The Dutch fast-charging provider Fastned has raised 150 million euros in an offering with accelerated bookbuilding. The funds are to be invested in the expansion of the charging network across Europe.

The former team behind Plugsurfing and Allego has launched an AI-based software-as-a-service platform for electric vehicle charging. The promise: anyone who wants to enter the electric vehicle charging market should be able to set up their own charging app within 24 hours with Deftpower.

In the Netherlands, zero-emission zones for delivery traffic are coming in at least 14 Dutch municipalities. They will only let purely electric delivery vans and trucks drive through from 2025.

Covestro and the Dutch logistics service provider Netherlands Partikuliere Rheinfahrt-Centrale Coöperatie (NPRC) want to convert the salt transport fleet on the Rhine to hydrogen-powered ships in a joint project.

VDL Bus Venlo will become an industrial partner of Camperfixx, a camper builder from Friesland. VDL will build compact electric campers based on the almost identical vehicles Peugeot Expert, Toyota Proace, Opel Vivaro and Citroën Jumpy. The first model is scheduled for completion in February.

The “Yoke” steering wheel presented by Tesla as part of the refresh of its Model S and Model X, which many thought was a marketing gag with no chance of realisation, is apparently actually eligible for registration in Europe.

Smart is releasing a special model of the EQ Fortwo Coupé to dealers during the second quarter of 2021. The special model called Edition Bluedawn is painted in a striking matt blue that Daimler calls ‘Velvet Blue’.

Dutch DAF Trucks presents the production version of its second all-electric truck model called LF Electric, which will go into production at Leyland Trucks in the UK in May 2021. The launch follows the revised CF Electric tractor shown a few months ago.

Solaris and transport operator Arriva Netherlands have signed a contract for the delivery of ten hydrogen buses. The twelve-meter fuel cell buses are to be delivered to the province of Gelderland later this year to replace diesel buses.

Ride-hailing company Uber is expanding its Uber Green service with electric and hybrid cars in North America. After launching in 15 cities last September, Uber has announced plans to make the service available in 1,400 more cities and towns.

After the new charging platform was founded this year, now more than 100,000 charging points are now available for roaming partners to connect via the European platform e-clearing.net. The platform has processed more than 3.3 million transactions this year.

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) and NewMotion announce a new partnership for FCA’s business clients that will gain access to NewMotion’s entire charging ecosystem. The partners will roll out the service in twelve European countries, starting with France, Germany and the UK.

Keolis Nederland has put 246 all-electric buses into operation in the provinces of Gelderland and Overijssel. This is the bulk of the order for 259 e-buses awarded to BYD at the end of 2019. The remaining 13 battery buses are scheduled for delivery in spring 2021.

The Amsterdam public transport operator GVB plans to convert its bus fleet to electric vehicles by 2025 and is now preparing a tender for a further 91 to 142 electric buses, of which 39 are to be ordered in a first phase.

China’s Aiways is driving its European expansion as the company’s first electric SUV reaches new customers. The EV maker has named the Netherlands as next destination this November, following an earlier market launch in Germany and parts of France.

In April this year, the Netherlands banned smoking and the sale of tobacco products at train stations. Now, the old ashtray posts are to be replaced by e-bike charging stations designed by Lightwell.

A new type of battery technology called ‘Spatial Atom Layer Deposition’ (SALD) is to enable higher capacities and charging performance for electric cars for “well over 1,000 kilometres range.” A company has now been founded for the series production of such cells.

Fastned has won a higher court case in which the Dutch fast-charging company challenged the exclusive granting of permits for charging points as an additional service to freeway restaurants and petrol stations.

The German certification service provider TÜV Rheinland and the Aachen-based start-up ConAC have announced a test laboratory for electric car drive batteries. The laboratory, which is to become one of the “largest and most modern independent battery test centres in Europe”, is scheduled to start operations in September 2021 in the German-Dutch industrial park Avantis.

The telematics specialist ViriCiti is introducing a smart charging solution for 163 electric bus charging points on behalf of the Dutch public transport operator Qbuzz. The smart charging function provided via the cloud will initially be implemented for Heliox chargers, with ABB chargers to follow shortly.

The Ecomotive team from TU Eindhoven presents a prototype of its Luca electric car in the form of renderings. In the next step, the developers intend to obtain road approval for the two-seater compact sports car, which is largely made of recycled material.

Three specialists from the Netherlands have come together to install what they claim to be the world’s first location where electric vehicles charge using machine learning. The site is at Royal HaskoningDHV office in the city of Amersfoort.

Alstom’s hydrogen train, the Coradia iLint, has passed as entirely operational in the Netherlands.

Plug-in hybrids have been losing their allure as bridges to a new era of clean transport with many analysis finding real-world consumption and CO2 emissions far from type-approval values. Fraunhofer ISI and the ICCT just prove this to hold globally and across models.

Punch Powertrain PSA e-transmissions, the joint venture between the French PSA Group and the Belgian transmission manufacturer Punch Powertrain, has now been established following official approvals. The company started operations on 17 September.

Corvus Energy has been contracted to supply the battery systems for five new all-electric ferries to be built by Holland Shipyards for the transport company GVB in Amsterdam. The first electric ferry should be delivered in summer next year.

Vattenfall has won a major tender for new charging infrastructure in the Netherlands. Up to 8,000 new charging points will be built in the provinces of North Brabant and Limburg by 2024.

According to a new study conducted by the Technical University of Eindhoven on behalf of the Green Party in the German Bundestag, currently sold electric cars are responsible for significantly lower CO2 emissions compared to internal combustion engines (ICE).

Mercedes-Benz has started the second test phase of the eActros “innovation fleet”: Customers will now test the electric truck in everyday use. The first eActros of the second phase will be supplied by the Dutch logistics service provider Simon Loos.

Once again, a whole lot of electric car charging points in Amsterdam are to be covered in rainbow colours. During Dutch Pride Week (25 July to 2 August), a number of charging stations will be covered in rainbow colours by a team from EVBox and Vattenfall.