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"Who Killed the electric Toyota RAV4?"
Well, the UK/EU media for a start - and they're still burying it
...
Who  Killed Toyota RAV4 EV
"Who Killed the electric Toyota RAV4?"
Well, the UK/EU media for a start - and they're still burying it
...

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Watch Regis & Kelly test-drive genuinely smart(ie. electric) Smart ForTwo

Watch L1X-75 (Tesla rival?) test drive: 0-60 in 3.1 secs, 175 mph, 200 miles/charge...

Watch Ebike v. Car commute downunder
Ebike v Car Commute OZ
No worries, no sweat, no contest !
(Suitable Transport Low Rider)

2007 Tour de Presteigne:
Electric Bike Rally,
Presteigne, Wales(map & sat view) May 13

Video(Youtube): PLUG-IN's would reduce fuel/biofuel use by 70%, CO2 by 50%
...so why are UK/EU commentators and politicians still so deadly silent ?

...more PLUG-IN videos.

Watch latest Youtube'd EMN TV highlights

Google.org announces initiative(RechargeIT) promoting EV and plug-in development(click: video & www.google.org/recharge)

New excl. RAV4 EV video - watch Eiichi's (who he?) - RAV4 EV in action
Eiichi's Toyota RAV4 EV

EVUK's 'Ms. Eclectic Electric' - EVUK's Moira G. - seeks new EV/ecotech/green media- related role!

Watch Moira G.'s 1998
EV docu "O Happy Zappy Days" - from London to LA & SF...

 

NEWS

March, 2010

BYD-Daimler & Youtube'd GenEVa
- made easy

Daimler-BYD CNBC USA Zetsche
Remember Dieter(Zetsche, Daimler,left) - this is CNBC USA !
So bitte - no dirty  words wie z.B. environmental, green, pollution, energy efficiency, fuel efficiency, climate change - instead stick with "There just ain't gonna be enough oil for all the Chinese who wanna drive !"

So, just for the record, here are the top two EV highlights of the month thus far - made simple(for us and for you):

1) Daimler's joint venture with BYD(Build Your Dreams) - see Business Week, view all Google News articles, watch daytime primetime(no really!) CNBC interview with Daimler Chairman Dieter Zetsche (Note: CNBC is still GE-owned/parented. See also: EVUK piece(Feb) re rival Bloomberg Asia's televised Reva-lution etc )

2) Geneva Motor Show 2010 - view all Youtube'd pure electric vehicles at Show.
View all Youtube'd hybrids & plug-ins at Show.

But - whether highlights or hype or hope - haven't we all now had more than enough - for the time being at least - of the ever-spinning, make-believe Motor Show Merry-Go-Round, the Concept Car Carousel ?

Car Shows -> Car Showrooms now please !

Hands up if, like us, you feel Déj&aagrave; Voodoo'd & Youtube'd to death or distraction ...
Enough already with the teasing, the titillation, the waiting game !

Even now we find ourselves - a dozen years on - still standing in front of a shop window jam-packed full of treats and sweets to come
- but the shop door remains firmly CLOSED to the public...at best jammed ajar.
Or: The EV genie has escaped from the bottle - but one foot is caught in the spout.
Or: Life is a Box of Chocolates locked in Mother's Cupboard: the Quality Street Cars - desired but not delivered.

The Quiet before the Perfect Storm. A zisshing, sizzling electrostatic(very static !) charge fills the air. Suddenly an eerie, otherworldly voice breaks the spell :
"Dad - are we there yet ?!".
"Declan - I've told you a thousand times ! Life - aka a box of chocs - is all about the journey, anticipation, aspiration - not destination, getting there, or finally getting what you want. And I should know - ask your mother."

Sorry everyone - just filling time .. and trying to enjoy the last few miles of what has been a very long uphill journey - before we all finally get to see and experience ..

Show Room Show Time !
ShowRoom ShowTime


February, 2010

Tour de Presteigne 2010 - electric bike rally May 8th & 9th

Presteigne Ebike Rally 2008  Presteigne Ebike Rally 2007
Click for Presteigne 2008, 2007 cycle clips(!) ...

We've just received this year's Presteigne press release ... and unlike so many (EV-related) PR promises this one never fails to deliver - come (torrential) rain or shine(click for wet/dry clips) !

To the unitiated : if the words "Presteigne" and "electric bike rally" mean nothing at all - or perhaps conjure up images of marauding, ebiking treehuggers and trekkies descending on a town somewhere in N.W France...Bretagne maybe (not far from Ashby-de-la-Zouch, peut-etre ?) - then no, sorry: wrong country, wrong tribe, wrong preconceptions et prejudices.

