Good morning! It’s Monday, November 25, and this is The Morning Shift, your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.
1st Gear: Tesla, Rivian Reach ‘Conditional’ Settlement In 2020 Suit
Tesla says it has reached a “conditional” settlement with Rivian in a lawsuit that started back in 2020. Basically, Tesla says the nascent Rivian poached employees in order to steal electric vehicle trade secrets. I can’t speak to the validity of that, but there is something about a Rivian that feels like a much more well thought out Tesla. Those things are good, man.
The Austin, Texas-based automaker didn’t disclose any of the specifics in the agreement during a court filing, but lawyers did tell a California state judge that it expects to seek a dismissal of the case by December 24 because of a satisfactory completion of terms. From Bloomberg:
The dispute kicked off more than four years ago when Elon Musk’s electric-vehicle maker accused Rivian of an “alarming pattern” of poaching its employees and stealing trade secrets. Some workers were “caught red-handed” misappropriating core technology for its next-generation batteries, Tesla later said.
Rivian has denied wrongdoing and criticized the lawsuit as an effort to suppress competition in the EV market.
Rivian and a group of its employees who defected from Tesla lost bids to get the lawsuit thrown out and a trial was set for March.
Back in July of this year, a California judge ruled that Tesla presented enough sufficient evidence against Rivian to warrant a trial, thus denying Rivian’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit, according to Reuters. The judge wrote, “Tesla’s evidence establishes that some Rivian employees were less thoroughly investigated and not disciplined.”
2nd Gear: Trump Plans To Boost Gas Exports, Oil Drilling
Donald Trump’s plan for energy and the environment is going to be as bad as well all feared, not that that should be a shock to anyone. The President-elect’s transition team is putting together a comprehensive energy package that’ll be at the top of his to-do list once he retakes office on January 20. It’s apparently going to approve export permits for new liquefied natural gas projects and increase oil drilling of the U.S. coast and on federal land. Fantastic.
Trump is also planning to repeal some of President Joe Biden’s key climate legislation and regulations. Yes, that means the EV tax credit is going away, and clean power plant standards that lower our reliance on coal and natural gas are being phased out. Here’s more on Trump’s plans, from Reuters:
An early priority would be lifting President Joe Biden’s election-year pause on new export permits for LNG and moving swiftly to approve pending permits, the sources said. Trump would also look to expedite drilling permits on federal lands and quickly reopen five-year drilling plans off the U.S. coast to include more lease sales, the sources said.
In a symbolic gesture, Trump would seek to approve the Keystone Pipeline, an issue that was an environmental flashpoint and which was halted after Biden canceled a key permit on his first day in office. But any company looking to build the multibillion-dollar effort to carry Canadian crude oil to the U.S. would need to start from scratch because things like easements have been returned to landowners.
“The American people can bank on President Trump using his executive power on day one to deliver on the promises he made to them on the campaign trail,” Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s transition spokesperson, said in a statement.
Many of the elements in the plan would require time to move through Congress or the nation’s regulatory system. Trump has promised to declare an energy emergency on his first day in office that could test whether he can bypass those barriers to impose some changes on an accelerated schedule.
Trump would also call on Congress to provide new funding so he can replenish the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, established as an emergency crude oil supply and which was depleted under Biden to help manage price spikes caused by the Ukraine crisis and high inflation during the pandemic. Replenishing the reserve would boost short-term oil demand and encourage U.S. production.
Trump is also expected to put pressure on the International Energy Agency, the Paris-based energy watchdog that advises industrialized countries on energy policy. Republicans have criticized the IEA’s focus on policies to reduce emissions. Trump’s advisers have urged him to withhold funding unless the IEA takes a more pro-oil position.
Trump is apparently planning “go strong” on LNG, according to a source who spoke with Reuters. That comes after the Biden Administrations put a freeze on new LNG export permits in January to study its environmental impacts. Still, the U.S. is the world’s top producer of natural gas, and it has been the number one exporter since 2022.
“The LNG issue is a lay-up and he plans to go strong on the issue,” said one of the sources.
There are five U.S. LNG export projects that have been approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, but are still awaiting permit approvals at the Department of Energy, federal records show.
Biden’s pause also halted necessary environmental reviews, portions of which may still be needed for the five pending DOE permits to withstand legal scrutiny.
What Republican’s climate agenda would be complete without a little “drill, baby, drill”? That’s exactly what Trump is planning.
Trump would look to accelerate drilling off the U.S. coast and on federal lands.
