities by advancing sustainability, NASCAR partnered with Swedish-Swiss electrical equipment manufacturer ABB.

'We actually have the opportunity to evaluate not just the battery electric part, but then also the crossover vehicle part.'

The beloved American stock car league's commitments to electrification echo those of the most basic plans put forth by limitless jurisdictions and manufacturers, stating that it would decarbonize its facilities and reach a net-zero carbon footprint in its core operations by 2035.

Simply put, while NASCAR said it will still use combustion engines in its cars, it would like to be able to tell people that its nonracing operations are sustainable.

"The combustion engine is our core product, and that will remain so for the coming future," Riley Nelson, NASCAR's head of sustainability, told CNN.

NASCAR hopes to have 100% renewable electricity at its racetracks and facilities by 2028 and also to have on-site electric vehicle charging stations. The partnership with ABB will supply the infrastructure needed at operational sites.

The EV itself, the ABB NASCAR EV Prototype, debuted in 2022 and was an attempt to make race cars look more similar to cars on the street, NASCAR said in a press release.

The car has three electric motors (one front, two rear) and regenerative braking. The braking is when an electric vehicle slows its speed to revert surplus energy back to the battery to allow for a longer driving time. This can be an irritating feature of a commercial electric vehicle, as certain driving modes will automatically put the brakes on the EV when it is at very low speeds, such as in a car wash.

"The pilot programs that we've implemented within operations of our core business, and then also the events, has been going really well," NASCAR's Nelson continued. She added the company is "still in the early stages of this journey."

NASCAR’s senior vice president of racing development, John Probst, told CNN that some fans will reject the very idea of electric racing and said that the gas cars are in no immediate danger of extinction. But like Nelson, Probst did not say they will never be eliminated.

The company reportedly has plans to change its fuel to become more sustainable in the future as well, despite currently using 85% gasoline and 15% ethanol.

"We actually have the opportunity to evaluate not just the battery electric part, but then also the crossover vehicle part," Probst said. "So it may be that one or both of these will become something in the future for us."

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Actor Kevin Dillon's Tesla automatically brakes inside car wash, causing 4-car accident



Actor Kevin Dillon was allegedly the cause of a four-car fender bender at an automatic carwash with a track system in Los Angeles.

The beloved "Entourage" actor was reportedly seen at the drive-through car wash in the Los Angeles area, where his electric vehicle automatically braked in the middle of the car wash, causing several cars behind him to collide with each other.

Police said that Dillon, who drives a Tesla, caused a ripple effect for other unlucky drivers when he reportedly lifted up from his seat, and his car stopped in place on the car wash track.

This could have been caused by any number of features in Tesla programming that automatically apply the brakes as a safety feature. The car engages "stopping mode" if both the accelerator and brake pedals are released at a "very low speed."

There are a series of different options for the stopping mode, but the most likely feature that engaged on Dillon, according to the Tesla online owner's manual, is the "hold" feature.

The feature "maximizes range and reduces brake wear by continuing to provide regenerative braking at speeds lower than with the Creep and Roll settings," the manual reads.

"When Model 3 stops, the brakes are automatically applied without you having to put your foot on the brake pedal. Whether stopped on a flat surface or a hill, Vehicle Hold keeps the brake applied, provided your foot remains off the accelerator and brake pedals."

It is likely the latter portion of the hold feature initiated if Dillon took both feet off the brake and accelerator pedals.

However, the unexpected stop could have been caused by the "regenerative braking" feature, as well.

The manual states that when a driver's foot is off the accelerator, but the Tesla is moving, the system automatically "slows down the vehicle and feeds any surplus power back to the Battery." This is done to increase the driving range of the EV by conserving battery power.

TMZ reported that the car wash actually had a sign that advised Tesla owners that any sudden seat movements could shift their car into park and therefore cause potential injury or damage to vehicles.

The Tesla manual did not appear to mention a feature about the car automatically stopping if the driver lifted up from their seat.

Additionally, one person involved in the slight collision complained about discomfort, and, as such, law enforcement was reportedly called to take an accident report.

TMZ did not receive a response from Dillon.

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The latest problem with EV charging stations: Power supply



The transition from gas-powered automobiles to electric vehicles has been a gong show, even though Democrat bans on new gas cars have not yet gone into effect. The trouble is not simply that EVs — which require the mining of many times more minerals than required for a conventional vehicle — are less environmentally friendly than promised or that they are both expensive and unreliable.

Electric vehicles require charging stations. Unless Americans are to be confined to 15-minute cities, there needs to be a juiced network of such stations.

The infrastructure is not in place, however, thanks in part to the Biden administration's bungling of its promised national rollout of EV charging stations. The Democratic administration has established fewer than a dozen of the promised 500,000 charging stations across the country.

