Think Electric Car

From Norway, comes the Th!nk City, the new compact electric car coming from Europe.

With a fantastic acceleration, considering the size of the car, with the following stats:

Top speed 100km/h
Acceleration 0-50km/h 6.5 seconds
Acceleration 0-80km/h 16.0 seconds
Typical charge time – standard electric socket:
0-100% SOC (state of charge) approx. 13 hours, 230VAC / 14A
0-80% SOC (state of charge) approx. 9,5 hours, 230VAC / 14A
Range IEC* 170km (summer tires, heater off)
Range FUDS** 180km (summer tires, heater off)
Range EU UDC*** 203km

With the city range around 200km(125Miles), the Th!nk City has the most attractive mileage in the Electric Car market, using the electric motor only.

Pre-launch activities of the TH!NK city have started in selected European markets like Norway, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria and now recently Spain. TH!NK city vehicles are in this pre-launch phase primarily being sold to municipal fleet, government and utility partners for early adoption EV pilot and demonstration fleets, supported by government incentives to help reduce the initial high cost of the batteries.

It might take some time before this car enters the open market in Europe and even longer in the US.

Electric Car Th!nk's Official site: www.think.no

GM fuels electric car hype wars

Hyping Volt's claim of 100 km/litre...

The company that gave the world the monster-sized Hummer now claims it will deliver a plug-in vehicle next year so fuel efficient it will take you several times across the city on a single litre of gasoline.

General Motors Co., eager to shift attention from its near-collapse and racing to dump its image as a maker of petrol-sucking trucks and SUVs, stoked international debate yesterday by saying it expects its upcoming Volt to get an unprecedented fuel economy rating of 230 miles per gallon (nearly 100 kilometres per litre) in city driving. That's four times better than the gas mileage of Toyota Motor Corp.'s bestselling Prius.

"Is it hooey? Probably not," said Paul Lacy, a specialist in vehicle power components with consultancy IHS Global Insight in Detroit.

http://www.financialpost.com/news-sectors/story.html?id=1883012

Mitsubishi i-MiEV launching in November 2009, with a $31,000 and $37,000 price range

Mitsubishi i-MiEV will be one of the first 'pure' electric cars being available in the UK.

It is a 4-door 5-seater than can travel 100 miles, or 160 Km, on a single charge.

It was just announced that the cars will become available for purchase in England beginning in November 2009. At first there will only be 50 vehicles made available, with another 150 arriving in 2010. Mitsubishi hopes to eventually sell 40,000 iMiEvs per year.

The price is being quoted as between £20,000 and £25,000 ($30,844-$37,800 USD).

The Mitsubishi i-MiEV will also abe vailable in a sports version, pictured below:

Local authorities get in on push for electric cars

As automakers amp up plans for electric vehicles, more local and state governments are trying to plug themselves into the movement.
Nissan Motor just announced alliances with Sonoma County, Calif., and the state of Oregon. And the mayors of San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose have a nine-step program aimed at making the Bay Area the "electric vehicle capital of the U.S."

...

About 7 million vehicles, 10% of the world's total annual vehicle sales, will be powered entirely by electricity by 2020, predicted Nissan Motor CEO Carlos Ghosn in a speech at the Los Angeles Auto Show last week.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2008-11-27-electric-powered-cars_N.htm

General Motors - Chevrolet Volt

The Chevrolet Volt is one of the first serious contestants, by General Motors, to be one of the leading electric cars in the world.

The vehicle is designed to run purely on electricity from on-board batteries for up to 40 miles (64 km), or about half the range of GM's first electric car, the EV1.
Unlike many other competing cars, the Volt can actually carry 4 people, unlike many other electric cars already in the market, and when the batteries run out a small internal combustion engine starts generating electricity to resupply the batteries, the vehicle's range is potentially increased to 360 miles (579 km) on the highway.



And an improvement over the EV1 with a top speed increased from 80 miles per hour (130 km/h) to 120 miles per hour (190 km/h). The battery pack size has also been reduced between the two, from about 300 L in volume in the EV1, to just 100 L in the Volt.
There might even be an upgrade to the Volt's batteries, making it go 80 miles (128 km) running only on batteries, in a near future.

The Volt is actually ahead of schedule for it's release in 2010 and General Motors will unveil a new photovoltaic roof option at the Detroit Auto Show in January. The roof will be able to charge the battery from 1/4 to 1/3 over 3 hot blazing days of sun, such as in an airport parking lot, and could function keep the A/C on when parked on hot summer days, avoiding battery draw to cool up the car when the driver gets in.

In the United States, the Volt will qualify for $7,500 tax credit. And in Europe it could get a tax cut in many countries, like the Hybrids are, if General Motors releases the Volt outside the US. The predicted cost of this car will be around $35.000

Audi Electric Car is in the works

Audi joins the Electric Car Race:

Audi will apparently be joining the ever-growing all-electric car contingent in the near future with an ultra-small car of its own, reports Autocar. During an interview at last week's Paris Motor Show opening, Audi board member Peter Schwarzenbauer confirmed that engineers at the brand's Ingolstadt headquarters are working diligently on the brand's first all-electric city car.

Audi Electric car in the works

The Race For The Electric Car

The race for the electric car, in CBS News, 60 minutes, an interesting read:

The price of oil is up, gas guzzling cars are out, and a race for a fuel-free, practical electric car is on.

It includes the usual suspects: Detroit, Japan, and Germany. But as correspondent Lesley Stahl reports, a surprising newcomer with no experience at building cars has entered the race: Silicon Valley.

The jury is still out on whether electric cars can ever be really practical, but the computer geeks in California are betting that their inventiveness can beat out Detroit's cumbersome bureaucracy in producing a viable e-car.

The Race For The Electric Car