The Viking Energy, an oil platform supply shipundergoing a pioneering retrofit to run on ammonia fuel, is now scheduled to begin operations in 2026—two years later than initially planned. Once completed, it will be the first vessel capable of operating full-time on ammonia, marking a major milestone in efforts to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions… Continue reading World’s First Ammonia-Fueled Ship Hits a Snag
Author: IEEE_Spectrum
We’re Charging Our Cars Wrong
If there’s one thing we could do now to hasten the transition to electric vehicles, it’s this: Build a robust public EV-charging infrastructure. While the media has focused on vehicle performance and range, consumers have always been clear that they want electric cars to do essentially everything their old vehicles do—including long overnight trips. To… Continue reading We’re Charging Our Cars Wrong
The British Navy Resisted a Decent Lightning Rod for Decades
In the mid-18th century, Benjamin Franklin helped elucidate the nature of lightning and endorsed the protective value of lightning rods. And yet, a hundred years later, much of the public remained unconvinced. As a result, lightning continued to strike church steeples, ship masts, and other tall structures, causing severe damage. Frustrated scientists turned to visual… Continue reading The British Navy Resisted a Decent Lightning Rod for Decades
Electric Vehicles Made These Engineers Expendable
When veteran Wall Street Journal reporter Mike Colias began writing about the automotive industry in 2010, the internal-combustion engine still served as the beating heart of legacy carmakers. Since then, the hard pivot to electric vehicles has sidelined engine design and upended a century of internal order at these companies. Colias has observed the transformation,… Continue reading Electric Vehicles Made These Engineers Expendable
Rivian Flexes Software Power: What VW Gets for $5.7B
Whoa, Nellie: With three electric motors and 625 kilowatts (850 horsepower), the 2025 Rivian R1S that I’m driving storms to 100 kilometers per hour in about 2.9 seconds. The Illinois-built SUV handles more like a sport sedan than the 3,100 kilogram (6,800-pound) brute that it is. Move off-road, and an adaptive air suspension can hoist… Continue reading Rivian Flexes Software Power: What VW Gets for $5.7B
Gyroscope-on-a-Chip Targets GPS’s Dominance
This year, two companies—Santa Clara, California-based Anello Photonics and Montreal-based One Silicon Chip Photonics (OSCP)—have introduced new gyroscope-on-a-chip navigation systems, allowing for precise heading and distance tracking without satellite signals. Such inertial navigation is increasingly important today, because GPS is susceptible to jamming and spoofing, which can disrupt navigation or provide misleading location data. These… Continue reading Gyroscope-on-a-Chip Targets GPS’s Dominance
Advanced Magnet Manufacturing Begins in the United States
In mid-January, a top United States materials company announced that it had started to manufacture rare earth magnets. It was important news—there are no large U.S. makers of the neodymium magnets that underpin huge and vitally important commercial and defense industries, including electric vehicles. But it created barely a ripple during a particularly loud and… Continue reading Advanced Magnet Manufacturing Begins in the United States
Supersonic Passenger Jet Prototype Surpasses Mach 1
Boom Supersonic’s prototype passenger jet, the XB-1, has officially gone supersonic. The human-piloted demonstrator hit Mach 1.122 (or 1,385 kilometers per hour) at a 10.7-kilometer altitude over the Mojave Desert on 28 January—marking a major step in Boom’s plans to market commercial aircraft flying roughly twice as fast as today’s subsonic airliners by 2030. In… Continue reading Supersonic Passenger Jet Prototype Surpasses Mach 1
The Starting Line for Self-Driving Cars
The 2004 DARPA Grand Challenge was a spectacular failure. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency had offered a US $1 million prize for the team that could design an autonomous ground vehicle capable of completing an off-road course through sometimes flat, sometimes winding and mountainous desert terrain. As IEEE Spectrumreported at the time, it was “the… Continue reading The Starting Line for Self-Driving Cars
EV Batteries Last Way Longer Than Expected
The rhythms of real-world driving enable EV batteries to live far beyond the predictions of laboratory tests, according to a new study from Stanford University. Thereport, published in December inNature Energy, suggests that EV batteries could last 38 percent longer than previous lab-based estimates. That means drivers could get as much as 314,000 kilometers (195,000 miles) more out… Continue reading EV Batteries Last Way Longer Than Expected