Even if there was a satisfactory number of active stations, there is no guarantee they would be useful on account of power supply issues.

Last month, the California-based software company Xendee released the results of its survey of leaders "involved in the development, operation, and commercial use of EV charging infrastructure."

75% of respondents said electric grid limitations were a "significant roadblock to the rollout of EV charging infrastructure for commercial EV usage." Despite uncertainty about whether the charging stations will have the power to charge the cars, 84% of fleet owners indicated they expect to draw grid power from the utility.

A new report from ISO New England Inc., the transmission organization that oversees New England's bulk electric power system and corresponding transmission lines, revealed that EV vehicle adoption over the next decade would significantly drive up electricity demand — demand satisfied mostly with natural gas, reported the VTDigger.

Vermont is hardly an exception. Princeton University recently projected that the U.S. will need 3,360% more electricity on hand to satisfy the Biden administration's EV goals, reported the Daily Mail.

"Right now, our infrastructure is likely 'OK' for the slow trickle of EV adoption," Robby DeGraff, the manager of product and consumer insights at AutoPacific, told the Mail. Increased demand shaped by government mandates will, however, mean that "the grid will certainly need to be revamped."

Already states like Georgia, Arizona, and California are buzzing their way toward capacity, and the costly infrastructure needed is far from established.

Michael Stadler, chief technology and marketing officer at Xendee, told Utility Drive that not only have numerous prospective EV charging station developers acknowledged they would be unable to acquire adequate electricity from utilities, electricity prices in some regions make it uneconomic to link up.

"Time of use rates and power charges are a really big problem," said Stadler. "If you end up paying more for electricity than gas, then something is wrong."

Many of Xendee's clients have apparently opted to install fossil-fuel-powered generators to power their charging stations. So in effect, there's a good chance that EVs whose drivers manage to find charging stations are powered by the same energy source EV is supposed to have made redundant — if not by a generator on-site, then by a predominantly gas-powered grid.

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'Lucky to be alive': Tesla charger sets home of NFL player Randall Cobb ablaze as his wife, 3 children, and dog escape



Pro Bowl wide receiver Randall Cobb posted images of his home online showing the aftermath of a fire caused by a Tesla charger in his garage that caught on fire.

The blaze happened at the 33-year-old's Nashville, Tennessee, home where he lives with his wife and three children. Wife, Aiyda Cobb, was the first to make comments about the incident online: "We are lucky to be alive. The telsa charger caught on fire in the garage late last night and quickly spread," she reportedly said in an Instagram story.

"We got out of the house with nothing but the clothes on our back and no shoes on our feet," a screenshot of her post showed.

'I can't get the image of the brave firefighter getting into position out of my head.'

Cobb himself posted a message the next day thanking firefighters and the community for their actions.

"Thank you for all the love and positive messages," Cobb said in a joint Instagram post with his wife. "First and foremost, we are all safe and healthy. We got out of the house and I was able to get back in and get our dog, Louie. We can't thank Chief Caruthers, Captain Irvin and the Nashville Fire Department enough for their swift action."

Cobb seemed particularly affected by the thought of the firefighters risking their lives to save his possessions.

"I can't get the image of the brave firefighter getting into position out of my head; he didn't even have water to shoot yet. I truly thought the cars were going to explode and that we would lose him in this tragedy. He is a true hero," Cobb continued.

"Unfortunately we don't know how much, if anything, will be salvageable, but this has been a reminder that nothing is more important than the health of our family."

The athlete finished by thanking the community of Nashville and the support his family has received from close friends who have provided a "temporary roof" over the family's heads.

After that, Cobb showed a video of the ash-covered interior of his garage, which included the Tesla. The walls were black from smoke and fire damage. Another video showed a damaged Mercedes SUV as the football player continued to examine the wreckage with a fire official.

The Nashville Fire Department confirmed to CNN that the fire was caused by an electric vehicle in the garage. The department clarified that the fire was contained to the garage, but "heavy smoke damage" happened in different parts of the home.

"There were no injuries reported to civilians or [fire] personnel," the department reportedly said. "The investigation is ongoing and some details are unavailable, as part of the investigation."

The news comes after a recent three-year study revealed that almost half of EV owners in the United States said they are very likely to switch back to gas-powered cars. At 49%, only Australians had a stronger response in terms of switching back to gasoline, with American consumers saying the same at a rate of 46%.

Cobb is currently a free agent in the NFL after spending the 2023-24 season with the New York Jets. He's been in the NFL since 2011.

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Talking head laughs in Buttigieg's face after he glosses over the Biden admin's epic failure



Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was recently asked about one of his boss' unrealistic green schemes, namely the installation of electric vehicle charging stations across the country. His answer prompted CBS' Margaret Brennan to laugh in his face.