Apropos - à propos - preconceptions: would you believe that even the Daily Telegraph has enthusiastically covered this annual event: see
"Batteries are Definitely Included" (D.Tel's Mark Williams)

"Golly Jeeves - it seems we've been looking in the wrong place - the rEVolution has been telegraphed !"

In fact, the Daily Telegraph has also elsewhere revealed a very understandable(and perhaps personal, property-linked..?!) penchant for the town itself - see
"Little Marvels: Britain's Top 10 Small Towns"(see excerpt below)
What's in a name ? More than can be reasonably justified: but there is simply no denying that an ebike rally held in, say, Newport Pagnell, Slough or Sutton Coldfield would definitely lack that mystical metric tonne-load of je ne sais quoi ..(or pourquoi for that matter...)

Google Map: Presteigne

Presteigne Ebike Rally 2006 Tour De Presteigne - homepage

See our previous Tour de Presteigne reports - with video links:

All Youtube'd videos - Tour de Presteigne

"Presteigne, straddling the border between Wales and England, makes a virtue of its comparative remoteness. Cheap property, small streets and old-fashioned shop windows have attracted an array of people from outside the mainstream of life: gardeners, writers, a maker of clarinet reeds, and the like.
It has always been like that. You can never tell who will pop up. There is an arts festival in August."
(D Tel: "Little Marvels...")

But hey, why wait till August?

Why not splash out now on a new electric bike - leap back into the saddle of a stallion - and join the rally in May ? (BTW: Our own current trusty steed and personal favourite by a long nose is the extremely sprightly, smart, smooth, stylish, sophisticated and very sensibly priced Cyclamatic Powerplus from Sports HQ* )
So allez-y ! Come on over the border, take a bike ride on the Welsh wild side - or spend
le whole weekend in borderline Pays de Galles - rubbing shoulders and propping up (cross/handle etc) bars with all those marauding and ..er.. revolting, franglais-fluent Telegraph revolutionaries ?

(*Note re Cyclamatic Powerplus ebike : EVUK has no financial, family etc ties at all with Sports HQ - this is quite simply the best-value ebike we've ever bought and owned. But rest assured - if this ebike should fall apart, give up the ghost or lose its spirit in the next few years we will report it here !)

***********************

Watch Ebike v. Car commute downunder
Ebike v Car Commute OZ
No worries, no sweat, no contest !


February, 2010

The Reva-lution(ouch!)  has just been televised* !
Revolution_Will_Not_Be_Televised_original                                          (*ref: "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised")

- by Bloomberg TV Asia

Now what was that we were saying about China, India - those "more freely and rapidly innovative regions of the world" - with media to match ?

Yes, despite the inevitable post-Copenhagen TV blackout there is still hope that the EV and green revolution will be televised - but the lead will almost certainly be taken by the less lethally lobbied and relatively liberated(the leashes are longer & looser) Asian outposts of major global TV networks such as Bloomberg, CNN, CNBC ..

View: One TV flick, four REVA EV pics:

Chetan Maini's non-collaborative..er..GM-free designs and ambitions(Feb news..) are, from every conceivable angle, infinitely more inspiring than the desperately bland, boring, banal misnomer that is the .. e-Spark ..

REVA-lution Televised 1

REVA-lution Televised 3
REVA NXG - the sparkingly stylish, 2010 version of the original 2005 prototype

REVA-lution Televised 4
REVA NXR

REVA-lution Televised All

REVA-lution Televised 2
The dull-as-dishwater e-Spark: the bold backside is sadly as sizzlingly exciting as it gets.
Come on GM - what price a little style ? If Reva's Chetan Maini can do it on a Bangalore budget - so can you guys. Or is this just one last-ditch, 11th hour attempt to Kill the Affordable Electric Car..the EV for EVeryman ? As in "Let's make something that'll appeal to the world's joyless, sallow [sic ], automotive vegetarians - and not to our all-important style-conscious, core, crank'n'piston customer base ?"

Base Notes:
- "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" Revolution_Will_Not_Be_Televised_original  Watch - and if you dare - listen to original (see also: Version 2).





- GM-REVA Backstory : "GM India Partner Reva Plans U.S., Europe Electric-Car Ventures"

("Sallow" postscript: JM from Herts and LF from Ludlow have eagerly emailed to "inform" us that our "sallow" is missing an "h". We stand uncorrected of course.
See sic note [sic !]. )



January, 2010

The not quite so revolutionary BMW ActiveE
- and the truth-exposing question that almost no-one knows to ask: could the latest li-ion BMW beat the still scandalously unreported, unapplauded and uncelebrated 2,142 km, 24 hour fast-charge record set by the li-ion Mitsubishi FTO in 1999 ?

