Saturday, 22 August 2026

Eleven carmakers have been drawn into recalls ordered by SAMR, China's market regulator, over mechanical emergency door unlocking systems, with more than four million vehicles covered, electrive reported.

The heaviest exposure sits with Tesla. Its Chinese recall reaches nearly 2.98 million cars, split between imported units and locally built ones, and spans four nameplates: Model 3, Model Y, Model S and Model X. That action begins 25 September.

Among domestic brands, the SU7 accounts for 390,435 recalled cars at Xiaomi, all from the 2024 model year. Leapmotor's tally reaches 371,200 vehicles from the C11 and C01 lines. Xpeng lists 264,842 cars drawn from three ranges, the G6, P7+ and X9.

Tesla filed a second Chinese recall as well, this one covering roughly 2.74 million Model 3 and Model Y cars over driver monitoring concerns, according to electrive. Adding that campaign to the other recalls disclosed the same day pushes the combined affected fleet past seven million vehicles.

The door hardware campaign arrives ahead of a regulatory shift dated to 2027, when China becomes the first country to largely ban concealed or retractable door handles in their current form on new vehicles, electrive reported.

The door-unlocking recall alone covers more than four million cars across eleven manufacturers. Tesla's share of that figure runs to nearly 2.98 million units, with Xiaomi, Leapmotor and Xpeng together adding more than a million.

Heart Aerospace's X1 demonstrator flew for 27 minutes on August 12 from Plattsburgh International Airport, powered entirely by batteries, according to CleanTechnica.

The airframe is large by the standards of electric flight testing. CleanTechnica reported the X1 has a 106-foot wingspan and weighed more than 25,000 pounds at takeoff.

Peak electrical draw during the flight exceeded a megawatt, per CleanTechnica. That is the figure that separates the X1 from the light two- and four-seat testbeds that have dominated battery-powered flight to date, and it puts the propulsion load in the range of grid-scale equipment rather than automotive packs.

Heart Aerospace calls the X1 the largest battery-electric aircraft ever flown. The manufacturer's own characterization is the basis for that ranking.

The flight itself ran on batteries alone, with no combustion contribution during the 27 minutes aloft.

Engie Vianeo plans to build four new charging parks for heavy goods vehicles at motorway service areas in Germany, electrive reported.

One of the sites is the 24-Autohof Homberg (Efze) on the A7. According to electrive, Engie Vianeo plans to commission three 400-kilowatt charging points there along with one Megawatt Charging System (MCS) charger rated at 1,000 kW, in spring 2027.

The four parks sit inside a much larger German pipeline. Around 50 sites in the country are currently being developed by Engie Vianeo with charging infrastructure aimed specifically at commercial vehicles, electrive reported.

The operator's stated target is 25,000 charging points across Europe by 2030, of which 1,000 are earmarked for heavy electric commercial vehicles. The Homberg (Efze) configuration, mixing 400 kW points with a single megawatt-class charger, indicates how the truck-facing share of that build-out is being specified per location.

Separately, electrive reported that Hubject is supplying Berlin-based Localiser with point of interest data and real-world usage information for charging stations under a strategic data partnership.

Sales of petrol models in China dropped 44% in July, according to CleanTechnica.

Over the same month, plug-in vehicles took a record 65% of the Chinese market, CleanTechnica reported. Battery-electric vehicles alone accounted for 44% of the market, according to the same report.

The two shares mark the split within the plug-in segment: BEVs at 44% of all vehicles sold, with plug-in hybrids making up the remainder of the 65% total reported by CleanTechnica.

The petrol decline runs in the opposite direction at almost identical magnitude, with combustion-only models shedding 44% of sales in the month, per CleanTechnica.