Same Profile, If You Squint!

[00:00:21] Hello everyone and welcome to Kilowatt, a podcast about electric vehicles, renewable energy, autonomous driving, and much, much more. My name is Bodhi and I am your host. I am not a good singer, so I will stop singing.

[00:00:35] Hey, a quick correction from last episode. I said when I was talking about the emergency latch on Teslas, and if you pull the emergency latch or the manual latch that the windows don't go down, apparently they do. I was corrected on this. They go down, but it's a little bit of a delay. So, correction there when you have to use that manual latch to emergency exit the vehicle.

[00:01:05] Or exit the vehicle in an emergency. And then Neil, who does the Dandy Funhouse YouTube channel, and I'll put a link in the show notes for Dandy Funhouse, he passed along a really cool virtual conference on EV engineering. I think this is going to be really interesting. It is from September 14th through the 17th. These are all, it's a webcast and it's completely free to attend. So there's really no reason not to.

[00:01:34] Even though it is a webcast, you can watch the videos live as they happen or on demand afterwards. So I'll put a link in the show notes to that as well. But yeah, I'm really excited about that. Was it next week that that happens? No, it's two weeks. We have two weeks for that to happen. We are in the beginning of September. Isn't that crazy?

[00:01:57] All right. In today's episode, we are not going to talk about Tesla news because there's a big Tesla event tomorrow as I record this and that will be the Cyber Cab. And we'll cover all the Tesla stuff then. And if there's relevant Tesla news around that, I'll cover that as well. Here's the thing. I'm going to let everybody in on an episode that's coming up.

[00:02:20] And it's all about full self-driving and how things, you know, some things that have gone wrong. So if you are a full self-driving Stan, you may not want to listen to that episode. And I'll give you another warning. And it's not I'm not doing this episode specifically to bash Tesla because that's not the plan here.

[00:02:43] But the the point is to kind of point out where it's failing and people give people who use this technology that information so that they are able to kind of recognize when some of these things happen. So it's not to bash Tesla. It's not to pop up, prop up some other. My kids, my kids just discovered America's Funniest Home Videos.

[00:03:11] And I don't know if you can hear them screaming in the background about whatever videos on. But they are they are quite excited. Anyway, yeah, it's not it's not to tear down Tesla. It's not to prop up any other self full self-driving type technology or autonomous driving technology. It's more of, hey, these things happened. And if you use this technology and it happens to you, these are some things you should be aware of. So it's it's a safety thing, not a bashing thing.

[00:03:40] Just want to let everybody know. And I will give you another warning. That episode will probably come out late September, early October. OK, let's go ahead and dig into our EV news. Because 13,451 new cars were registered in August just in Norway. Right.

[00:04:03] Which is a teeny tiny 3.4 percent drop when you compare to August 2025 to August 2026. 2026 was not quite as good, but still pretty good. But the news here is that EVs made up 98.7 percent of market share of the new EVs sold in Norway. I mean, we already know that Norway has a very aggressive EV adoption rate.

[00:04:31] But yeah, nearly 100 percent of cars sold in Norway in August of 2026 were EVs. That's nutty. Speaking of EV sales in different countries other than the U.S., Don was nice enough to pass this information, this next article, on to me. Where did she? I believe it was LinkedIn.

[00:04:57] Yes, it was LinkedIn where she sent this story. You can you can email me or send me messages on LinkedIn, just so you know. But Don sent this story over in July of 2026. China had a 6 percent year-over-year increase in battery electric vehicle sales. That's not a lot. You might be thinking to yourself, why are we even talking about this if it was only a 6 percent year-over-year increase for the month of July? That seems weird.

[00:05:26] Well, it's nothing crazy unless you look at the rest of the categories that were the other sales categories for July 2026. So overall car sales in China in July 2026, they were down 3.9 percent. Plug-in hybrids were down 21.1 percent.

