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US Senate authorizes DOE green car loan program [UPDATE]

Tesla Motors' crush of Model 3 reservations is fresh in everyone's minds, while Fisker Automotive (or at least its bankruptcy) is a distant memory. That's one explanation for a US Senate with a Republican leadership at one time bashed the Department of Energy's loan program for green-vehicle makers but now, under bipartisan support, the Senate has OK'd about $1.6 billion more to push forward green-vehicle technology, according to Hybrid Cars. The Senate voted to authorize a $1.6-billion federal program. The US Senate voted by about a seven-to-one margin to authorize a $1.6-billion federal program for the DOE's Vehicle Technologies Office program housed under the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE). This is a different program from the Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing (ATVM) program, which was last funded in 2007. The feds have been green-lit to spend $339 million per year through 2020 to speed up the development of advanced-technology vehicles. The mission: to get the US new light-duty fleet to meet the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) mandate of a 54.5 miles per gallon average (which is a real-world average of around 40 mpg) by 2025. Four automakers received funding from the ATVM program in the first go-round. The list was: Tesla, Fisker, Ford and Nissan. Specifically, Tesla was loaned $465 million in 2010, and paid that loan back in 2013 – about nine years ahead of time, with interest. On the flip side, the Department of Energy was slated to loan extended-range plug-in vehicle maker Fisker $528 million, but Fisker only received $192 million before the spigot got shut off because of missed deadlines. Fisker collected enough cash to pay down some of the debt, but the government still was stuck with $168 million unpaid. And that got washed out in Fisker's 2013 bankruptcy. Nissan was awarded $1.4 billion and Ford got $5.9 billion. Senator Gary Peters (D-Michigan), one of the authors of the new bill, issued a press release about the new funding, which you can read here. The new ATVM program will also target automotive suppliers. UPDATE: This post has been updated. We inaccurately said that the ATVM had been re-authorized. In fact, the ATVM loan program "has $16 billion in remaining loan authority for automotive or component manufacturers for reequipping, expanding, or establishing manufacturing facilities in the U.S.

Recharge Wrap-up: Musk sees solar future, Uber sued for tips

Elon Musk and his cousin, Lyndon Rive, spoke about their ideas for solar power and energy storage at a private conference in New York. Musk, the Tesla CEO and Rive, CEO of SolarCity, said that within 10 years, every solar system SolarCity sells will come with battery storage, and that it will be cheaper than getting energy from a utility company. Tesla, which provides battery packs for SolarCity, will set aside a portion of its Gigafactory's production capacity for grid-scale energy storage. Rive says his company will be able to produce the most efficient solar panels available, while Tesla has plans for in-home energy storage that not only saves power for nighttime and cloudy days, but also looks good. Read more at The Wall Street Journal and head over to Treehugger for more commentary. Proper deployment of bike lanes could help improve the flow of traffic while making cycling safer in urban settings. In New York City, adding bike lanes improved automotive traffic according to a study. What seems to work well is putting the bike lane closest to the curb on the left side of a one-way street, with a small buffer zone and a parking lane separating it from car traffic. The addition of turning lanes, with their own traffic signals for vehicles turning left, also allows car and bike traffic to continue smoothly. Read more at Core77. Uber is facing a lawsuit over its included gratuity. The ride-hailing app charges a 20 percent tip, included in the price of the ride. The Illinois plaintiff claims, however, that Uber keeps "a substantial portion" of that gratuity for itself, rather than paying it out to the driver. The lawsuit, which is seeking group status, looks to make Uber give up any of the gratuity funds it has kept. The plaintiff is also seeking an unspecified amount of cash in damages. Read more at Bloomberg. A new study breaks down the demographics of the users of public transit. The study, called "Who's On Board 2014," Finds that ridership is mostly inverse from income, with people making over $150,000 per year bucking the trend by riding as much as those in lower brackets. Regardless of region, younger people are more likely to use public transportation, while older people prefer to drive more. African Americans are more likely to ride, with 39 percent using public transit once a week, and 22 percent commuting by transit. Whites use public transit less, with only 10 percent riding once a week, and just five percent using public transit to commute.

Should you buy an EV?

Gas prices are hitting the skids and EVs are following suit; nearly every model in today's market has experienced a double-digit decline in sales – with the always notable exception of the Tesla Model S. Some EVs are in the last year of their generation while others have been half-heartedly designed and engineered to fulfill federal government quotas. The two non-Tesla front runners, the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf, are in the unfortunate position of offering customers "2015" vehicles that were designed with 2011 in mind. Yet there's plenty of love in the air. Nissan has built over 180,000 Leafs worldwide, and chances are you will be seeing a second electric vehicle accompanying the Leaf when the new generation is released in the coming months. The Chevy Volt now offers the highest customer satisfaction out of any car or truck sold in North America. Forget the luxury cars, the sports cars, the family trucksters, and even the rolling flagship that guides Tesla's jaw dropping valuation on Wall Street. You want happy with your EV? The brand that's rocking the segment right now is Chevy. It's been doing so for a while. The EV market is poised to become a lot more sophisticated over the next 18 months with the three leading manufacturers – Tesla, General Motors, and Nissan – launching five brand new models along with no fewer than 16 other manufacturers making many of their bread and butter cars available as plug-in hybrids. So, if you want to keep your money as far away from the Arab dictatorships and Russian mafia as Mercury is from Pluto, and enjoy your commute, we're more than ready to do our part! So let's begin with the most important question. What's Your Range? How much driving do you generally do in a day? If the answer to that question is 50 miles or fewer, an all-electric vehicle like the Nissan Leaf may be the best ingredient for your driving recipe. This is especially true if you have a second vehicle you can use for the occasional longer drive or are willing to rent for the weekend. But here's a little surprise for you. The upcoming Chevy Volt was designed to be driven in all-electric mode for over 50 miles. Fifty-three, to be exact. Plus, the Volt's battery has experienced a lot fewer deterioration issues than the Nissan Leaf's due in part to the Volt's liquid-cooled battery, which also uses a lot less of its capacity than the air-cooled Leaf's does.