Reuters: EPA Asks Volkswagen to Make Electric Cars in US

U.S. authorities have asked the German carmaker Volkswagen to produce electric vehicles in the United States as a way of making up for its rigging of emission tests, the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag reported.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is currently in talks with Volkswagen with the aim of agreeing on a fix for nearly 600,000 diesel vehicles that emit up to 40 times legal pollution limits.

The paper, which gave no source for its report, said the EPA was asking VW to produce electric vehicles at its plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and to help build a network of charging stations for electric vehicles in the United States.

InsideClimate News: Scalia's Death Leaves Court in Ideological Limbo as Climate Decision Looms

Twelve years ago, Antonin Scalia wrote in no uncertain terms why it was so important that the Supreme Court have nine justices on the bench at all times. He reasoned that the absence of even one jurist on a single case would impair the court's functioning.

After Scalia died last week during a hunting trip, the Supreme Court may feel his absence for a year or more, as Republicans in the Senate resist approving a successor chosen by President Barack Obama.

And partly because of two coincidences, Scalia's death is putting pending decisions on climate change and other environmental questions in sharper relief than ever.

Jalopnik: Aston Martin Will Develop Electric Vehicles With Faraday Future's Chinese Backers

British luxury automaker Aston Martin just signed a deal to develop its first electric Aston with Letv, the Chinese company that finances electric automaker startup Faraday Future. But what exactly does this deal mean for everyone involved?

We’ve known for a while that China is really interested in an electric version of the gorgeous Rapide, and who can blame them? So, despite claims that Aston would forever stay true to the ways of the V12, which they still are, the automaker has turned to Letv for a business venture to supply batteries and transmission materials to accelerate development an all-electric Rapide.

Business Insider: We're Hearing About Troubles at Nest

Nest has been touted as the model for the new Alphabet corporate structure, in which subsidiary companies operate autonomously with their own CEOs and processes. But the company’s track record since it was acquired by Google two years ago shows many reasons to wonder about the direction of what it sees as the next moonshot.

Business Insider spoke with various people who have worked at Nest, who described a unit with huge potential to shake up the nascent home-automation market but which is also plagued by a string of product problems, employee departures, and disorganization.

Bloomberg: Puerto Rico Approves Electric Utility Restructuring Bill

Puerto Rico lawmakers have approved legislation to allow the island’s main electric utility to restructure almost $9 billion of debt, a key step in the commonwealth’s efforts to resolve its fiscal crisis.

The legislation authorizing a mechanism to restructure the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority’s debt was signed late last night by Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla after being passed by the House of Representatives and Senate, according to the governor’s spokesman.

A debt-reduction agreement between the agency known as Prepa and its creditors was set to expire Tuesday absent passage of the bill. The House of Representatives passed it Monday and sent it back to the Senate for final concurrence.