[00:05:51] And in China, there's more options for plug-in hybrids than there are in a lot of different places. So they were down 21 percent. Extended range electric vehicles were down 16.5 percent. Conventional hybrids were down 4 percent.

[00:06:09] But ICE vehicles, and we're talking, you know, vehicles that run purely on dead dinosaurs, no electricity involved in the propulsion of the vehicle, down 44 percent in China. So battery electric vehicles were the, it was the only category that was up when we look at all those different, you know, mixes.

[00:06:36] But ICE vehicles down 44 percent. So when you consider all that, a 6 percent increase in sales for battery electric vehicles, pure battery electric vehicles, makes that a lot more interesting. And again, thank you, Don, for passing that story along. So next up, Nikkei is reporting that Toyota is delaying the three-row Highlander battery electric vehicle. Oh, man.

[00:07:05] Do you all remember when I was like, I got to eat my words because it looks like Toyota is very serious about EVs, and maybe they're the ones that did it right, where everybody else kind of fell blind? I mean, I'm not saying, I'm not ready to take that back again. But this is the second delay in the last few months.

[00:07:27] Nikkei is reporting that the battery electric vehicle, the Highlander, will go on sale sometime in 2027 or possibly later. Toyota, we should mention, Toyota has not confirmed this news. This is Nikkei reporting that they are a pretty reputable site. The Highlander will be built, interesting enough, in Georgetown, Kentucky, here in the U.S. And initially it was set to be released the second half of 2026.

[00:07:57] But yeah, it sounds like 2027, possibly 2028. Although it seems like 2028 would be, there's got to be something really going on if it's going to be 2028. Right. It didn't, the article didn't talk about their solid state battery. But their solid state battery is, according to Toyota, close to production. So it may be that they are delaying the Highlander to put the solid state battery in.

[00:08:24] That doesn't make any sense to me, but that is a possibility. But I'd highly doubt that that's the case. But yeah, if you were curious, the Highlander EV actually does have a pretty decent range for the battery size. It's expected to have a 77 kilowatt hour battery, which would give it anywhere between a 270 and 287 mile range, depending on the configuration of the car.

[00:08:51] And a 95.8 kilowatt hour battery would give it 320 miles. And that's not too bad. I mean, that's actually pretty good. Especially when you consider this is a three row SUV. This is not a teeny tiny car. This is a big car. So, yeah. If you're wanting to buy a Toyota Highlander and you don't mind buying an ICE vehicle or a hybrid vehicle, those are still for sale.

[00:09:16] And then I'm pretty sure everybody's aware that Subaru and Toyota are working together on their EV operations. The Subaru getaway, which is the Subaru version of the Highlander, that is also going to be delayed. So, you know, it kind of makes sense. Because the Subaru getaway actually will be built in the same plant in Kentucky, the same Toyota plant in Kentucky. So, yeah.

[00:09:45] I want to see Toyota succeed in electric vehicles just because they have such a grip on the automotive market. They have very, very devoted customers. And if these customers can get great EVs, like the one, not something that looks like it came out of a cyberpunk game, right?

[00:10:10] But something that looks like a car that they know and love, like the Highlander or even the Tacoma or what's the Tundra. You know, anything like that. If they can get that vehicle in an EV, I really think it's going to help EV adoption overall. All right. All right. Let's see.

[00:10:34] We got three more stories and they all involve a Hyundai Group company. So starting off with Kia. Kia is recalling over 21,000 EV9s. And the reason why is there's an improper routing of the occupant detection system mat bladder tube.

[00:10:56] Basically, the sensor that's going to detect whether or not somebody who is sitting in the front seat of the car is heavy enough to deploy the airbag. The tube can get, because it was misrouted, it could get damaged when someone's adjusting their seat. And then that would deactivate that feature. So if a child or a car seat happens to be in the front seat, the airbag would go off.

[00:11:26] So that's no good. No bueno. So this is affecting all 2025 and some 2026 models that were manufactured in Georgia. And it's only, it looks like it's only about 6% of the EV9s sold, but 100% pretty much of the 2025 models in Georgia. So owners will be notified on, this seems so weird.

