Power Electronics Institute, North Carolina State University.

Research initiative: U.S. president Barack Obama announced the creation of a public-private research center, led by North Carolina’s State University. The ‘Next Generation Power Electronics Institute’ will focus on developing cost-competitive wide bandgap (WBG) semiconductor technologies in the next five years.
greencarcongress.com, earthtechling.com, whitehouse.gov

New ecodesign for electric motors: The European Commission has published the amendments to the EC 640/2009 regulation concerning the ecodesign of electric motors in their Official Journal thus making them the new standard. A transitional period of six months has been granted until the new rules outlined in Directive 2005/32/EC apply. The changes concern current exceptions for motors operating at great heights or under extreme temperatures, which will be further limited.
new.eur-lex.europa.eu (Directive text), ec.europa.eu (Ecodesign standard), maschinenmarkt.vogel.de (In German)

Low to no effect: Researchers from the universities of North Carolina and Minnesota modelled the deployment of light-duty electric vehicles (EDV) in the U.S. but could not find a consistent trend towards lower system-wide emissions of CO2. This is due to the small overall share of emissions from the LDV sector (20%) and because EDV charging still produces emissions depending on the grid mix.
greencarcongress.com