Lamborghini sets a date for going electric, but hybrids will have to satisfy your need for speed for a while
Lamborghini is set to unveil its first electric supercar in 2028, but the company’s CEO Stephan Winklemann says don’t expect its hybrids to phase out anytime soon.
With several automakers proving a fully electric supercar is possible, the brand that’s essentially synonymous with performance is finally setting a date for its EV release.
Companies like Rimac are releasing electric hypercars like the Nevera with 0-to-60 mph capabilities of 1.85 seconds.
In January, Lamborghini’s CEO claimed 2022 would be the last year we would see a new solely gas-powered Lambo hit the market. As of 2023, Winklemann says Lamborghini will release only hybrid electric (HEV) and plug-in hybrid (PHEV) vehicles as it progresses toward a pure electric model.
Lamborghini is spending $1.8 billion on a four-year electrification transformation, which includes a few fan-favorite Lamborghini models that will get an HEV or PHEV upgrade, such as the:
- Aventador HEV in 2023
- Huracan PHEV in late 2024
- Urus PHEV SUV also in 2024
Meanwhile, while many automakers have used hybrid as a bridge to fully electric or have skipped this phase altogether, Lamborghini plans to keep hybrids “as long as possible.”
Lamborghini to sell hybrids alongside fully electric models
Although Lamborghini is targeting 2028 for a pure electric model, the supercar company isn’t planning to phase out its engines anytime soon.
According to an interview with Auto Express, Lamborghini’s chief suggests synthetic fuels may play a role in “keeping [Lamborghini] alive,” adding:
We don’t need to decide now – we still have some time. After 2025 we need to take action.
Despite these comments, Winkleman did mention Lamborghini’s first electric model will not replace any current models. Instead, it will be a:
Fourth model which will be more daily useable. This means a 2+2, two-door car with more ground clearance.
The company hinted at working with Volkswagen, as it did for the Urus, meaning it could use VW’s Scalable Systems Platform (SSP), designed for all auto segments.
Lamborghini’s chief technical officer, Rouven Mohr, spoke on the benefits of a Lamborghini electric vehicle, stating:
Some of our core pillars from the technology point of view are fitting perfectly with the electric world. If we speak about carbon-fibre function integration, battery integration as a structural part – this is something that allows you much more degrees of freedom from the design perspective in the sense of aerodynamics.
As far as the added battery weight, Mohr says:
We have some cool ideas to compensate this… for instance regarding the driving dynamics, the control, the driftability, the driving behaviour in general.
Adding the possibility of “a 360-degree approach combining all active systems to enable wheel speed control, not possible with a standard combustion engine.”
Electrek’s Take
Lamborghini seems to be a little late to the electric supercar party, but waiting until 2028? That may cost them.
The automaker’s CEO says they have until 2025 to decide; yet by that time, the market of electric supercars will be several times larger. Furthermore, automakers are continuously developing innovations allowing electric cars to go faster and drive longer.
I’m excited to see Lamborghini setting a date for a pure electric model. However, by 2028, it may not have the same thrill after several electric supercars hit the market.
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The Reliance Industries Ltd. oil refinery in Jamnagar, Gujarat, India, on Saturday, July 31, 2021.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
India is navigating a tricky balancing act after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened a “penalty” over its continued imports of Russian oil — a trade that New Delhi appears reluctant to end anytime soon.
Despite Trump telling reporters Friday that he “heard” India would halt purchases, officials in New Delhi have remained noncommittal. Foreign ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said that the country decides its energy import sources “based on the price at which oil is available in the international market and depending on the global situation at that time.”
“The Indians must be having some confusion” following Trump’s threat — a reversal from the more tolerant approach taken under the Biden administration, Bob McNally, president of consulting firm Rapidan Energy Group, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia.”
“Now we’re flipping around and saying, ‘What are you doing taking all this Russian oil?'” McNally said.
In March 2022 — a month after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine — Daleep Singh, a former U.S. deputy national security adviser for international economics in the Biden administration, reportedly said that “friends don’t set red lines” and “there is no prohibition at present on energy imports from Russia.”
“What we would not like to see is a rapid acceleration of India’s imports from Russia as it relates to energy or any other exports that are currently being prohibited by us or by other aspects of the international sanctions regime,” Singh said.
On July 30, Trump announced that India would face a 25% tariff beginning Aug. 1, along with an unspecified “penalty” for buying Russian oil and military equipment.
But analysts suggest that India, which is the third-largest energy consumer in the world, isn’t blinking. Reuters reported that there are no immediate changes planned to India’s long-term contracts with Russian suppliers, citing two anonymous Indian government sources that did not wish to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Russia has become the leading oil supplier to India since the war in Ukraine began, increasing from just under 100,000 barrels per day before the invasion, or a 2.5% share of total imports, to more than 1.8 million barrels per day in 2023, or 39%. According to the International Energy Agency, 70% of Russian crude was exported to India in 2024.
India’s energy minister Hardeep Singh Puri defended New Delhi’s actions in a July 10 interview with CNBC, saying that it helped stabilize global prices and was even encouraged by the U.S.
“If people or countries had stopped buying at that stage, the price of oil would have gone up to 130 dollars a barrel. That was a situation in which we were advised, including by our friends in the United States, to please buy Russian oil, but within the price cap.”
Russian oil exports had been capped at $60 per barrel in December 2022 by the Group of Seven nations, representing the world’s top economies, while the European Union had lowered the price cap to just above $47 per barrel in July.