Apparently keen to keep the laughs coming, Buttigieg subsequently blamed airline turbulence on climate change.

Only 499,992 to go

Ahead of the 2020 election, then-candidate Joe Biden promised the American people in four debates and during his CNN town hall interview that he would build half a million new charging stations across the nation if elected.

After taking the White House, Biden reiterated his promise, stating in November 2021, "We're going to build out the first-ever national network of charging stations all across the country — over 500,000 of them. ... So you'll be able to go across the whole darn country, from East Coast to West Coast, just like you'd stop at a gas station now. These charging stations will be available."

That month, the then-Democrat-controlled Congress passed a corresponding $1 trillion infrastructure package. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and 18 other Republican lawmakers, evidently unswayed by former President Donald Trump's critiques, subsequently helped Democrats pass the measure in the U.S. Senate.

Of the 1,000 billion taxpayer dollars sunk into the bill, $73 billion was designated for updating the nation's electricity grid so it could carry more renewable energy and $7.5 billion to build Biden's promised EV charging stations by 2030.

According to the EV policy analyst group Atlas Public Policy, the funding designated for the rollout should be enough for at least 20,000 charging spots and 5,000 stations.

Now years into the scheme, it appears increasingly unlikely that Biden's costly promise will materialize.

In March, the Federal Highway Administration confirmed to the Washington Post that only seven of Biden's planned 500,000 EV charging stations were operational, amounting to a total of 38 spots for drivers in Hawaii, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania to charge their vehicles.

Politico noted last year that that a National Renewable Energy Laboratory study estimated the country will need 1.2 million public chargers by 2030 to meet the demand artificially created by the Biden administration's climate agenda and corresponding regulations. As of June 2023, there were roughly 180,000 chargers nationwide.

House Committee on Energy and Commerce Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) and other Republican lawmakers penned a February letter to Buttigieg and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, expressing concerns that "American taxpayer dollars are being woefully mismanaged."

Over the weekend, Margaret Brennan pressed the issue further in conversation with the Biden DOT secretary on CBS' "Face the Nation."

Laughable

"Let me ask you about a portion of this that I think does fall under your portfolio, and that's the charging stations you mentioned. The Federal Highway Administration says only seven or eight charging stations have been produced with a $7.5 billion investment that taxpayers made back in 2021," said Brennan. "Why isn't that happening more quickly?"

"So the president's goal is to have half a million chargers up by the end of this decade. Now, in order to do a charger, it's more than just plunking a small device into the ground. There's utility work, and this is also really a new category of federal investment."

"But we've been working with each of the 50 states," continued Buttigieg. "Every one of them is getting formula dollars to do this work."

Brennan leaned in and asked, "Seven or eight, though?"

"Again, by 2030: 500,000 chargers," responded Buttigieg.

Brennan laughed at Buttigieg's suggestion, evidently unable to conceal her disbelief in the possibility that another 499,992 chargers could be installed and operational inside the next six years.

"And the very first handful of chargers are now already being physically built. But again, that's the absolute very, very beginning stages of the construction to come," added Buttigieg.

Despite the Biden administration admittedly being at the "very, very beginning stages," it is nevertheless trying to get gas-consuming cars off the streets and replacing them with EVs that will all rely on the handful of existing charging stations.

In March, the administration announced a rule that would limit the amount of exhaust permitted from cars such that by 2032, over half of the new cars need to be so-called zero-emissions vehicles, reported the New York Times.

Keeping it light

While short on satisfactory answers, Buttigieg still had plenty of alarmism to go around.

The DOT secretary told Brennan, "The reality is the effects of climate change are already upon us in terms of our transportation. We've seen that in the form of everything from heat waves that shouldn't statistically even be possible threatening to melt the cables of transit systems in the Pacific Northwest, to hurricane seasons becoming more and more extreme, and indications that turbulence is up by about 15%."

A study published last year in Geophysical Research Letters suggested that clear-air turbulence "is predicted to become more frequent because of climate change," claiming that the strongest category of clear-air turbulence was 55% more frequent in 2020 than in 1979.

Brennan pressed Buttigieg on whether the kind of extreme turbulence experienced last week by Singapore Airlines flight SQ321, which was traveling from London to Singapore, would soon become more common in the United States.

"To be clear, something that extreme is very rare. But turbulence can happen and sometimes it can happen unexpectedly," said Buttigieg. "This is all about making sure that we stay ahead of the curve, keeping aviation as safe as it is."

The "Face the Nation" interview was slapped with a community note on X, noting that National Transportation Safety Board data "shows there is no rising trend in aircraft turbulence incidents."