BMW ActiveE lithium
Above: the (by contrast) widely reported and applauded - but not quite so revolutionary - 2010 BMW ActiveE at Detroit Show( Youtube)

Below: the disobediently disruptive, 1999 record-breaking li-ion Mitsubishi FTO EV.

That's right: in 1999 - 11 long years ago - Mitsubishi achieved a record-breaking 2,142 km in a lithium-powered FTO using rapid-charge pit-stops(and not by battery-swapping !)
- a remarkable feat noted by the Guinness Book of Records but systematically ignored by our corporate media - this despite our own relentless email-blitzing efforts to break the customary collective silence.
Indeed, for many years only one reference to this incredible Mitsubishi distance record - apart from our own - could be unearthed even by Google ! Later our man in Japan Eiichi Oogami alerted us to an additional article - with more photos. So here again, are those two long-hidden, rarely viewed, rarely referenced reports:

1) "New EV Distance World Record" - scroll to last page of text for photo.
2) "Mitsubishi EV Sets New World"- as this rarely viewed multi-photo report explains, the precise distance was 2,142.3 km(average speed: just shy of 90 km/h )

And as we, again almost alone, have also mentioned before: nine years ago, in 2001, a Mitsubishi Eclipse EV was driven more than 400 km on a single charge at Japan's Shikoku EV Rally 2001 - see detailed photo-report.

Yes, the inconvenient truth is that way back in 1999 upstart, defiantly disruptive Mitsubishi engineers broke ranks, broke the rules and,yes, went way too far, way too soon for Big Auto and the media that serves it(and itself..).

Why-oh-why let sleeping dogs .. 'lie' ?!
So whilst were all obviously exceedingly pleased that BMW is now working to catch up with and overtake the competition, you may have noticed that we have no intention of EVer forgetting or burying the hard-won real EV legacy that the auto industry and most of our corporate media still steadfastly refuse to publicly acknowledge or admit to - let alone applaud and celebrate.

Oh yes - just a little more BMW-related memory-jogging whilst were in the groove: the BMW MiniE - like the Venturi Fetish, Tesla Roadster etc - owes its performance - its very existence - to its Tzero/AC Propulsion-derived drivetrain-plus-battery platform.

And no - despite so many media reports to the contrary - BMW did not invent the term "EV Smile" in 2009 - see Forbes magazine(1998) and our own EVUK 2006 article re
magic car-pets, EV Smiles, Modec electric vanguards etc.(See Base Notes, below)

So again - the one burning question that almost no-one knows to ask must be:  does BMW have the bottle, the stomach to attempt a 24 hour Guinness challenge ?(ah yes - we've all been there !)

Does the ActiveE have sufficient "Efficient Dynamics" to
Break Mitsubishi's World record - 11 years on ?

Mitsubishi FTO team 1999
Mitsubishi FTO and the efficient, dynamic, disruptive team to beat...

One immediate snag of course is that the 2010 BMW ActiveE currently takes 3 hours to "fast-charge" just 100 miles/160 km of range. Thus - as things stand - in order to reach the 1999 target distance of 2,142 km  13-14(!) three hour recharge pit-stops would be needed. So, 40 hours at a standstill ..literally "charging" nowhere - plus another 20 hours or so actually moving/driving at around 70mph.
Hmm...sixty hours in total for the BMW ActiveE to achieve what Mitsubishi's efficient, dynamic trailblazers pulled off in just one day in 1999.


Base Notes:
- Disruptive Technology(Wikipedia) - term used "to describe innovations that improve a product or service in ways that the market does not expect".
And that powerful vested interests usually don't want !


January, 2010

EV's - a stimulus package on wheels

Build Your Dream Economy - BYD & DIY ...
BYD e6 Video Detroit Jan 2010 Video  - Solar Water Heaters China - New Scientist
Pipedream ? Can Britain's eco-refusenik, clunk-headed, Clarksonite car dealerships be persuaded to run green joint promotions ? (Click for clips - and join dots !)

Forget Trickle Down - it's time for green . . .

. . .  Power Up ! economics

An EV-driven, people-driven green economic recovery is possible, argues EVUK's Paul Govan -
- but car dealerships and EV manufacturers must be persuaded and incentivized to launch a wide range of imaginative greentech, energy/cash-saving joint promotions and tie-ins with green businesses, industries and agencies on a local, national and global scale.

We'll call it (remember - you heard it here first..):

Electric Carbon Trading

That's right - Forget Eco Summits-for-Nuffin and Cash for Clunker cul-de-sacs - it's time for something/summit infinitely smarter, more stimulating, synergetic, symbiotic, cross-fertilizing and poly-pollinating - it's time for green ..

