The GreenCars Podcast has returned for a second season, and the conversations are going deeper. Hosted by automotive journalist Craig Cole and industry analyst Sam Abuelsamid, Season 2 is built around long-form interviews with the engineers, executives, and analysts working directly inside the future of cleaner transportation. The first episode is live now, with a full season of guests already lined up.
Who Is Behind the Mic
Cole brings years of automotive journalism to the show, with a knack for pulling technical conversations into plain language. Abuelsamid is the Vice President of Market Research at Telemetry and one of the sharper voices in the EV and mobility space. Together, they know how to ask the right questions and let the guest do the talking. The chemistry works because neither one is performing. They are genuinely curious about the subject, and that comes through.
Season 2 Opens With Volvo and the Full Vehicle Lifecycle
The first guest is Vanessa Butani, Head of Global Sustainability at Volvo Cars. The conversation goes beyond tailpipe emissions into territory most shoppers rarely hear about: battery supply chains, recycled materials in manufacturing, and what actually happens to a vehicle at the end of its life. Butani explains that sustainability at Volvo stretches from raw material sourcing through production, ownership, and eventual recycling. "It is about electrifying, but it's also about so much more," she says.
One of the standout moments is Butani describing Volvo's battery passport, which now ships with every Volvo EV. There is a QR code inside the car door. Scan it, and you get data on battery health, key materials, sourcing, and recycled content. It is not a complete picture yet, but it is a transparency tool that treats the battery as something traceable rather than a sealed mystery. The latest Volvo battery generation also carries a 40 percent smaller carbon footprint per cell compared to the previous one, with meaningful gains in recycled content across the cathode, anode foil, and pack enclosure.
Plug-in hybrids come up, too. Butani frames them as a practical bridge: "Different markets are moving at different speeds to go electric. It is the future. But we need that bridge for a while to help people get there." For households that are not ready to go fully electric, that honesty is more useful than a sales pitch.
What Is Coming This Season
The season's guest roster covers serious ground. Erin Keating, Executive Analyst at Cox Automotive, joins on May 6 to talk EV market trends and consumer sentiment. Ryan Decker, VP of Strategy and Brand at Scout, follows on May 20 with a look at what it takes to launch an entirely new EV brand. Rivian's Vidya Rajagopalan, SVP of Electrical Hardware, will make an appearance on June 3, while GM contributes two voices later in the season: Kurt Kelty, VP of Battery and Propulsion, and Mandi Damman, Chief Engineer of Autonomous Vehicles. The range is deliberate. This season touches market data, brand building, battery engineering, and autonomous driving from the people closest to each.
Why It Is Worth Your Time
The EV and hybrid space moves fast, and most of the coverage either oversimplifies or overwhelms. A new model launches, a policy shifts, a battery chemistry breaks through, and the headlines cycle before anyone has time to understand what it means. The GreenCars Podcast slows that down. These are not five-minute hot takes. They are real conversations with people who can explain the decisions shaping cleaner transportation, what those decisions mean for buyers, and what is still uncertain. If you are shopping for your next vehicle, thinking about going electric, or just trying to keep up with an industry that refuses to sit still, this is a good place to start.
The GreenCars Podcast is available on all major podcast platforms. New episodes drop throughout the spring and summer.
