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This is the cheapest charging station for your EV

If you’ve spent any time road-tripping an EV across Europe, you already know the drill: fast chargers are plentiful—until you actually want one that doesn’t cost the better part of a euro per kilowatt-hour. In most EU countries, anything under €0.50/kWh at a DC fast charger feels like spotting a unicorn at a rest stop. Promises of “cheap solar charging” abound. Actual delivery? Not so much.

Except in Katrineholm, Sweden.

This small town in the country’s south has quietly become home to what might be the cheapest fast-charging setup in Europe. The ETC Solpark charging station offers DC fast charging for just €0.15 per kWh during daylight hours. That’s not a typo, not a temporary promo, and not some accounting trick involving certificates or offsets. It’s fast charging, powered directly by the sun, at a price that makes the rest of Europe look like it’s gouging.

The secret isn’t complicated—it’s just rare. ETC Solpark generates its own electricity on site using a dedicated solar power installation located right next to the chargers. No grid middlemen. No peak pricing gymnastics. No greenwashing. Just electrons going straight from solar panels into EV batteries.

“We launched this offer recently and we’re already seeing a huge number of people coming here to charge their vehicles—more than we expected,” says Gahangir Sarvari, manager of ETC Sol. That reaction isn’t surprising. At €0.15/kWh, you’re paying less to fast-charge than many drivers pay to charge at home, let alone on a 150-kW DC unit.

Yes, you read that right: 150 kW. This isn’t a sleepy AC charger tucked behind a grocery store. The site features two 150-kW fast chargers capable of charging up to four EVs simultaneously. Plug in during the day, and you’re getting proper highway-speed charging for a price that feels like it came from a decade ago.

Sarvari puts it bluntly: “Since we produce electricity ourselves, we can maintain the lowest price on the market. It is more profitable for us to consume it at the charging station itself than to sell it to the grid, even at such a low price.”

That single sentence quietly exposes a major flaw in how EV charging is usually done. When solar producers sell power back to the grid, margins are thin and pricing is volatile. Use that same electricity directly—especially for something as energy-hungry and high-margin as fast charging—and suddenly the economics flip. Cheap for drivers, sustainable for operators.

The station has been operating since mid-October and has already delivered around 4,000 kWh. That’s pocket change compared to Europe’s mega-charging hubs, but for a local, independently operated project, it’s a strong start—and proof that demand follows price.

There is, of course, a catch. The €0.15/kWh rate is only valid between 8:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m., when solar production is strongest. Outside those hours, the price jumps to €0.43/kWh. Even then, it remains competitive with most public fast chargers across the EU. Unsurprisingly, nearly everyone charges during the cheap window. According to ETC Sol, about 99 percent of charging happens during daylight hours.

And that might be the most telling detail of all. Drivers are willing to adapt their behavior—timing stops, planning routes—if the incentive is strong enough. Cheap energy doesn’t just save money; it reshapes habits.

What makes ETC Solpark truly interesting isn’t just the price, but the replicability. This isn’t some exotic pilot project requiring government subsidies or cutting-edge tech. It’s solar panels, fast chargers, and a business model that prioritizes local energy use. In sunnier countries—southern Europe, anyone?—this approach could work even better.

In a landscape full of overpromised EV solutions, Katrineholm’s solar-powered fast charger stands out by doing something refreshingly radical: it works. Fast, cheap, clean—and no asterisks required.

Source: ETC Solpark

News

Maserati GT2 Builds on 2025 Championship Success Ahead of Global 2026 Push

Maserati has never been shy about drama, but its modern racing renaissance is shaping up to be something more compelling than nostalgia. The 2025 season quietly confirmed what the Trident’s return to closed-wheel racing hinted at back in 2023: Maserati isn’t visiting the paddock—it’s moving in.

The proof comes with hardware. Lots of it.

Philippe Prette, driving the Maserati GT2 run by LP Racing, locked down the Am Class title in the GT2 European Series powered by Pirelli, successfully defending his championship crown after winning it in 2024. That’s not a footnote; that’s dominance. Ten wins from twelve races will do that, especially in a category designed to reward consistency rather than hero laps. The title was formally handed over on November 22 at the SRO Motorsports Group Awards in Venice—a suitably ornate setting for a brand that has always preferred silk gloves to pit-lane grease.

But the bigger story isn’t just what Maserati won. It’s where it’s going.

GT2, Confirmed—and Expanded

Maserati’s GT2 program is officially locked in for 2026, with the GT2 European Series returning and kicking off at Monza on May 30–31. That alone would be enough to keep Modena’s engineers busy, but Maserati is stacking the deck. The brand has signed on to the SRO GT Academy project, first announced during the 24 Hours of Spa, opening the door to something far more ambitious.

The new SRO structure introduces a Silver class, with the GT Academy title awarded to its champion. The prize? A full-season campaign in the GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup starting in 2027, run in either Silver or Pro-Am trim. In other words, Maserati is positioning itself not just as a constructor, but as a ladder—one that can carry drivers from GT2 into the sharp end of global endurance racing.

That’s not heritage marketing. That’s infrastructure.

America, Finally

For U.S. fans who’ve watched Maserati’s racing revival from afar, here’s the part that matters most: the Maserati GT2 and the unhinged MCXtrema are heading stateside.

The International GT Championship will, for the first time, welcome both cars into its GTX category. This isn’t a token appearance, either. The calendar reads like a greatest-hits album of American road racing: Sebring, Road Atlanta, Lime Rock, Mid-Ohio, Road America, Watkins Glen, VIR, Laguna Seca, Barber, and COTA. If there’s a better way to introduce a European GT weapon to American audiences, we haven’t found it.

