A year and a half after Amazon announced that it would buy 100,000 electric trucks to reduce its carbon footprint, Amazon says it has begun using prototype vehicles for real-world deliveries in Los Angeles. Amazon expects to spend a few more months testing the vehicles before the start of mass production later this year.

Amazon placed the massive order with Rivian, a startup that has raised billions of dollars to build electric trucks. Amazon is a Rivian investor.

Rivian has designed a "skateboard" electric truck platform that can be used to build a wide variety of vehicles. Rivian is aiming to begin deliveries of its flagship pickup truck, the R1T, and the R1S SUV later this year.

"Last-mile" delivery trucks are a good application for electric vehicles because trucks tend to drive a relatively short distance with a lot of stopping and starting. Amazon says the new Rivian delivery trucks have a range of 150 miles. Amazon says that it has "started getting its buildings ready to accommodate the new fleet of vehicles and has installed thousands of electric vehicle charging stations at its delivery stations across North America and Europe."

The purchase of the electric trucks is part of Amazon's overall project to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2040. Amazon is aiming to use 80 percent renewable energy by 2024 and 100 percent by 2030. The company wants to have 10,000 electric delivery trucks on the road next year. In 2019, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said he hoped to have all 100,000 Rivian vehicles on the roads by 2024.

Because electric motors are so quiet, regulations require electric vehicles to make an artificial sound when they are moving at low speeds. People who have seen Amazon's new trucks in the wild report that they make a futuristic sound that's loud and irritating—though that may change with future versions of the vehicle.

Rivian is planning its own version of Tesla's Supercharger network by revealing plans to install some 3,500 chargers at over 600 sites in the US and Canada, ahead of the market launch of its electric truck and SUV. Dubbed the Rivian Adventure Network, the stations will feature DC fast-chargers that will be able to add up to 140 miles of range in 20 minutes to the company's R1T electric truck and R1S sport utility.
The company says that the chargers will be for Rivian owners exclusively, and that the chargers will be automatic, which means owners will be able to simply plug their vehicles in. The chargers themselves will offer charging rates of 200kW at first but will expand to 300kW and higher in the future, and will all be located on main roads and highways, frequently by shops and cafes.

While Adventure Network of chargers will be solely for Rivian owners, the company also plans a second network of stations dubbed Waypoints, which will be available to other EV drivers. These will number over 10,000 and will be installed through 2023. The first batch will go to Colorado's 42 state parks, each getting two Waypoints each. Rivian plans to begin building this network starting this July. The company also plans to locate these Waypoints by parks, hotels, shops, and restaurants.
The Adventure Network will feature DC fast chargers, while the public Waypoints will offer slower chargers. RIVIANThe Waypoints will feature only the J1772 plugs and offer a charging speed of 11.5 kW, so these won't be as quick as the DC fast chargers.

"Los Angeles to Tahoe. Manhattan to the Adirondacks. San Francisco to Seattle. I-70 to The Rockies. Michigan's UP via I-75. California's Hwy 395. The entire Blue Ridge Parkway from Shenandoah National Park down to Great Smoky Mountains National Park. All these routes and more will begin opening this year," the company promises.

Rivian's two-tier plan of charging networks represent a serious step for the company, just months ahead of the market launch of its first two vehicles, and unlike Tesla's network, only a part of it will be exclusive to Rivian owners. While not all of these stations will offer blazing fast speeds, at the moment the US needs all the chargers it can get, especially in the upper midwest and across the northern east-to-west routes, which have been largely neglected by station builders.

Western states like Colorado will get plenty of Rivian Adventure Network chargers by themselves, as will California and the Pacific Northwest, but the company will also add lots of chargers to the Northeast corridor and even western Canada.
Beyond the two networks, Rivian will also offer its owners its own wall charger, which the company says will add 25 miles of range every hour, juicing up the truck or SUV overnight from a nearly empty level to full at a 11.5 kW charging speed. Beyond charging, these units will feature WiFi connectivity for their own over-the-air updates. Rivian will be selling these chargers during the vehicle order process or separately, in case you have another EV that uses the J1772 plug.