- Cash for Catalysts

- Greenbacks for Green Packs

So here's the vision, here's the dream. Laid out and spelt out.
A shout-out perhaps to all wannabe and actual Warren Buffetts of this world(as in BYD - Build, Buy, Be Your Dreams....).

Get a flavour of what we hope to see and savour when we breeze by or into car-showrooms or flick thru newspapers & magazines or accidentally forget to flip channels(it can happen) during TV ad-breaks :

- Half-price solar water heaters with every EV/plug-in sold ! Save £400 on normal price !
Slash electricity bills !
Or
- Free home energy & cash-saving kit with every EV - consisting of:
2x Standby Busting remote control mains switches.
2x Standby-Saver Ecotek socket boards(see Base Notes, below)
Plus! A dozen 100,000 hour, state-of-the-art, gallium nitride ultra low-energy home LED light bulbs (See The Guardian: Prof Colin Humphrys)
Or
- Free with every EV: blackout-busting modular 100 Watt solar/PV starter kit. Cut & trim electricity bills. Never lose your power ! (100 watts is sufficient to power a laptop plus low-energy light-bulb)
Or
- Free Home Energy audit with every EV/plug-in - plus special discount deals on home insulation !!
Or
- Free folding electric or push bike with every EV - easily fits in boot/trunk. Park & Bike Ride !
Or
- Free folding electric scooter with seat & briefcase/shopping basket. Park & Scoot !
Or
- Free with every EV: family 30 trip bus/tram/transit pass valid for a year with every EV sold !
Or
- Free £300 green gift voucher to spend on any energy-saving product of your choice at Home Base, B&Q, Home Depot, Currys, Lowes and other participating stores !
Or
- Free 50 x full "Freedom of the Road" EV recharges at Sainsburys, Asda, Comet, Currys - and many other outlets. Valid for one year from date of purchase !
Or
- £100 Green Switch cashback ! Switch to green electricity when you purchase this EV - and get £100 loyalty cashback after 1 year, £50 after 2 years !

  ... etc etc etc - the poly-pollinating possibilities are endless ...

What ? Solar water heaters in car showrooms ? Displayed next to EV's and plug-ins ?
A pipedream ?

Or Build Your Dreams ?
Sure , the green synergetic showroom rEVolution will almost certainly begin in more freely and rapidly innovative regions of the world - China, India, California - but instant web-enabled public awareness - punter power - will almost certainly persuade even the most corporately clunk-headed, clog-headed, Clarksonite countries and companies to quickly follow suit and get with the stimulus programme.

*************

So here we are - 2010 at last. The long, painfully long-awaited year of the EV watershed has finally arrived.
No more treading water, no more drowning in excuses, no more hollow promises. The catastrophic, stuck-in-traffic waiting-game has played itself out and the fast-lane beckons ..

True - it is all sadly, even tragically, happening a decade later than it could & should have - but late can only be better than nEVer. This is surely one New Year's REVolution that won't fade away.

So - time to rEVvvv up, rEVitalize, rEVive, re-energize, rewire and fast-charge(no trickling please ..) the world's flat-drained economic batteries.
The EV genie is finally out of the bottle - let the magic begin.

Does anyone still not get what we're driving at ?!

A green Economic Recovery - people-driven, EV-driven - could be, should be, must be just around the corner. At your local car showroom, for instance.
Car dealerships and EV's serving as key job-spawning economic drivers, hubs, market motors, magnets and movers.
But it's up to us.

We can't leave it to CNBC & Co to replace or radically rebalance dis-credit-ed
Trickle Down, P*ssed On From A Great Height economics with democratizing, decentralizing, smartgrid-enabled  . . .
      . . .    Power Up ! economics.


Base Notes:

Standby Saver socket board strip   Standby Saver socket board/strip - almost unknown and unreported outside Britain. No mention yet either in Wikipedia's Standby Pages

Standby Buster remote control mains switch  Standby Busting remote control mains switches(right) - again, scarcely reported by mainstream media.


BYD Boss Chinas Richest Man Buffett-backed BYD boss Wang Chuanfu is China's Richest Man(Business Insider)
- solar entrepreneurs also rank among the country's wealthiest ...


September, 2009

Moira G's in Japan(again) -

- watch excl. new MiEV / RAV4 EV clips !

Well, it looks as if September's edition of our august August comments May have to wait a while: EVUK's Moira Govan has just up/downloaded a refreshing little pack of time-tripping
future now
clips from Fukuoka and Tenjin, Japan, where she's been teaching, learning, yearning etc ....

"Back to the Future"(RAV4,MiEV) meets "Found In Translation" you might say...

OK - enough ! We'll let the clips speak for themselves already:

We welcome you to Fukuoka !