[00:11:53] Why have this story and only notify the owners in October? October 20th is when they're going to notify owners. Or maybe they'll just notify owners by October 20th. I don't know. This seems like as soon as the article came out, you should have already been in the process of notifying owners. So I like the EV9 though. I know some, actually, you know what? I know somebody who has an EV9.

[00:12:20] And maybe he's a friend of my kids. He's a dad, not a friend. He's a dad of one of my kids' friends. So if I see him, I will, I'll ask him. I don't want to call him. Seems weird to call him out. I don't know him that well, but he seems to like his EV9. All right. The Kia EV3 is a very slick looking car, in my opinion.

[00:12:45] It's small and affordable, but it still looks, luxury isn't quite the right word, but it looks like quality. And it looks modern. And it feels like the styling feels fun and kind of youthful. And you get a lot of value for your money when you buy these cars. To me, the exterior of the Kia EV3 kind of has some EV9 type elements, but not really.

[00:13:14] It also has maybe the Kia Nuro type of look to it, which is the car that it's supposed to be replacing. But yeah, this is just a really cool looking car. And we don't have it here in the U.S. at the moment. Maybe someday soon. We'll see what trade negotiations are looking like in terms of tariffs. But the interior of these cars feels very tech forward.

[00:13:45] If you've ever seen the inside of a Kia, you know, you got that nice, beautiful rectangle infotainment system. And then behind the steering wheel, you have a nice screen that's easy to read. This car is going to start at $31,385 and it tops out at $47,385. And you get 220 miles of range for the base model, but 321 miles of range at the top end.

[00:14:12] And I think even starting at $40,000, you still get the higher range. Currently, they're building these in South Korea and Mexico. And then when it comes to the markets that they're in, it's Europe, the U.K., Mexico, Australia, Latin America. And like I said, someday the U.S. And I think right now the U.S. is just kind of jonesing for an affordable EV.

[00:14:41] We have the Chevy Bolt, but the Chevy Bolt is only a temporary run according to GM. They're only going to do, you know, a certain amount and they're done. We have the Nissan Leaf. We'll have the Slate and the Ford Fathom. We'll have those. But yeah, we need more cars starting around $30,000. So hopefully we'll get it here sooner than later.

[00:15:11] And then finally, I know, crazy, we're already at the final story. Hyundai has opened orders for the Ioniq 3 in the U.K. and Europe. So this is a sporty, more fun looking Hyundai Kona. It's the, as far as I know, it's the same kind of car built on the same platform as the EV3. So it's the same size roughly. It's about the size of a Chevy Bolt. It's sporty though.

[00:15:42] Like this. Okay, so they call it an arrow hatch shape. For me, when I was looking at the side profile of this car, if I kind of, if I tilted my head and I squinted and I tugged on my ears and I like, I sneeze at the same time, it kind of looks like the shape of the Cybertruck. So in the show notes, this is the first story that I wrote up.

[00:16:09] And I went instantly to ChatGPT to create the show art for this episode based on comparing the Ioniq 3 and the Cybertruck shape. I'm not saying they're exactly the same, but it has a lot of similarities. So this vehicle is going to come equipped with the new Plios Connect infotainment system, which is the, it was built on Android Auto.

[00:16:38] That doesn't mean, excuse me, it's built on Android Automotive operating system. It supports Android Auto and still supports Apple CarPlay. You have the option, which is weird. You have an option between a 12.9 or 14.6 inch infotainment display. And then there's also an optional driver display that doesn't sit like most Kias and Hyundais that you have this display that sits behind the steering wheel. This kind of sits on the dash above the steering wheel.

[00:17:07] And it's more just kind of displaying the speed and stuff. Like there's not a lot of information. It's a very long, thin screen that sits up top. The car is also going to support digital key, plug and charge, EV route planner, whatever that means. I'm going to guess it's kind of like a better route planner clone that Hyundai put together. And then vehicle to load, which the Hyundais have been able to do forever.