Earlier this week Rivian started series production of its R1T pickup truck, months ahead of competitors from Tesla, Ford, and GMC, with the R1S electric sport utility to follow in the coming weeks at the company's plant in Normal, Illinois. But one item that had been somewhat overlooked in the months leading up to the start of series production is the fact that, just like Tesla, Rivian had also been planning its own charger network. And not just one of them, but two.

Earlier this year the company revealed that its Rivian Adventure network would be composed of 600 locations offering 3500 individual fast-chargers, giving owners the ability to get enough juice in 20 minutes for 140 miles of range. Rivian plans to offer 200-kW rates at chargers that will be a part of this network, later planning to dial it up to 300 kW. These stations will be for the exclusive use of Rivian owners.

The automaker also has a second network in the works for all EV users called Waypoints, featuring more modest charging speeds, with construction having started this summer. The company indicated that it would build 10,000 chargers as a part of this system, with the first group slated for Colorado state parks.

"Every mile you drive will be matched with renewable energy resources such as wind and solar," the automaker says. "Rivian will ensure 100% of the energy your vehicle consumes is matched with renewable energy purchases—whether you charge at home, on the Rivian Adventure Network, at a Waypoints charger, or at a partner network charging site."

Ahead of the official launch of the networks later this year, the automaker is now offering membership to its owners that will include unlimited charging on on the Adventure Network and at all Waypoints. Membership will also offer, as an extra, off-roadside assistance with what it calls "Adventure Extraction," in case a vehicle gets stuck on a trail, as well as Charge Assurance, which will juice-up a vehicle if it runs out of power or gets close to that point. As part of membership, Rivian will also offer unlimited access to 4G connectivity.

"In the future, Rivian-led experiences will connect community members through memorable, one-of-a-kind adventures," the company adds, indicating that it will host education programs and activities for kids.

Over the air (OTA) updates have become trivial these days and many carmakers already improve their cars remotely using this trick. The latest to the game is Rivian, and so their first customers were blessed this week with an OTA update. According to the feedback shared on forums, the update went smoothly, although the rear display no longer works.
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Rivian is still new on the market, and their R1 line of cars only started deliveries last November. This means owners did not have the chance to experience an OTA update up until now. You see their excitement when they finally got one and we must say we are impressed this came in sooner than expected. It is not a big update by any means, but one meant to iron out some bugs here and there, just to make things smoother onboard the R1T and R1S.

And smoother they went, judging by the favorable comments on social media. Nobody reported bugs with the new update, except the rear display is locked for now. That was already covered in the release notes, though. The update procedure was documented by the user “Iwantatesla” in Rivian Forums, who also mentioned everything seems “much snappier” after the update. He also went on to praise his R1T as one of the best vehicles ever made, so I guess he should change his nickname to something like “notatesla”.

Back to the OTA update, the notice on the screen shows this should improve an R1 vehicle’s performance. Zooming in, we find the update covers things from Bluetooth connectivity to the improved Navigation app. Various user interface refinements were also on the menu, with smoother transitions between apps as well as improvements to the infotainment system’s performance. More importantly, the new update brings improved safety to the Driver+ suite, especially for the Highway Assist system.

We are happy to see Rivian taking time to squash the bugs in its cars’ software and even happier to see the updates bring tangible improvement to users, without botching other things. As for the nonfunctional rear display, some users pointed out it was already misbehaving before. Perhaps Rivian decided to switch it off until they figure out what to do, but they promise to fix it for the next OTA update.

Rivian’s launch hasn’t gone smoothly as the fledgling automaker has struggled to ramp production, resulting in them missing their 2021 production targets, even after cutting them.

The issues were enough to shut down the entire production line for one week earlier this month.

Rivian says they have now been able to increase production to 200 units per week, but those issues and delay have cost them a domestic supply of EV batteries.