The average time to complete a drilling permit on federal and Indian land averaged 258 days in the first three years of Biden’s administration, up from 172 days during the four years of Trump’s presidency, according to federal data.
Trump is expected to expedite pending permits, hold sales more frequently and offer land that is more likely to deliver oil, the sources said.
Despite the lag time in permit approvals, Biden’s Interior Department approved more onshore oil drilling permits on average than Trump’s first administration, federal records show.
Oil output on federal lands and waters hit a record in 2023, while gas production reached its highest level since 2016, according to federal data.
Drilling activity on federal lands and waters accounts for about a quarter of U.S. oil production and 12% of gas output.
I mean, no one should be surprised by all of this. It’s exactly what he said he’d do on the campaign trail, so this is apparently what y’all wanted. Thanks.
3rd Gear: Big Cuts May Be Needed To Save Volkswagen
Things are not looking so great for Volkswagen workers right now. The German automaker’s chief executive cannot see a path forward that avoid layoffs and plant closures as it attempts to cut 4 billion euros (about $4.2 billion) in costs. These comments by Thomas Schafer will very likely rub the unions that represent VW workers the wrong way. They’ve threatened strikes starting in December, and they’ve asked the company to present solution in ongoing negotiations over pay and to keep plant closures and major job cuts off the table. From Reuters:
“Ultimately, any solution must reduce both overcapacity and costs. We can’t just stick a band-aid on it and keep dragging it along. That would come back to bite us later in a serious way,” Schaefer told weekly Welt am Sonntag.
Schaefer said most of the envisaged job cuts at the German carmaker, which the group has not quantified, could be done via normal attrition and early retirement, adding however that this would not be enough.
“It would simply take too long. There is no point in delaying restructuring until 2035. By then, our competition would have left us behind,” he said, adding VW’s restructuring should rather be done within 3-4 years.
To make matters even worse for workers, it’s not just job cuts and plant closures. Volkswagen is asking those who work for it to take a 10 percent pay cut. I cannot imagine that will go over well.
Schaefer said there was no hope at the moment that demand in Europe would recover significantly. He also noted that labour costs in Volkswagen’s German sites were roughly twice as high as those of peers and VW’s own sites in southern and eastern Europe.
He said ongoing savings efforts had resulted in a positive effect on profits of around 7.5 billion euros, adding a further 4 billion euros in savings were needed.
Schaefer said the company currently saw no possibility to avoid plant closures in Germany, adding potential shutdowns not only referred to vehicle factories, but also to component sites.
Volkswagen is in quite a precarious position right now, and I don’t see any outcome where this doesn’t end in some sort of major labor dispute between the auto-making giant and the folks who build its cars.
4th Gear: Genesis, Hyundai And Kia Recall 240,000 EVs
Over 240,000 electric vehicles built by triplets Hyundai, Kia and Genesis are being recalling in the U.S. and Canada due to a number of safety issues, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. That is… a lot of cars. From the Detroit News:
In one of two separate notices, NHTSA announced the recall of certain electrical vehicles from Hyundai, Kia and Genesis, citing a loss of drive power from damaged charging units that “increases the risk of a crash.”
The recalls potentially affect more than 62,872 units from Kia and 145,235 units from Hyundai and Genesis, a luxury division owned by Hyundai Motor Group. Most of the recalled units from Hyundai and Genesis were produced for sale in the United States, but about 34,529 were produced for sale in Canada, Ira Gabriel, senior group manager for corporate and marketing PR at Hyundai, said in an email.
The vehicle models listed under the recalls include 2022-2024 models of the Kia EV6, 2023-2024 models of the Genesis G80 EV, 2023-2025 models of the Genesis GV60, 2023-2025 models of the Genesis GV70 EV, 2022-2024 models of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and 2023-2025 models of the Hyundai Ioniq 6.
In an emailed statement, Kia America said that the drivers of the affected vehicles may hear warning chimes or see activated warning lights, in which case they should have the vehicle towed to the nearest Kia dealership “right away.”
“If the driver ignores the warnings associated with the discharging battery condition and continues to operate the vehicle in a reduced power mode, the vehicle may eventually experience a complete loss of motive power, which increases the risk of a crash,” Kia America added.
Just to add insult to injury, NHTSA also announced the recall of about 42,000 2025 Hyundai Tucsons and Santa Cruzs because their transmissions can shift out of park without the brake pedal being engaged. It can allow the cars to roll away and, which is less than ideal.
