Lucid Group announced on Tuesday morning that it had officially launched an at-home charging station for its EVs. The launch of the at-home charging station is a part of the official launch of Lucid Vehicle Accessories, an expanding lineup of accessories that serve as a “stylish complement” to each Air sedan trim level the company offers.
Lucid Charging moves to your home
Lucid’s Connected Home Charging Station can support up to 19.2 kW of power, giving owners perhaps as much as 80 miles of electric vehicle range per hour. “The home station will effectively double the rate at which the Lucid Air can be charged when installed at full power compared to the included charging cable,” the automaker said.
Designed in-house by Lucid’s team of Engineers, the goal was to design a compact and minimal enclosure to make it comparable in size to other options while giving more driving range per hour than competitors. For comparison, Tesla’s Wall Connector has a power output of up to 11.5 kW or 44 miles of ranger per hour.
The Lucid Connected Home Charging Station is also capable of bi-directional electrical power, allowing the vehicle to act as an energy storage system that can keep essential appliances powered when outages are experienced. Lucid appears to have desires to venture into bi-directional charging as it said it was the company’s first offering that would support a customer’s want to “integrate their vehicle into the company’s future energy ecosystem.”
Lucid said the Connected Home Charging Station will cost $1,200 USD and $1,600 in Canada.
Other Products – Lucid Air Cargo Capsule
Lucid is also planning to launch an Air Cargo Capsule, adding roughly 11.5 cubic feet of cargo space, a sizeable addition to the Lucid Air’s class-leading 32.5 cubic feet of room:
“The spacious and streamlined capsule, composed of a sculpted ABS shell, is exclusively available in black and finished in split gloss and matte black finishes with a gloss black Lucid logo. The capsule can be opened from either side of the vehicle for easy access to the additional storage space and offers interior lighting for visibility in low-light environments.”
Credit: Lucid Group
Lucid’s Air Cargo Capsule will cost $2,000 USD and $2,750 in Canada.
Lucid Air Crossbars
For hauling bikes, kayaks, or surfboards, Lucid has also developed the Air Crossbars, certified for loads of up to 165 pounds while impacting vehicle aerodynamics minimally. The Air Crossbars are compatible with Yakima mounts and are designed to “blend into the lifestyles of the most adventurous Lucid customers.”
The Lucid Air Crossbars are listed at $500 in the United States and $700 in Canada.
Lucid Air All-Weather Mats
Lucid is also introducing a set of all-weather floor mats for the Air, which were also designed in-house. The vehicles are composed of heavy-duty rubber and are non-slip, waterproof, and feature raised edges for a more rugged and durable alternative than the traditional carpet mats.
Lucid said the All-Weather Floor Mats will be available in four colors: Ceramic, Graphite, Saddle, and Black. They will be available in a three-piece set only.
The Lucid Air All-Weather Mats are priced at $250 in the U.S. and $375 in Canada.
The full range of Lucid Air accessories will be available later this year, with the Air Cargo Capsule arriving in early 2023, Lucid said. The Connected Home Charging Station will be available in limited quantities.
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A common misconception of anti-EV proponents is that the batteries used in the vehicles are detrimental to the environment and that they cause more waste than they are worth. But a look at Tesla’s battery recycling efforts last year shows the company is doing more than ever to recover materials and give portions of the cells a second life.
Tesla reported a significant milestone in its sustainability efforts last year, with battery recycling volumes rising 20% compared to 2024. According to the company’s 2025 Impact Report, Tesla recycled over 14,000 metric tons of battery material through a combination of in-house processing at its Gigafactories and collaborations with third-party recycling partners.
Tesla: “In 2025, we recycled over 14,000 metric tons of battery material through a combination of in-house processing and through our network of recycling partners.”
That’s equivalent to 46,000 long-range battery packs, a +20% increase from 2024. pic.twitter.com/TC3Nz7Kaqf
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) July 7, 2026
This amount of recovered material is equivalent to the resources needed to produce approximately 46,000 long-range battery packs. The increase reflects growing operational scale as Tesla’s global vehicle fleet expands and more batteries reach end-of-life or manufacturing scrap becomes available for processing.
Tesla and Battery Recycling
Battery recycling forms a core part of Tesla’s circular economy strategy. The company designs its batteries for longevity, often exceeding 200,000 miles of driving, and prioritizes repairs, remanufacturing, and second-life applications before full recycling.
Once packs are decommissioned, Tesla ensures 100% are recycled with no materials sent to landfills. This approach recovers critical metals including lithium, nickel, cobalt, and copper, which can be refined and reused in new battery production.
Tesla has advanced hydrometallurgical recycling processes capable of achieving recovery rates up to 98% for key battery metals. These methods are more efficient and environmentally friendly than traditional pyrometallurgical techniques, reducing energy use and enabling higher-purity materials suitable for direct reintegration into battery manufacturing.
Tesla co-founder JB Straubel confirms Redwood’s battery recycling operations are already profitable
In-house capabilities are supplemented by a network of specialized partners, creating a robust system that handles both production scrap and end-of-life packs.
The environmental and economic benefits are substantial. Recycling reduces reliance on virgin mining, lowers the carbon footprint associated with raw material extraction and processing, and helps stabilize supply chains for critical minerals amid rising global EV demand. As millions of Tesla vehicles age, the volume of recyclable material is expected to grow significantly in the coming years.