Rivian has been in talks with Samsung SDI to build a cell factory in the US to help meet their goal of 100GWh of battery production by 2025.

Those talks have now broken down over the production issues and delays, and terms unacceptable to Samsung SDI, according to sources familiar with the discussions.

The terms included a request for “a transfer of the battery making technology and also rights to inspect the interior of factories,” reports the South Korean publication The Elec.

Rivian also didn’t agree to buy specific amounts of the batteries produced at the facility.

Despite there no longer being a deal for a factory, Samsung SDI will continue to supply Rivian with batteries for the R1S and R1T from their other facilities.

The partnership between the two companies was announced in April 2021.

Despite there no longer being a deal for a factory, Samsung SDI will continue to supply Rivian with batteries for the R1S and R1T from their other facilities.

Rivian has been in talks with Samsung SDI to build a cell factory in the US to help meet their goal of 100GWh of battery production by 2025.

Those talks have now broken down over the production issues and delays, and terms unacceptable to Samsung SDI

Over the next decade, battery-powered cars from different automakers began popping up across the U.S and continued to gain popularity. Around the turn of the century, electric vehicles were so commonplace that New York City even had a fleet of more than 60 electric taxis. By 1900, electric cars were at their heyday, accounting for around a third of all vehicles on the road. In the coming years, electric models continued to show strong sales....

We‘ve already seen Rivian testing the dual-motor configurations of its R1T and R1S electric vehicles, but the EV startup has now shared more details about the more affordable variants. Rivian has developed all the major components for the dual-motor variants in-house.
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Rivian has crossed some rough water in 2022, with deliveries affected by chip shortages and other supply chain disruptions. Nevertheless, the EV startup has been working relentlessly to improve its products, mainly by developing new electric motors and power electronics. The efforts will certainly pay off because the vertical integration will allow Rivian to better weather down the problems in the auto industry.

Unlike the Quad-Motor configurations of the R1 EVs, which used off-the-shelf electric motors and power electronics, the Dual-motor versions will feature new parts developed in-house. Rivian claims that all the major components, including the motors, gearboxes, and inverters used to build the Dual-Motor configurations, are developed and manufactured entirely by Rivian.

We’ve already seen the R1T and the R1S undergoing testing with the new drive components, and Rivian is adamant that they will prove at least as good as the ones bought from third-party suppliers for the quad-motor variants. According to previous information, the dual-motor R1T and R1S will be offered in two power variants, a standard version with 600+ horsepower and an enhanced version with about 700 horsepower.

The difference is made in software, which unlocks additional power and acceleration. This means that the enhanced version will only need 3.5 seconds to accelerate from 0 to 60 mph (96 kph) instead of the 4.5 seconds for the standard variant. There are no differences between the two Dual-Motor flavors related to the off-road driving dynamics, including front-to-rear torque vectoring and independent brake actuation at each wheel. Also, the towing capabilities are identical, keeping the good ratings received by the Quad-Motor specification. As such, the dual-motor Rivian R1T maintains an 11,000-lb towing rating, while the R1S has a 7,700-lb rating.

The dual-motor system continues to offer all-wheel-drive capabilities, and Rivian reveals that the AWD system is rear-biased. However, it can distribute torque continuously between the front and rear drive units. The Rivian R1T and R1S Dual Motor are also capable of left-to-right torque vectoring using brake technology. This is an interesting take, as carmakers usually use a differential to split power between the wheels of an axle. Nevertheless, Rivian claims its solution is superior, with brake actuation at every wheel allowing to send just enough torque for “confident handling dynamics on-road and the ability to overcome obstacles and loose terrain off-road.”

The standard Dual Motor configurations of the R1T and R1S are $8,000 more affordable when ordered with the same Large battery pack as the Quad Motor variants. Thus, the R1T Dual Motor starts at $79,000, while the R1S Dual Motor starts at $84,000. Nevertheless, since you can also order both with the Standard battery pack, they are even more affordable, cutting another $6,000 from the price tag.