Sebring kicks things off February 26 through March 1, which feels appropriate. The place is bumpy, unforgiving, and brutally honest—exactly the sort of circuit that exposes whether a car is built for headlines or for racing. Maserati seems confident it’s the latter.

Built to Travel

Part of that confidence comes from the GT2’s growing eligibility. Thanks to the 2025 rollout of Maserati’s Endurance Pack, the GT2 is now cleared to compete across an even broader range of series. The numbers are telling: over 20 championships, more than 170 races annually, and upwards of 100 race weekends spread across the calendar year.

That’s not boutique racing. That’s a global program.

It also reflects a subtle but important shift in Maserati’s motorsports philosophy. Where the brand once dipped into competition for prestige, it’s now engineering cars designed to work—across rulesets, continents, and driver skill levels. GT2 isn’t a halo project. It’s a platform.

A Century in the Making

All of this momentum lands in a year that carries serious historical weight. In 2026, Maserati will celebrate the 100th anniversary of its racing debut, which came in 1926 when the Tipo 26—wearing the Trident badge for the first time—entered the Targa Florio and promptly won its class.

That victory established a pattern: Maseratis don’t ease into competition; they announce themselves.

Nearly a century later, the names and technologies have changed, but the intent hasn’t. The GT2 program isn’t chasing Le Mans headlines or Formula One relevance. It’s doing something arguably more difficult—building credibility race by race, championship by championship, in series where performance matters more than mythology.

The takeaway is simple. Maserati’s return to racing is no longer a comeback story. It’s an expansion plan.

And judging by the trophy count, the calendar, and the circuits now on the itinerary, the Trident isn’t done carving its name into the asphalt anytime soon.

Source: Maserati

News

Alfa Romeo’s New 33 Stradale Comes Home

Some cars travel the world like celebrities. Others return home like royalty. The new Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale has done both—and now it’s back where it belongs, under Italian light, inside the Alfa Romeo Museum in Arese, where it will be on display through January 6. This marks the car’s second public appearance at the museum, following its official unveiling in August 2023, and it feels less like a museum exhibit and more like a victory lap.

After a globe-trotting North American tour that read like a greatest-hits list of the modern concours circuit—Monterey Car Week, The Quail, Laguna Seca, the Petersen Automotive Museum, Art Basel—the 33 Stradale has returned to Italy to remind everyone that Alfa Romeo still knows how to build a car that makes grown adults stop mid-sentence.

The museum has placed the car in a dedicated area of the “Timeline” section, strategically positioned near a wind-tunnel model. That’s not accidental. The new 33 Stradale isn’t just a styling exercise or a nostalgia trip—it’s a statement about how aerodynamics, performance, and design still intertwine at Alfa Romeo when the brand is operating at full volume. Think of it as a thesis statement written in carbon fiber and aluminum.

Only 33 examples will ever exist, which is both a nod to the original 1967 33 Stradale and a reminder that this car plays in an entirely different league from Alfa’s production models. Each one is built using an artisan-focused approach under the brand’s BOTTEGAFUORISERIE program, meaning no two cars are exactly alike. This isn’t mass production—it’s modern coachbuilding, filtered through a 21st-century performance lens.

And yes, this thing goes like it looks. Beneath the rear decklid sits a twin-turbocharged V-6 producing 630 horsepower, enough to launch the 33 Stradale from zero to 100 km/h in under three seconds and on to a claimed top speed of 333 km/h. Those numbers feel almost theatrical, but that’s kind of the point. This car isn’t chasing Nürburgring lap records or spec-sheet dominance; it’s about delivering a sense of occasion every time it turns a wheel.

What makes the new 33 Stradale especially compelling is how confidently it balances reverence and restraint. It draws clear inspiration from the original 33 Stradale and the Tipo 33 race cars without slipping into retro caricature. The proportions are dramatic but clean, the surfaces sensual without being overwrought. It looks unmistakably Alfa Romeo, yet entirely modern—a harder trick than it sounds.

Its North American tour reinforced that point. At Monterey Car Week, surrounded by seven-figure hypercars and concept vehicles with more screens than a Best Buy, the Alfa didn’t need gimmicks to stand out. It relied on form, history, and the quiet confidence of a brand that knows exactly what it’s doing when it wants to. Appearances at events like Motorlux, Hagerty House, and the Concours at Wynn Las Vegas only cemented its status as one of the most talked-about modern Alfas in decades.

Now, back in Arese, the 33 Stradale sits within a museum that has become a pilgrimage site since reopening in 2015. Organized into three sections—Timeline, Beauty, and Speed—the Alfa Romeo Museum tells the brand’s story not as a straight line, but as a series of emotional highs. The 33 Stradale fits perfectly into that narrative, bridging past and future with the kind of clarity Alfa has sometimes struggled to maintain.

Visitors through January 6 also get an added bonus: a temporary exhibition titled “Colore,” the final chapter in a series exploring the many shades of Alfa Romeo’s signature Rosso. It’s a fitting backdrop. If any modern Alfa deserves to be surrounded by a deep dive into the brand’s most iconic color, it’s this one.

In a car world increasingly dominated by software updates, electrification roadmaps, and carefully managed brand messaging, the new 33 Stradale feels almost rebellious. It exists because Alfa Romeo wanted to prove—to itself as much as to anyone else—that it still can. Seeing it back in Italy, displayed not as a relic but as a living expression of what the brand is capable of, makes one thing clear: when Alfa Romeo decides to aim high, it still knows exactly where the target is.

Source: Stellantis

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