With the price of petrol going ever skyward, can we look forward to one day driving an electric car to work, and waving cheekily as we drive past the petrol station on the way?
According to a recent Op Ed piece in the New York Times, this future is possible, but it won’t on as grand a scale as we would probably like. At least, not at first. Politically, the idea has plenty of backing from the Obama administration. The White House has a goal to put 1 million electric cars on the road by 2015.
But not all of these will be purely electric. Many will be hybrids, a combination of combustion and battery run vehicles. The US market has already seen vehicles like the Chevrolet Volt and Nissan LEAF (European Car of the Year for 2011) come rolling off the assembly line. And what happens in the USA should eventually happen here.
But the difference is that these projects will require financial backing from the government in the form of subsidies and incentives to get the public to take the plunge and ‘go electric’.
In Britain, the Office for Low Emissions Vehicles offers a grant of up to 25% for the cost of the car, up to a maximum of £5000. Electric cars in Britain are also exempt from £10 a day congestion charge and road tax.
This is easy enough for countries with deep pockets, but what about less wealthy countries, like South Africa?
Of course, we already have an electric car in development, the Joule, slated to be available for sale by 2014. The Department of Trade and Industry has supported the manufacturers, Optimal Energy, in their mission to create a wholly South African-made vehicle that is geared for a future beyond petrol.
International manufacturers like BMW and Toyota are also in negotiations with the DTI regarding rebates for electric vehicles, according to a recent report in the Business Day. BMW wants to introduce electric vehicles as early as next year says BMW spokesman Guy Kilfoil. But there will have to be some kind of rebate he says.
The other challenge, of course, is to provide the infrastructure that would allow electric car users to travel beyond the limits that the lithium batteries allow. The LEAF, for example, has a range of between 76kms and 222kms, depending on how you drive. More than enough when collecting the kids from school, but a bit more of a challenge for extended trips.
To do this, petrol stations will have to add rapid recharge facilities, which will give a car like the LEAF an 80% charge within 30 minutes. But they are unlikely to do so unless incentivised, until there are significant numbers of electric cars on the road to justify it.
Either way, it’s just a matter of time before we see electric vehicles on the road, but how long it takes before we see them in significant numbers, is anyone’s guess.