MiEVs at the Mall:
Earth Vehicle Home Charging etc promo

MiEV promo video - Home Sweet Home-Charging:
MiEVs Shopping Mall

Two days later all 2000 MiEV's have been sold:
MiEVs Sold Out Birdie
..yes - you can hear birds twittering when driving an EV...

Shopping Mall - Lucky Dip clip:
more MiEVs Shopping Mall

From MiEV to RAV4: "Back to the Future" meets
"Lost-and-Found in Translation":
RAV4 insider
Moira's..er..film shorts by the way - according to most critics - work on many different levels - stylishly unstylish, no special effects, very pink - and yet very green ...

My 11 year(!) RAV4 EV journey: from Jersey in the Channel Islands to Hollywood(Ed Begley) - and now Japan revisited:
outside RAV4 - pink shorts

Driving RAV4 EV, very politely, in Fukuoka:
Driving RAV4 EV in Fukuoka

Driving and filming from inside RAV4 EV:
Driving RAV4 EV in Fukuoka
...sadly no twittering birds to be heard here(see MiEV promo above)



Back to 1998:
Moira London 1998 to SF & LA
Yes, 1998: watch Moira G's first beamed up by Scotty film short:
London to LA & San Francisco - a Voice in the Wilderness

Ah yes, 1998 ! The world wide-eyed web would surely soon deliver the green tech, green energy, sustainable
soluton-revolution we so urgently needed.
By 2000 -   or  2001 perhaps ?

August, 2009

August comment
Summer summary
Quiet optimism

So - you're wondering - where the EVUK have you guys been all summer ?
Well, let's just put it..spin it this way: if our Ponzi'd politicians can enjoy an excessive mid-depression, mid-recession recess at our expense - then why shouldn't we - and all their victims ?

But then again, why do we pay the elephants & bulls just to stay out of the china shop for a couple of months ?
Why not pack them off to Madoff correctional centres - together with a selection of our finest, homegrown and ever-so expert financial/political TV punditry/banditry?
And by "correctional" we mean part rehab, part penitentiary, part sweet revenge - enforced with oodles, nay, lashings of 3-line Whip discipline ...
Just add Big Brother-style fly-on-the-wall TV cameras, TV crew and .... then brainstorm for killer title: we'll go with:


"The Laughing Stock"

Talking of stocks: high-tech, electrified medieval, village green-type stocks would provide a key ratings feature -
  "In The Stocks". (with a view to permanent use on green outside Westminster...)

Ah yes - forget those rotten vegetables. We're talking live-wired Electric Shock Stocks here. Voltage and victims to be determined by viewer phone-vote numbers. Remember folks:
    "Votes = Volts !"
(Naturally, for ethical and environmental reasons, 100% renewable green electricity would be used at all times).
In The Stocks
People power - just add electric power - and Re-Volt !
Guilty as charged.

Oh - and whilst we're brainstorming - let's not forget the unique waterboarding & torture suite...where water is tastefully replaced by wine - Chardonnay, claret - not least for the interesting inner conflict and confusion it could cause:
"Aaah ! Stop ! Please - can we try the claret instead ? Gosh, I say - what a delightful nose..a vintage to die for ! " etc etc.

(In Vino Veritas ? So why not experiment with wine-boarding...wine & cheeseboarding...smorgasboarding ?)

But what in the EV World - you may ask - has all this got to do with electric cars ?
Well, the answer comes in 2 parts:
1) EVerything
2) who cares ... when you're having (post-depression, mid-recession) fun ?
(...to be continued)

Note: this belated, just-in-time, Quietly optimistic EVUK piece will expand and grow organically - so expect even more unseasonably seasoned and august thoughts - September thru November, December ...and beyond)

In The Stocks
Stocks to Watch

June, 2009

Fiat - electric Panda - quando ?
We talk to Italy's EMN TV...

Fiat Panda Cross SUV
Watch non-electrified Fiat Panda Cross take on VW Cross

We may be wrong, but no-one out there in the ever-expanding twitosphere, blogosphere or ever-shrinking & sinking corporate media seems to have been covering most of our Fiat-focused Q's over the past few months - so we decided to contact our long-suffering fellow EVangelist Marcelo Padin - creator and co-presenter of Milan-based Electric Motor News TV(EMN TV) .

When, we asked, are we likely to see a re-incarnated, all-electric Fiat(-Chrysler) Panda ?

A quick jog down memory lane for you : Fiat did present a fuel cell version of the Panda in 2006 and indeed way back in 1990 a worthy but heavily lead-laden 2-seater Fiat Panda Elettra hit the streets(hard !) ... and in 1992 a 100 km/h, 77 km/charge flightier version was rolled out. So the precedents are there - Italian roads are paved - or potholed - with good and green intentions.

