CNN Money: Porsche Plans Electric Car to Challenge Tesla

Porsche and Audi are hoping to challenge Tesla in the luxury electric-car market, but Elon Musk can sleep easy for now. Both are still years away from production.

Porsche unveiled its first all-electric concept car at the Frankfurt auto show Tuesday. It looks like a futuristic version of the Porsche 911.

The German sports-car maker boasts that the four-door Mission E will be able to drive roughly 310 miles on a single charge. The new model should take just 15 minutes to charge to about 80% of its capacity.

ZDNet: Peugeot Joins With Dongfeng to Develop Electric Vehicles

PSA Peugeot Citroen and Chinese company Dongfeng Motor Group are coming together in a partnership focused on improving electric vehicle battery development.

At the 2015 Frankfurt car show on Wednesday, Peugeot's head of research and development Gilles Le Borgne told attendees that electric-vehicle battery development will be the common ground and starting point for the new partnership, which will eventually lead to the creation of a new EV by 2020.

Bloomberg: California Climate Law an $8.6 Billion Coup for Solar Utilities

California lawmakers on Friday passed a watered-down version of what state Senate President Kevin de Leon had billed as part of the “most far-reaching effort to fight climate change in the history of our nation.” Before lawmakers stripped out provisions including a 50 percent rollback in gasoline use, de Leon’s bill had drawn opposition from building owners, the oil industry, retailers and even fruit and vegetable growers.

The clean energy mandate provides a potential $8.6 billion investment opportunity for utility-scale solar projects, according to GTM Research. That figure could vary depending on how much large-scale solar is used to meet the goal and other factors, including projected declines in panel prices and other renewable energy sources. The market could be as much as $10 billion based on an estimate provided by the California Solar Energy Industries Association.

Washington Post: The U.S. Might Lift Its Ban on Oil Exports. Here's What You Need to Know

Is the four-decade-old ban on U.S. exports of crude oil a useless relic or a valuable safeguard for American consumers? Or is the ban so full of holes that it doesn’t matter anymore?

A House bill that would end the ban is set to pass the Energy and Commerce Committee Wednesday, and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said this week that the legislation could soon come to the floor.

Even if the House passes a bill, opposition awaits in the Senate, and President Obama would likely veto the measure.

Fortune: In the Solar Industry, It's a Scramble to the Top

Lyndon Rive, CEO of the dominant U.S. solar installer SolarCity, likens the trajectory of solar panels to the development of computers over the past 20 years. Decades ago, business computers were made by a variety of small companies. Today the PC industry has consolidated around big names like HP, Dell, Lenovo and Apple.

The same trend is afoot for the companies that are installing and financing solar panels. A handful of companies -- SolarCity, SunEdison, and Sunrun among them -- have been scooping up smaller firms in their quest to survive in a market where scale is everything.

“Consolidation is good. It means the industry is maturing,” says Rive, who is the cousin of Tesla Motors and SpaceX CEO (and SolarCity chairman) Elon Musk. In the past two years, SolarCity has acquired at least five companies to help it lower costs, boost sales, and move into new areas.