This 20% year-over-year growth demonstrates the effectiveness of Tesla’s investments in recycling infrastructure and technology. It positions the company as a leader in addressing one of the automotive industry’s major sustainability challenges. Continued innovation in battery design for easier disassembly and higher recyclability will further enhance these efforts.
Overall, Tesla’s progress in 2025 highlights how scaling recycling operations supports both environmental goals and long-term business resilience in the transition to electric mobility. As the EV market matures, such closed-loop systems will become increasingly vital for sustainable growth.
Tesla has spent years trying to engineer its way out of the automotive paint shop, one of the most expensive, space-consuming, and environmentally costly steps in vehicle manufacturing. With the Cybercab, Tesla confirmed on X this week that a new reaction injection molding process will embed color directly into the panel itself during production.
“Our new reaction injection molding (RIM) process shrinks Cybercab paint cycles from hours to minutes. This cuts those parts’ manufacturing and supply chain emissions by 35% and eliminating 100% of paint volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted in traditional paint methods.” noted Tesla.
While the RIM process isn’t necessarily new and has existed since the 1960s, what makes Tesla’s application notable is how it is being used specifically for exterior body panels that traditionally required a separate paint process after forming.
Tesla’s RIM approach integrates the color directly into the panel material during the molding process itself. The pigment is part of the polymer mix injected into the mold, meaning the panel comes out of the mold already colored, with no separate paint application required. The clear coat or protective layer can be applied at the mold stage or through a much faster post-process than traditional multi-stage painting. Tesla claims this compresses what was a multi-hour paint cycle into minutes per panel.
Tesla’s obsession with killing the paint shop is one of the most consistent threads running through the company’s manufacturing philosophy going back years. As far back as 2018, Musk was trimming paint color options to simplify production, tweeting at the time: “Moving 2 of 7 Tesla colors off menu on Wednesday to simplify manufacturing.” Two years later, in a 2020 Automotive News interview, Musk laid out his broader vision, saying he believed Tesla factories could one day be 1,000 times more efficient than conventional plants, and pointing to the paint shop as one of the biggest sources of waste, cost, and complexity. The Cybertruck was the most extreme expression of that thinking. Tesla chose an unpainted stainless steel exterior partly because it would eliminate the need for a $200 million paint facility at Gigafactory Texas. The stainless approach proved harder and more expensive than anticipated, but the underlying ambition never changed. The Cybercab is what happens when that same ambition meets a manufacturing process that delivers on it.
Lifestyle
Tesla app update makes Robotaxi ownership make a lot more sense
Tesla’s app now shows a live indicator when your car is actively driving itself.
A recent Tesla app update, released last week (4.58.5), gives visibility on whether a vehicle is navigating in its semi-autonomous mode or being drive by a human driver. The updated app now displays a live “Self-Driving” indicator in bright blue text directly beneath the vehicle’s speed readout whenever Full Self-Driving is actively engaged, along with the signature glowing blue navigation path that FSD users see on the main touchscreen. It is a small visual update with meaningful implications for how Tesla owners monitor their vehicles remotely.
The feature was first spotted in the wild by X user Jordan Camina, who shared video of a Hardware 3 Model S displaying the new animation through the app while driving. That detail is significant because it confirms the update is not limited to newer HW4 vehicles. It works across hardware generations, and Tesla confirmed it will eventually support all vehicles regardless of chip platform once both the app and vehicle software are updated. The vehicle side requires software version 2026.20.6.1, which has reached nearly 40% of the fleet so far, as monitored by NotaTeslaApp.
The feature makes the most practical sense when viewed through the lens of Tesla’s expanding robotaxi operation. In a robotaxi context, the owner of a vehicle generating ride revenue has a direct financial and safety interest in knowing whether their car is operating under autonomous control at any given moment. The app’s new FSD indicator gives fleet owners exactly that visibility, the same way a logistics company monitors whether a delivery driver is following the planned route. It also carries implications for Tesla’s insurance model. Tesla’s own insurance product prices premiums in part based on FSD engagement rates, and real-time visibility into when FSD is active creates a feedback loop that could eventually tie directly into policy pricing. For individual owners who have opted their personal vehicles into the robotaxi network, the update effectively turns the Tesla app into a fleet management dashboard, one that tells you whether your car is earning money, whether it is driving itself to do it, and whether everything is operating the way it should from wherever you happen to be.
Tesla expands Robotaxi to Florida, marking its third state for autonomy
As Teslarati has reported, Tesla launched unsupervised robotaxi rides in Miami this summer, a milestone that makes a remote FSD status indicator significantly more practical than a cosmetic feature. When a vehicle is operating as a robotaxi without a driver present, the owner or fleet operator needs a reliable way to confirm autonomy is engaged. The app now provides exactly that.
As noted by NotATeslaApp, The update also arrived alongside a hint buried in the same app version that Tesla plans to use the cabin camera to verify driver identity before FSD can be activated. Pairing identity verification with a live autonomy status indicator points toward the infrastructure Tesla is building for a fleet of driverless vehicles that owners can monitor the way you would track a package delivery.
Tesla battery recycling efforts increased 20 percent last year
Tesla FSD is about to know your specific house and neighborhood better than any map