And would Marcelo prove willing to break another taboo and risk speculating as to how much influence or control the Italian mafia now exerts over Fiat's operations - dealerships, unions, parts supply-chain etc ? (But given that a Russian bank - Sberbank - has just more or less taken over Opel, is there really any point any more in asking exactly who is running the whole smoke & mirrors shebang ? )

Prego, Signor Padin, what exactly is the grapevine gossip over there in Italy ?
Here's part of what Marcelo told us:

"As regards the all-electric FIat Panda · some unofficial sources have explanied that it will probably be manufactured at Fiat's Termini Imerese facility near Palermo which was recently re-opened after being shut down for several months due predictably to economic reasons and the need to cut production..."
"I also understand that Fiat are to receive 46 million Euros from the EU as part of various initiativis to fund the development of green cars."
"The electric Panda could obviously be developed on the same platform as the Fiat Phylla - a prototype unveiled last year."

Fiat Phylla Electric Solar
Watch EMN TV report - Fiat Phylla

"As for your "Mafia - la mia Fiat etc?" question: sincerely, I really don't think that the mafia have made business in-roads into Fiat for the simple reason that it's a company that's now under a lot of control in Italy... I think that the mafia is more focused on grabbing political power..." (EVUK Ed: "..so just like so many unscrupulous, sordid, scandal-ridden industry lobbyists then...see Siemens, VW, EDF...").
"Can I just add that I now have a partner with an electric vehicles shop - "Zio Presti" - in Bergamo (50 km from Milan, Google map) and if possible I would like to promote some type of tourist initiatives around e-bikes or e-scooters. Bergamo is very near the Orio al Serio Airport... and it's a tourist city. "
Perfect Plug.
Grazie Marcelo!

And finally, from vintage Italian grapevine gossip and reasonably reliable rumours to a little wistful wishful-thinking with a purpose("Be/Build Your Dreams", right?)....
.... venturing one giant leap further than Autobloggreen's Jeremy Korzeniewski - we surely cannot be alone, can we, in seriously fancying an electric or plug-in version of the Fiat Panda Cross(sub-compact SUV) ?
It would certainly appeal to those millions of Americans - and eco-confuseniks elsewhere - still reluctant to fully surrender SUV-style, strut, "status".

Fiat Panda Cross SUV
Video: an acrobatic stretched giant Panda XL - a crowd-pleaser if ever there was one.

Then perhaps, at some point, wheel-motors - like those recently demonstrated by Zap and before them by Mitsubishi, Quiet Cars, GM...). could be fitted. This would also free up considerable front-end luggage space ie. two boots for the price of one or - for our American audience - a spacious pair of trunks.
And how's about a stretched Panda at last ? A - relatively speaking - "giant" Panda Stretch XL ?
A slightly longer(20 cm- ish ?) and wider(6 cm -ish) version of the standard car - again not just for the downsizing US market: Brits, Europeans, Aussies and, of course, Panda-besotted Chinese consumers would surely eagerly embrace a stretched Panda ...

Super lithium update -
- the Italy-USA nanowire connection: universities of Stanford & Milano-Bicocca in cutting-edge collaboration (see Green Car Congress, Jan 2009 update)

Sept 2009 (you're definitely hearing it here first - even Milan-based EMN TV were surprisingly unaware of this upcoming event ! ) :

Dr Yi Cui Nanowire lithium
The Stanford nanowire team's "principle investigator" Dr. Yi Cui is to speak at Milano-Bicocca university (Summer School in Materials Science 14-19 Sept '09) - click for full details

(Update: Dr Cui has agreed to talk to EMN TV during his visit to Milano Bicocca University in September)

Review:

- Original(December 2007) - Stanford News report :
"Nanowire Battery Can Hold 10 Times the Charge of Existing Lithium-ion Battery"

- Google Video: Dr. Yi Cui discusses "Nanowires and Nanocrystals for Nanotechnology"

- GM-Volt.com (December 2007) interview with Dr. Yi Cui

"Ten times the charge" - can we suggest that headline-writers adopt the term "Factor 10" lithium - or better still - the Roman Numeral form - "Factor Ⅹ" lithium?

And although researchers and academics may sniff a little, it is surely now time to accept the tabloid-friendly term "super lithium" - after all even The Sun is finally getting revved up about EV's and our own homegrown Scottish/British Kings of Li-ion at St.Andrews - see
" Wizz Brits' Battery Runs on Air"(!)  Sadly The Sun's agenda is 100%
clear: nuclear.
See EVUK's exclusive 2007 Q&A with St.Andrews'..er.."Wizz Brit" Professor Peter Bruce.

