2011 - Bmw 7-series on 2040-cars

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BMW i3 owners in California get $1,000 to delay charging

It's fairly rare to get paid for doing absolutely nothing, but that's exactly the case for a select group of BMW i3 owners in California. A hundred people are part of the ChargeForward pilot program in coordination with BMW and Pacific Gas & Electric Company, and each participant gets a $1,000 gift card to not plug in their cars – at least not whenever they want to. It's all part of an attempt to develop strategies to reduce the strain on the grid during peak usage. The trial runs from July 2015 to December 2016 in California's Bay Area. According to the automaker's website, when plugged in, BMW has the ability to delay the charging of the i3s by up to an hour. There are no necessary mechanical or software modifications necessary, either. Although, if drivers desperately need the juice, they can also opt out of the program for a day. At the end of the experiment, the people are eligible for a second gift card for up to another $540, depending on their involvement. According to Bloomberg, with 65,000 electric vehicles in Northern California, the power company estimates the area has among the highest concentrations of EVs in the country. While all of those emissions-free miles are great for the environment, plugging them all in once just adds to the load on the system. As a second part of the program, used Mini E batteries are being repurposed to create a solar-powered, stationary storage system that Pacific Gas can also use to supplement the grid.

Recharge Wrap-up: Renault-Nissan at COP22, BMW launches Cruise e-Bike

The Renault-Nissan Alliance has been chosen to provide a fleet of electric cars for the UN's COP22 Climate Conference in Marrakesh, Morocco. The group will provide 50 passenger EVs – the Renault Zoe, Nissan Leaf, and Nissan e-NV200 – to shuttle delegates to and from conference venues. The Alliance will also provide more than 20 charging stations to support the shuttle fleet. The group provided electric shuttles for the historic COP21 summit in Paris last year. Read more from Renault-Nissan. FCA, Iveco, and gas grid company Snam have signed an agreement to boost natural gas as a cleaner alternative fuel for Italy. Under the Memorandum of Understanding, FCA and Iveco will work together to develop CNG vehicles, while Snam will invest in CNG supply facilities like filling stations to support a growing fleet. Italy leads Europe in the amount of natural gas consumed for transport, with 1 million vehicles currently on the road. Read more at Green Car Congress. LG Chem has officially announced it will build a battery plant in Poland to the tune of about $340 million. Located near Wroclaw in southwestern Poland, the plant is expected to produce 100,000 batteries a year for 200-mile EVs beginning in 2019. The plant could help Poland in its goal to reduce pollution by introducing a million EVs on its roads by 2025. "We will turn the Poland EV battery plant into a mecca of battery production for electric vehicles around the world," says UB Lee, President of LG Chem's Energy Solution Company. Construction begins in the second half of 2017. Read more from Automotive News Europe. BMW has introduced the Cruise e-Bike. Its Bosch Performance Line electric motor provides electric assistance at speeds of up to 15 mph. The battery can be either be removed or remain on the bike for charging, which takes 3.5 hours for a full charge. "BMW aims to be the leading provider of premium mobility services, and our bicycle collection furthers that mission," says BMW Accessory and Lifestyle Manager Eric Riehle. "As we enter the holiday season, these bikes make the perfect present for those wishing for their first BMW." The BMW Cruise e-Bike costs $3,430. Read more from BMW.

BMW spied testing new Alpina B7

Just last month BMW released the 2016 7 Series, ushering in a new era for the Bavarian automaker's flagship luxury sedan. And fans of big European performance sedans know what that means: Yes, a V12 model to follow, and maybe an M Performance variant at some point in the future. But before that, we're getting a new Alpina B7. Spied leaving BMW's test center at the Nurburgring, this camouflaged prototype for the new B7 appears to be wearing Alpina's signature low-key visual enhancements. Those include a subtle aero kit and upgraded rolling stock. Though we're only looking at it from the outside, you can expect the interior to feature some similarly discreet upgrades as well. The bigger question is what Alpina will have done to the new 7 underneath the bodywork. The outgoing B7 packed a 4.4-liter twin-turbo V8 with 540 horsepower and nearly as much torque, netting a 0-60 time quoted at 4.3 seconds and an autobahn-crunching top speed of 194 miles per hour. Hardly a slouch, then, but the new Alpina B7 is tipped to pack 600 horsepower or more, which ought to give the high-powered, high-speed, and high-end likes of the Mercedes-AMG S63, Audi S8, Maserati Quattroporte, and Jaguar XJR a run for their considerable money. We smell a battle heating up amidst all that burning rubber and sumptuous leather.