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Volvo studying test of electric roads in Sweden

Volvo already announced the results of a study of wireless charging using a stationary C30, and now it's embarking on a more ambitious study of wireless charging involving moving city buses. Next year, in conjunction with the Swedish Transport Association, Volvo will build a section of electric road up to 500 meters long that would use inductive charging to refill the batteries while the bus drives over it.
Right now, the company's Hyper Bus diesel hybrid has to stop to plug in and charge at the end of its route. The company is looking for a way to keep buses in service while being able to run on electric power for greater lengths of time. The new line used for the study will be called ElectriCity, and will come online in central Gothenburg sometime in 2015. There's a press release below with more information.

Volvo XC90 Coasting Transmission Deep Dive | How, when and why of coasting

In our recent 2021 Volvo XC90 Recharge review, its turbocharged-supercharged-hybridized powertrain delivered impressive horsepower and fuel economy. But Volvo has one additional trick up its sleeve, propelling a car with power that's simpler, cheaper and all-natural: It's the power of momentum and gravity. I've always been halfway to a hypermiler. I'm not obsessive about it, but in city driving, I enjoy timing stoplight approaches to keep the wheels rolling and avoid the inertia of restarting from a stop. There's little point to needlessly racing and braking between red lights, wasting kinetic energy (and therefore fuel). So I tend to drive strategically instead, often catching up with the drivers who jackrabbit but get hung up at the lights. And, back when I owned a long line of vehicles with manual transmissions, I coasted. Coasting used to be slightly controversial. Some claimed it doesn't actually save gas, though my mileage calculations showed otherwise. Another school of thought insisted that removing engine braking from the equation, even momentarily, constitutes a dangerous loss of control. Of course, an experienced driver can slip a manual transmission back into gear in a flash when engine braking's actually needed. And one should always use some common sense and judgment about when and where to coast. I'm not talking about careening down a 15% grade into a school zone.  Anyway, those arguments became moot when automatic transmissions pretty much took over. (And no, never coast with a typical automatic transmission. Even if it weren't damaging to your type of automatic — but assume that it is — the risk of screwing up a nudge of the shifter from drive into neutral is too great.) XC90 Recharge 8 View 18 Photos But happily, some automakers in recent years have added a coasting feature to their automatics, with the aim of eking out more fuel efficiency. Volvo calls the feature on its Aisin eight-speed "Eco Coast." Some Mercedes, BMWs and others call it "sailing" or "gliding." The Hyundai Ioniq, Ford Mustang Mach-E and Polestar 2 are among EVs that allow you to cancel out all regeneration and freewheel downhill. And future cars such as the BMW iX are also being designed to do it. By building coasting into the clockworks, automakers have taken any traffic safety concerns out of the question, because the car will instantly switch you back into gear when needed.

The next-generation wearable will be your car

This year's CES has had a heavy emphasis on the class of device known as the "wearable" – think about the Apple Watch, or Fitbit, if that's helpful. These devices usually piggyback off of a smartphone's hardware or some other data connection and utilize various onboard sensors and feedback devices to interact with the wearer. In the case of the Fitbit, it's health tracking through sensors that monitor your pulse and movement; for the Apple Watch and similar devices, it's all that and some more. Manufacturers seem to be developing a consensus that vehicles should be taking on some of a wearable's functionality. As evidenced by Volvo's newly announced tie-up with the Microsoft Band 2 fitness tracking wearable, car manufacturers are starting to explore how wearable devices will help drivers. The On Call app brings voice commands, spoken into the Band 2, into the mix. It'll allow you to pass an address from your smartphone's agenda right to your Volvo's nav system, or to preheat your car. Eventually, Volvo would like your car to learn things about your routines, and communicate back to you – or even, improvise to help you wake up earlier to avoid that traffic that might make you late. Do you need to buy a device, like the $249 Band 2, and always wear it to have these sorts of interactions with your car? Despite the emphasis on wearables, CES 2016 has also given us a glimmer of a vehicle future that cuts out the wearable middleman entirely. Take Audi's new Fit Driver project. The goal is to reduce driver stress levels, prevent driver fatigue, and provide a relaxing interior environment by adjusting cabin elements like seat massage, climate control, and even the interior lighting. While it focuses on a wearable device to monitor heart rate and skin temperature, the Audi itself will use on-board sensors to examine driving style and breathing rate as well as external conditions – the weather, traffic, that sort of thing. Could the seats measure skin temperature? Could the seatbelt measure heart rate? Seems like Audi might not need the wearable at all – the car's already doing most of the work. Whether there's a device on a driver's wrist or not, manufacturers seem to be developing a consensus that vehicles should be taking on some of a wearable's functionality.