Still, pressure is mounting. Vishnu Varathan, Managing Director at Mizuho Securities, said that the U.S. threats present a “clear and present danger” to India. He said that New Delhi is likely to remain non-committal on oil purchases as it assesses the trade-offs of this “Russia option” as a bargaining chip.
India will need to scour the global market for comparable oil bargains with Russian oil, Varathan, who is also the head of macro research for Asia ex-Japan, added.
New Delhi could explore alternatives, including Iran — if an exemption from the U.S. can be negotiated — as well as a few other producers “either within or outside of the OPEC+ that have been pressured by the U.S,” Varathan said.
The OPEC+ bloc had agreed on Sunday to raise output by 547,000 barrels per day in September, as concerns mount over potential supply disruptions linked to Russia.
India is going to face a tough choice, Rapidan’s McNally said.
“Trump is serious. He’s frustrated with Putin… India is going to have a tough choice to make, but it’s hard to see them continuing to import that a million and a half barrels [of] Russian crude if Donald Trump decides to really put the whole relationship on the line over it.”
Wagons don’t get a lot of love Stateside, with American buyers choosing SUVs over – well, pretty much every other type of vehicle imaginable. That’s our loss, as the latest plug in hybrid versions of the Volkswagen Passat are here to prove.
The latest Passat Variant eHybrid (or, in some markets, Vario, which is what the Europeans like to call wagons) is different from the version we get in the US. Unlike the domestic version which is based on a low-cost platform specific to the US and China, the Euro-market version is built on the MQB platform that underpins VW’s flagship Arteon four-door coupe and both VW‘s and Audi’s entry-luxe SUVs.
That might seem weird, since VW has sold more than 34 million units sold worldwide and the Passat is the second top-selling Volkswagen of all time (behind the Golf and ahead of the Beetle). It’s understandable, then, that the European execs are pretty proud of their Passat.
The latest evolutionary stage of the modular transverse matrix (MQB evo)forms the highly innovative technical basis of the ninth Passat generation. Thanks to the significant economies of scale of the MQB evo, Volkswagen has again democratised numerous high-tech developments and made them available for hundreds of thousands of drivers. The two completely newly developed plug-in hybrid drives (eHybrid) are a perfect example of this. In combination with a new battery, they make all-electric ranges of around 100 km possible. This distance turns the new Passat Variant into an electric vehicle for everyday life – this is additionally ensured by short charging times as the battery can now be charged at AC charge points with 11 kW instead of the previous 3.6 kW. The Passat Variant eHybrid can even be charged with up to 50 kW at DC fast charging stations. In addition, the combination of electric drive motor and new economical turbocharged petrol engine provides overall ranges of around 1,000 km.
KAI GRÜNITZ
Member of the Brand Board of Management, VW
In case the jealous American wago-philes reading this aren’t jealous enough, Volkswagen has announced new Passat eHybrid Match and Black Editions that add nearly £5k of options for the new model year effectively for free.
“Match is better equipped than the outgoing Life, with additional features including metallic paint, VW’s IQ.Light LED matrix headlights, tinted rear windows and an ‘assistance pack’ which adds area view and emergency assist,” reports Alastair Crooks, from the UK car site AutoExpress. “The new Black Edition comes with metallic paint, 19-inch alloy wheels, a panoramic sunroof, tinted rear windows (darker than the Match’s), heated front and rear seats, a head-up display, a 15-inch central touchscreen and the same assistance pack as the Match.”
The entry-level Match replaces the previous Life trim, but costs the same £45,555 (about $60,500), while the Black Edition costs the same as the outgoing R-Line, from £48,900 (about $64,950). The order books open 14 August.
You can take a look at some of the VW press photos of the European Passat wagon Variant, below, then let us know if you’d rather have this for $60K or the discount American version in the comments.
VW Passat Variant gallery
SOURCE | IMAGES: VW, via AutoExpress.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
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Wirtgen Vögele recently revealed the battery-powered MINI 500e and the MINI 502e electric pavers. With an electrically heated screed, a range of paving widths, and zero-emission operations, they’re paving a greener, cleaner path.
Co-developed by Wirtgen Vögele and Italian road equipment manufacturer C. M. S.r.l., the new electric pavers will enable contractors to bid on construction projects that are subject to even the strictest noise and emission limits – but the company is quick to point out that they’re capable enough to serve on conventional job sites.
“These pavers excel on small-scale construction projects and jobs covering a small area – the type of work for which paving crews would not previously have been able to use machines,” reads the official Wirtgen Vögele copy. “Thanks to their elimination of manual labor, among other benefits, the new MINI pavers improve the efficiency and quality of asphalt paving, particularly in the construction of sidewalks and drains, as well as in tight downtown locations.”
The new Wirtgen MINI 502e (the one with wheels) and the MINI 500e (the one with crawler tracks) offer pave widths from 0.25 to 1.8 m, feature a battery-electric drive outputting 22.8 kW (30 hp), and your choice of either a 15 kWh or 22 kWh 48V li-ion battery – good enough battery capacity for up to 16 hours of continuing paving. Both versions can be fully charged on a conventional 110/120 “L1” power socket in about eight hours.
Electrek’s Take
At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what the federal EV incentives are or even what the guys on your crew want to operate. What matters is that construction noise upsets Mrs. Clancik’s terrier, and she will force the town council to keep the noise down all by herself.
If your construction company wants to bid on any municipal work, that means you’re gonna have to stay quiet. Maybe even keep the smells to a minimum, too. Buying electric equipment means you can do both.
SOURCE | IMAGES: Wirtgen, via Construction Equipment International.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
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