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Recharge Wrap-up: Kia Soul EV wins MotorWeek award, Virgin Hotels offering Tesla Model S rides

The Kia Soul EV has been awarded a MotorWeek's Drivers' Choice Award. Winning the honor for Best Eco-Friendly Vehicle, "The Kia Soul EV is the perfect EV," according to MotorWeek host and executive producer John Davis. "It has more power and range compared to other affordable all-electric vehicles. Plus, its funky style makes driving the Kia Soul EV really cool." The Soul EV has a driving range of about 93 miles on a single charge, and offers an interior roomy and comfortable enough to earn MotorWeek's praise. Read more in the press release below. Virgin Hotels will provide its Chicago guests car services in the Tesla Model S. Guests can get rides to and from the hotel in a red, dual-motor Model S P85D. Virgin Hotels offers the EV services as part of its sustainability program. "Tesla is the hottest electric car on the road right now, and we're elated to provide our hotel guests with this chic house-car service while also helping to reduce our carbon footprint," says Virgin Hotels vice president of sales and marketing Doug Carrillo. "For Virgin Hotels it's important to provide services our guests desire but do so with the environment in mind whenever possible." Hyundai has announced the first lease of its Tucson Fuel Cell in Canada. Hyundai chose the Vancouver couple, Jennifer Ma and Clayton Crawley, as the first buyers in part because they live near both a dealership and a fueling station, the latter of which sources its hydrogen from a chemical company that produces the gas as a byproduct. Crawley, whose children love the beach, says, "Getting there while reducing our environmental impact will be awesome." Read more at Automotive News. The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) is providing $30 million in grant money for Proterra electric buses. Six transit agencies will buy 28 of the EV buses for a variety of projects. Proterra CEO Ryan Popple calls the funding a "tremendous validation for the company." In total, the FTA is handing out $55 million in grant money for the deployment of American-made electric buses. Four other agencies will receive buses from BAE Systems and New Flyer as part of the program. Read more at Charged EVs. Kia Soul EV Wins 2015 MotorWeek Drivers' Choice Award Kia's First All-Electric Vehicle Wins Best Eco-Friendly Honor - Soul EV praised for funky style, power, range and roomy interior - MotorWeek's annual list of winners serves as a buying guide for the show's nationwide audience CHICAGO, Feb.

Tesla will build first Gigafactory in Nevada

After months of guessing, the location of the first massive Tesla battery plant should be announced around 24 hours from now. A joint press conference has been called by Tesla and the Nevada Governor's office for tomorrow afternoon and the subject is likely to be that the so-called Gigafactory will be built in Reno, NV. Reno was first confirmed as a serious candidate for one of the Gigafacatory locations during Tesla's most recent shareholder call at the end of July, when the automaker said it had broken ground on a potential location there. Speculation was swirling before that that Reno would be chosen first. Tesla wouldn't directly confirm what the subject of tomorrow's announcement would be, but did give AutoblogGreen a statement that said, "Tesla looks forward to joining Governor Sandoval and legislative leaders tomorrow in Carson City at 4 pm for a major economic development announcement." We'll let you decide. When it announced the $4-5-billion Gigafactory, Tesla said it would provide up to 6,500 jobs and make enough batteries to supply 500,000 Tesla electric vehicles a year, in particular the company's next vehicle, the lower-cost Tesla Model 3. Of course, Tesla also said it would not announce the location of the battery plant until "late 2014," so we'll take everything with a grain of salt for now. Recently, the California Budget Project suggested the five states in the running for the first Gigafactory should work together so as to not give too many tax benefits to Tesla. We should find out tomorrow how much Nevada "spent" to attract the new battery plant and a host of other details. **Media Advisory** Governor Brian Sandoval to Host Press Conference for Major Economic Development Announcement Contact Mari St. Martin Communications Director (702) 250-8210 mstmartin@gov.nv.gov Carson City, NV - September 03, 2014 Governor Brian Sandoval will host a press conference tomorrow, Thursday, September 4th, for a major economic development announcement. TIME: 4:00 p.m. WHAT: Press Conference WHO: TBD LOCATION: Capitol Building 101 Carson Street Carson City, NV 89701 MEDIA: RSVP to confirm location Press set-up to begin 30 minutes before press conference ### Office of the Governor . 101 North Carson Street . Carson City, NV 89701 . (775) 684-5670 Grant Sawyer State Office Building . 555 East Washington, Ste 5100 . Las Vegas, NV 89101 . (702) 486-2500

New Tesla, McLaren, and Ferrari models added to Takata recall list

UPDATE: A McLaren spokesperson confirmed to Autoblog that "a number" of McLaren models in the US, Japan, and South Korea will be recalled to fix non-dessicated airbag inflators. However, the recall only affects passenger airbags, as all driver's-side inflators use a different technology and are not affected. The timeline is still being determined. It's been more than two and a half years since the Takata airbag recall first made waves. Despite knowing which airbags were at fault and the exact cause of the failure, manufacturers like Audi, Ferrari, McLaren, and Tesla have been building and selling cars with defective airbags. Although it takes several years for the airbag to degrade to the point of failure, all of these new cars will eventually have to be recalled for replacements. It appears that time has come, as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has now issued a recall on some of these new models. Models from Tesla and McLaren have been added to NHTSA's recall list for the first time. Tesla is recalling every 2012 - 2016 Model S while McLaren is bringing back every model it's made since relaunching its road-car business in 2012. Not even the P1 is free from failure. Other automakers have expanded their affected-vehicle list. All of Ferrari's 2016 - 2017 lineup now falls under the recall and joins a number of previously recalled models, while Audi is recalling the 2017 R8. Since the recall started, dozens of automakers have recalled millions of affected cars to replace potentially fatal and highly flawed airbags that can deploy bits of metal at occupants. Eleven deaths in the United States are directly related to the faulty airbags. Before the recall, Takata held a sizable share of the airbag market. When the failures began to occur, some automakers were left with no alternative suppliers. As it takes a few years for the airbags to fail, automakers without other options faced a choice: they could either build cars that would be recalled in the future or stop building cars altogether until a secondary supplier could be found. These recalls seem to be happening so frequently that owners may not know what to do or where to check to see if their car is potentially affected. NHTSA is keeping a comprehensive list of all affected models. Their website can help owners determine if they have a potentially problematic airbag installed and the steps to take to replace it.