— (@)

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GM CEO says she is committed to Chinese market and will push forward in 'overhyped' electric vehicle sector



General Motors CEO Mary Barra said that the company will push forward with its operations in China despite a whopping loss in the country in the first quarter of 2024.

Barra recently visited China and promised that GM remained committed to the market, which has been a mainstay for the manufacturer since 1997. A $106 million loss in the first quarter in China was just GM's third quarterly loss in the far east in the last 15 years, CNBC reported, but the company announced that it expects the numbers to turn around.

GM CFO Paul Jacobson reportedly told investors that the company expects similar or slightly lower than $446 million in profit, which is what it garnered in China in 2023.

However, 2023 was the lowest year for equity income for GM in China since at least 2012, but this has come at a much smaller market share. GM's percentage of the market has shrunk from nearly 15% down to 8.6% in the last decade, lowering expectations.

Still, 2023's numbers were more than $230 million lower than 2022, despite only losing 1.2% of the market share in that time. Comparatively, GM's income in China stayed relatively the same between 2014 and 2018 despite its market share dropping by about 1%.

At the same time, Barra claimed that GM is going to be charging forward with electrical vehicle production. The CEO told Bloomberg that she planned on making at least one EV model for every GM brand while trying to convince America's middle class that electric cars are right for them.

"I think it was overhyped and now it's probably underhyped, and the truth is somewhere in the middle," Barra said of the EV market. "Growth has slowed, but it's still growing."

If consumers are confused by Barra's recent statements, they wouldn't be wrong. In 2022 she told Bloomberg that GM was purposely taking its time in the EV market, but in 2024 she says she wishes the company hadn't done so.

"If I had a do-over, I would have — even though we were moving , I would have accelerated the pace."

Of course, this is far away from what General Motors announced in October 2023. At that time, the company announced it would be slowing production of EVs after losing $1 billion from the autoworkers' strike, with Jacobson stating that GM would be "moderating the acceleration of EV production" to protect pricing.

Barra also said that the company planned on reducing electric vehicle product spending while simultaneously slowing the launch of several models in order to cut costs. The company also noted that it was abandoning targets to build 100,000 electric vehicles in the second half of 2023 and another 400,000 in the first six months of 2024.

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More Than Two Dozen AGs Sue Biden Administration Over EV Mandate

A coalition of 25 attorneys general filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration's electric vehicle mandate Thursday.
Electric vehicle explodes inside owner's garage after residents are forced to evacuate at 6 a.m.

Electric vehicle explodes inside owner's garage after residents are forced to evacuate at 6 a.m.



Homeowners of an electric vehicle were forced out of their home at 6 a.m. when a vehicle in their garage caught fire and then exploded as firefighters waited for backup.

Fire crews responded to a distress call from an alarm company in Boulder, Colorado, to a family home at 6:08 a.m. Upon arrival, crews noted that an electric vehicle inside the garage was smoking.

The call was changed to a "Fill-the-Box" incident, which is when the firemen are requesting additional resources. As the firefighters were waiting for resources, the vehicle exploded in the garage, Boulder Fire-Rescue reported on their X account.

"It sounded like an aircraft had crashed right here and exploded," a neighbor told ABC Denver7.

The crews reported no injuries, and all the home's residents were safely evacuated. Firefighters then worked to ventilate the home, which had been filled with smoke. They then carefully removed the exploded vehicle from the garage, along with another family vehicle of unknown type.

The department has opened an investigation into the origins of the fire.

None
— (@)

Electric vehicle fires are not unheard of by any means. However, while the make and model of the car was not identified by fire officials, several readers of the story pointed out that the car in question did not appear to be fully electric but rather a hybrid.

Multiple online sleuths pointed to a Volvo XC40 Recharge as the model that caught fire and exploded, a hybrid-electric vehicle. However, the vehicles — which can cost around $75,000 — still use a 78kWh lithium ion battery.

Therefore, despite the distinction, the vehicle would still carry a large battery at its base, underneath the vehicle's frame. It also is still charged similarly to a fully electric car, with a plug-in DC charger.

The incident is yet another example that lithium ion batteries do not appear to be fully user-safe as of yet. In 2022, four were killed in a New York City electric-bike repair shop.

"It is very clear that this was caused by lithium-ion batteries and e-bikes. There was a very large number of both batteries and e-bikes," said FDNY Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanaugh.

A new analysis showed that the number of fires caused by rechargeable batteries in New York City surged from 30 in 2019 to 220 in 2022. Firefighters have been warned that lithium-ion battery fires burn longer and hotter than regular car fires and are hard to extinguish safely. Since 2019, they've found 669 incidents between New York City and San Francisco, resulting in hundreds of injuries.

The vast majority of such batteries come from China, as well, with the country controlling 83% of the lithium-ion battery market.


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