We are currently tryng to establish - with EMN TV's assistance - if Fiat are involved in, or indeed aware of, this potentially, game-changing Milan-Stanford lithium nanowire - Factor 10 - Factor X - R&D collaboration. (Update will follow soon)
We're also hoping of course that Marcelo Padin of EMN TV will be able to provide an on-canera interview - come September - with Dr. Cui (aka Professor Cui) and one or two of his Milano-Bicocca university colleagues.

April, 2009

Denmark's "Yes" to electric cars..
and No! to nuclear power

Denmark No Nuclear EVs
Listen to DW radio's Living Planet report(April 17th,2009) in English.
Download as MP3

Yes - this is what can happen when your Prime Minister's brother does not(sssh!) work as Director of Corporate Communications at EDF Nuclear Energy (cf. Gordon / Andrew Brown...no photos please!).

Or when your President (cf. Nicolas Sarkozy) does not double, unofficially, as globetrotting, lead-seeking Head of EDF International Sales.

It also helps of course if your country's capital city(ie. Copenhagen) is to host the world's next major global Climate Conference.

Read Living Planet report summary here.

(Note: DW radio - thankfully - bears no resemblance whatsoever to DW (Deutsche Welle) television - without doubt one of the most corporately correct, self-censoring, starch-suited, irony-free, executive-hotel-room televison networks out there.)

Nuclear Spin homepage.

April, 2009

EDF Nuclear spies targeted UK/French truth-tellers,activists

Quelle surprise ! Quelle coincidence !
Quel spooky Sixième Sens !
Or maybe not...

Yes - just hours after we posted up our prophetic little
Green Denmark v. Brown(x2) Britain piece above - the EDF nuclear spies news broke - or was quietly & tellingly ignored - worldwide.

It was reported by(among others):

Wall St. Journal
Financial Times
Democracy Now
Greenpeace

- and as conspicuously / predictably ignored by almost all corporate TV outlets incl. www.bbc.co.uk and Channel 4 whose "green pages" , incidentally, are sponsored by none other than...EDF Nuclear Energy.

This all begs the wider question of course as to just how far the nuclear industry(and the governments that covertly/overtly support them) are willing to go - not just in order to stifle dissent and to silence or intimidate potential whistleblowers etc - but in order to turn life-time, die-hard opponents into suddenly(and suspiciously) loyal proponents.

December, 2008

EVUK Quiet Car video shoot exclusive
  - Moira Govan reports

(Quiet recap: see EVUK report "Quiet Car Co. powered by top British li-ion & wheel-motor pioneer Steve Green" )

Quiet Car2
EVUK video: Quiet Car 2 in the New Forest

   Boy - what an EVentful weekend I had.
Things stormed off to an other-worldly, dream start when Steve Green swished up at Brockenhurst train station to take me to his Lymington home about 12 miles away in his now very desirable and rock-solid Citroen Desire EV conversion which he of course 'electrified' himself in less time than it takes a gaggle of root cause politicians to bail out yer average middle-of-the-road major-minor auto giant.

Moira at Wheel of Citroen Desire EV

The Citroen, incidentally, now boasts a very real battery range of 200 miles thanks to recently installed...um,er...Zebra sodium nickel chloride batteries.
Of course it would by now be powered by nth generation nanotech-enhanced 300+ miles/charge low cost lithium batteries if...if.. our utterly / literally / irreversibly dis-credit-ed and confidently clueless political, media, automotive, financial establishment had heeded (rather than arrogantly ridiculed, ignored and misrepresented..) the advice and warnings of EV and Green Tech progressives a decade ago before the vapourous Greed Tech bubble inevitably burst in 1999-2000.
In other words, 20-20 foresight would be a wonderful thing if only the ruling idiotocracy and the incurious public at large - the malleable masses (see new climate change film: The Age of Stupid) would once and for all not just learn the lessons of history but act on them.

But I digress...unapologetically.

So where was I ? Ah yes, Lymington .... where we silently merged to form an electric vehicle convoy - a quiet threesome - led by genial Quiet Car Co. founder Vaughan Richmond and his( wake up now, petrolheads) strikingly beautiful, smart(both senses) Swiss wife.

But this was all so surreal - this feeling of having suddenly leapt forward in time from the train station through a Harry Potter-style railway-platform portal into the enlightened and brave new world we've all been hoping and campaigning for for so long ... with real life fact joyously replacing fantasy as we all coolly overtook an unsuspecting and admittedly non-adversarial £30,000 BMW on the way to Vaughan's club where we gathered around a roaring log fire to warm once again to the now red-hot topic(it's everywhere you look) of energy-saving, planet-saving, Detroit-saving, face-saving, cash-saving, livelihood-saving electric cars.
That 12 mile journey by the way - as Vaughan pointed out - would have cost the BMW driver around £1.50 's worth of fuel - the Quiet Car 2 got there on less than 20 p !