[00:17:35] Right now, I believe only the Tesla Model Y can do vehicle to load and they have to get the high-end performance version to do that and the Cybertruck. But with Kia and Hyundai, they pretty much come with all of the... All modern ones, I think, come with the vehicle to load. Interesting, this car is not going to be built on the typical 800-volt architecture that many of the Hyundais and Kias are built on.

[00:18:04] For the EVs, it's actually going to be built on a 400-volt architecture, which is for cost reduction reasons. So if you are charging, it's going to be a little bit slower. It's 10% to 80% in around 30 minutes if you're DC fast charging. And that doesn't really matter if you have the 42.2-kilowatt-hour battery or the 61-kilowatt-hour battery. It's roughly 30 minutes for both. A little bit less time for the smaller battery, but it's like 29 and 31 minutes.

[00:18:34] It doesn't really matter in terms of time. The larger battery will get you 308 miles of range, 213 for the smaller battery. And the interesting thing is when we look at pricing, right? And of course, when we're talking about the European Union, the price is going to be different in every country. But when we look at pricing for this vehicle, it's 22,245 British pounds. So if you're in the UK, that's what you're going to pay.

[00:19:05] Right around 25,718 euros. And for everybody in the US, both of those numbers are right around 29,800 US dollars. But unlike the Kia EV3, the Ioniq 3 will not be coming here into the United States. So just in case you were curious, only right now, I believe it's only Europe and UK and probably South Korea.

[00:19:32] But yeah, sounds like a good car. And lately, I feel like I've been pretty US-centric or North America-centric in the episode. So I thought I would throw some stuff out there for other countries just to kind of talk about what's going on in the rest of the world. I don't want to get too navel-gazely with this particular podcast. So yeah, kind of a light episode. I have lots of episodes coming up.

[00:20:02] I'm working on an episode, like I said, for the full self-driving stuff. I'm working on an episode for Donut Labs. I'm working on a sodium ion battery episode. Working on a couple episodes for renewable energy because this show does discuss renewable energy. However, I rarely ever have time to talk about it. There's just so many EV stories. And then, you know, I might throw some autonomous driving other stuff in there just as we kind of go.

[00:20:31] But yeah, I got lots of plans. And like I said, I'm taking two to three weeks off in the end of September, beginning of October. I'm not sure quite where that's all going to fall, depending on how quickly I can get this done. But hopefully it's interesting. And I have a couple of interviews planned, or at least one. I have two interviews kind of in the works, and I think one's going to go through for sure. So you'll get an interview as well. So yeah, lots of stuff happening. Lots of cool stuff happening.

[00:21:01] If you want to email me, it's about, oh, and we're going to have not as a regular, like every show segment, but every now and again, we're going to get some cool EV tips from a secret tip maker. I think you're going to enjoy that as well. So yeah, there's just so much going on. But again, big thanks to Neil for recommending the EV Engineering Conference. Again, that's a virtual.

[00:21:29] It's free to attend, and you can watch it on demand. So I would highly suggest going and sign up for that link in the show notes. And thank you again to Don for letting us know about the Chinese sales, EV sales. And that tipper, and I don't want to reveal the name of the segment yet, but the person who gave us that tip told us about the windows in the Tesla emergency exit.

[00:21:57] So yeah, there's a lot to look forward to over the next couple of weeks is really kind of what I'm blabbing on about. If you want to email me, it's Bodhi, O-D-I-E, at 918digital.com. I am on X at 918digital, but I don't really post there all that often. We do have a YouTube channel. I should probably put that in the link. It's basically just this. Oh, I'm working on a review for a product that is hopefully going to be out this weekend.

[00:22:25] I was hoping to do it today, but I got interrupted with some other stuff that I needed to get done. But I have a product review that's coming out that will be separate from the actual show. Hopefully this weekend, if not this weekend, next. And there's just so much going on.