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☆ The Chevy Malibu Was So Uncool It Was Cool
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-09 | by ( Jim Windolf | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

If you asked a child to draw a car, the result would probably be something that looked like the Chevrolet Malibu. For decades, this dependable midsize vehicle was a stalwart of the American road. Because that kind of thing is no longer in demand, it came as no surprise when General Motors announced on Wednesday that it would discontinue the model as it shifts its focus to sport utility vehicles and electric cars. The Malibu never had the back-alley glamour of the Chevrolet Camaro or the brute force of the Chevrolet Impala. It was the ultimate normcore-mobile, made for a time when Americans were content to drive simple, gas-powered sedans, rather than rugged S.U.V.s, high-riding pickup trucks or electric vehicles that cruise along in near silence.

Organizations: Chevrolet, General Motors, Malibu Locations: Chevrolet Malibu

☆ For Michigan’s Economy, Electric Vehicles Are Promising and Scary
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-19 | by ( Peter S. Goodman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

That yielded a pay raise of 25 percent over the next four years, easing the pain of reductions that she and other union workers swallowed more than a decade ago. But as Ms. Simmons, 38, contemplates prospects for the American auto industry in the state that invented it, she worries about a new force: the shift toward electric vehicles. The Biden administration has embraced electric vehicles as a means of generating high-paying jobs while cutting emissions. It has dispensed tax credits to encourage consumers to buy electric cars, while limiting the benefits to models that use American-made parts. But autoworkers fixate on the assumption that electric cars — simpler machines than their gas-powered forebears — will require fewer hands to build.

Persons: Tiffanie Simmons, S.U.V.s, Simmons, President Biden, Biden, Mr Organizations: Ford Motor, United Automobile Workers Locations: Detroit

☆ Death of Political Activist in Zimbabwe Increases Fears of Crisis
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-14 | by ( John Eligon | More About John Eligon | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

An activist with Zimbabwe’s main opposition party was found dead on the side of a road in the capital, Harare, the police said on Tuesday. A party spokesman said he had been abducted while campaigning in a local election over the weekend. The death of the activist, Tapfumanei Masaya, is the latest in what opposition and civil society leaders say has been a string of violent episodes fueling a growing political crisis in the southern African nation since national elections were held in August. President Emmerson Mnangagwa and his governing ZANU-PF party maintained power in the August vote, despite doubts raised by regional and international observers about the election’s credibility. Mr. Masaya, 51, a pastor, was campaigning door to door on Saturday to promote a candidate along with other members of the political party Citizens Coalition for Change when multiple S.U.V.s pulled up and attackers jumped out and chased them, said Gift Ostallos Siziba, a spokesman for the party.

Persons: Tapfumanei Masaya, Emmerson Mnangagwa, Masaya, Ostallos Organizations: ZANU, Coalition Locations: Harare

☆ Toyota Recalls 1.8 Million RAV 4 S.U.V.s Over Potential Fire Risk
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-01 | by ( Orlando Mayorquin | More About Orlando Mayorquin | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Toyota, the world’s largest automaker, on Wednesday recalled over 1.8 million RAV 4 sport utility vehicles spanning several model years because a replacement battery could pose a fire risk. The voluntary recall covers 1.85 million vehicles from model years 2013 to 2018, the company said in a statement. Some of the vehicles may be equipped with replacement 12-volt batteries that have dimensions that are too small, it said. “If a small-top battery is used for replacement and the hold-down clamp is not tightened correctly, the battery could move when the vehicle is driven with forceful turns,” it said. Movement from a strong turn could create a short circuit that could potentially ignite a fire, the company said.

Organizations: Toyota Locations: ”

Former President Donald J. Trump surrendered at the Fulton County jail in Atlanta on Thursday and was booked on 13 felony charges for his efforts to reverse his 2020 election loss in Georgia. It was an extraordinary scene: a former U.S. president who flew on his own jet to Atlanta and surrendered at a jail compound surrounded by concertina wire and signs that directed visitors to the “prisoner intake” area. As Mr. Trump’s motorcade of black S.U.V.s drove to the jail through cleared streets, preceded by more than a dozen police motorcycles — a trip captured by news helicopters and broadcast live on national television — two worlds collided in ways never before seen in American political history. The nation’s former commander in chief walked into a notorious jail, one that has been cited in rap lyrics and is the subject of a Department of Justice investigation into unsanitary and unsafe conditions, including allegations that an “incarcerated person died covered in insects and filth.”The case is the fourth brought against Mr. Trump this year, but Thursday was the first time that he was booked at a jail.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Trump’s, S.U.V.s Organizations: Department of Justice, Mr Locations: Fulton, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S

☆ Americans and Their Cars
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-13 | by ( Somini Sengupta | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Summertime is road trip time for many of us in the United States. That makes it a good time to look at what our relationship with the road has meant for global warming. The data crunchers at the Frontier Group, a research organization focused on sustainability, sought to answer that question by looking at gasoline consumption since 1949, the year the United States started tracking transportation data. They estimated that if American cars, S.U.V.s and pickup trucks were their own country, they would be the sixth-largest emitter of heat-trapping carbon dioxide emissions since 1949, putting them behind the total national carbon dioxide emissions produced by the United States, China, Russia, Germany and Japan. Add other forms of transportation, including heavy trucks, trains and planes, and U.S. transportation would be the fourth-largest carbon emitter, producing around 6.5 percent of the carbon dioxide that’s accumulated in the atmosphere over the last seven decades.

Organizations: Frontier Group Locations: United States, China, Russia, Germany, Japan, U.S

☆ The Long Demise of the Stretch Limousine
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Jesus Jiménez | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“There wasn’t one stretch limousine on the show floor,” said Robert Alexander, president of the National Limousine Association, a trade group. “Not one.”Decades ago, stretch limos were a symbol of affluence, used almost exclusively by the rich and famous. Over time, they became more of a common luxury, booked for children’s birthday parties or by teenagers heading to the prom. These days, it seems as if hardly anyone is riding in a stretch limo. While the limousine name has stuck, the limo industry has shifted to chauffeur services in almost anything but actual stretch limos, which have largely been supplanted by black S.U.V.s, buses and vans.

☆ How Electrifying Everything Became a Key Climate Solution
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Nadja Popovich | Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +19 min

Water heating Air conditioning Space heating Refrigeration Washing and dry. Refrigeration Air conditioning 16% electric Water heating 99% Refrigeration Air conditioning Residential Cooking Space heating Refrigeration Other 96% Lighting and electronics Lighting and elec. Cooking 2021 Current Electricity Use Electricity as percent of total energy consumed in 2021 36% Water heating Space heating Washing and dry. Cooking 2050 Net Zero Pathway Electricity as percent of total energy consumed in a high-electrification scenario Water heating Space heating 63% Washing and dry. Air conditioning Refrigeration Other Air conditioning Water heating 99% Refrigeration Space heating 96% Other Lighting and electronics Lighting and elec.

☆ Just How Good for the Planet Is That Big Electric Pickup Truck?
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-17 | by ( Elena Shao | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +11 min

But as electric vehicles have bulked up, they have also faced new questions over their environmental and safety impacts. Less emissions per mile More emissions per mile Electric vehicles Vehicle SIZE, BY WEIGHT: Heavier vehicles tend to have higher emissions. Take the Ford F-150 pickup truck compared with the electric F-150 Lighting. The same beeswarm chart as in the previous graphic, but Ford F-150 Lightning and Ford F-150 gas-powered models are highlighted. Larger batteries have also added significant weight to many big electric vehicles, anywhere from hundreds to thousands of pounds.

Automakers are now shifting to electric vehicles, which could make up one-quarter of new sales by 2035 , analysts project. Around the world, governments and automakers are focused on selling newer, cleaner electric vehicles as a key solution to climate change. Some Democrats have proposed reviving that program to accelerate the shift to electric vehicles. In that scenario, the researchers found, the United States could cut emissions just as deeply with around 205 million electric vehicles. “Right now it can be inconvenient to own an electric vehicle if there are no charging stations around.

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