Anyway - enough blather already ! Quiet please !
Time to let Steve Green and Quiet Car company founders Vaughan Richmond, Mike Hedger and their assorted EV's do the talking.

EVUK Video Gallery:

EV Convoy Citroen EV, Quiet Cars 1 and 2 - overtake BMW and Vaughan Richmond compares cost of driving 12 miles in £30,000 BMW to Quiet Car 2:
EV Convoy Overtake BMW Vaughan and Quiet Car2
Steve Green explains how to double current range of Quiet Car2 - Vaughan relates mass production plans of Quiet Cars:
Steve and Quiet Car2 Vaughan and Quiet Car2
Steve pleads(*see Base Notes re pleading politicians..Top Gear pay deals etc) for Government funding to make affordable, 150-200 miles/charge family EV's a reality for 2009:
Steve Green Govt funding
Quiet Car 2 sets off for a spin in the New Forest:
Quiet Car2 in New Forest  Quiet Car2 in New Forest
EV Convoy:
EV Convoy  EV Convoy
Quiet Car 2 on the road - Vaughan reveals Desmond Swayne MP will order a Quiet Car:
Quiet Car2 on the road  Inside Quiet Car2
Mike Hedger on global interest in Quiet Cars :
Mike Hedger and Global Orders for Quiet Car
Steve Green describes his 200 miles/charge Citroen Desire EV:
Steve Green and Citroen Desire EV
Citroen Desire EV overtakes "exhaust'ed smokers" on route to Southampton:
Citroen Desire EV overtakes ICE-cars
Citroen Desire EV on return journey - Southampton to Lymington - approx 40 miles: Steve Green estimates cost:
Citroen Desire EV in front of Southampton BR Station   Steve Green on cost of 20 mile journey in EV

EVUK Photo Gallery:

EVUK's Moira Govan with the 200 miles/charge Citroen Desire EV (photos only):
Moira and Citroen Desire EVStage
Moira at Wheel of Citroen Desire EV
Citroen Desire EV:
Citroen Desire EV
Citroen Desire EV Recharging
Quiet Car2:
Quiet Car2
Three EV's:
Quiet Car2

Quiet Car Company homepage.


Base Notes:
 .  The GM-EVUK-Quiet Car connection - or Three Degrees of Separation.
As we mentioned in our earlier piece: when company director Vaughan Richmond began scouting around for a talented EV specialist to help convert Chinese vehicles he at first contacted experts in the US/Calfornia: one of those happened to be Gary Starr of Zap...who had read EVUK's various reports over the years describing Steve Green's unique and trailblazing(lithium and wheel motors) Jester EV project.
Firstly it was indeed a bizarre stroke of luck or fate that Steve like Vaughan was based in the quiet little idyll of Lymington.

But it gets better: shortly after Quiet Car's appearance at the Brit Motor Show in July a couple of GM engineers paid a non-covert visit to the company's modest premises in Lymington to investigate how Steve et al were dealing with the various challenges associated with in-wheel motors. Those Three Degrees of Fate: if Zap's Gary Starr had not read about Steve Green in EVUK, GM would not have had cause to visit Lymington because the Quiet Car 2 would definitely not now be powered by SOA in-wheel motors.

 .  At present - at very low speeds - the Quiet Car does make some noise. But a new and more sophisticated controller - due for delivery in January - will eliminate this so-called "cogging" noise altogether.

 .  Pleading for funds & pleading politicians.
Compare & contrast: Top Gear presenters recently demanded and were gifted a rumoured £1 million each - that's £3 million for three presenters every year
. As always our compliant, adoring corporately correct media herd utters barely a word of criticism.
No mention of the fact that over the past 7-8 years in particular the toxic, divide & conquer mantra of Top Gear has been roughly as follows:

"Bl**dy environmentalists...bl**dy political correctness...bl**dy PC brigade ...bloody cyclists...we hate electric cars".

Yep, that's right, £3 million a year demanded for persuading the eco-hostile, malleable masses that life is just one long heroic crusade against political correctness.

- So Steve, Vaughan, Mike - please demand £5 million - with menaces if need be !
As for pleading politicians and their media cheerleaders: after the last catastrophic 5-10 years it is clearly 95% of politicians and "expert" media pundits who should be pleading - in vain, of course - for their jobs.(Sorry guys - but those black box suits and power  red ties just can't hide the awful, naked truth...)

Black Suit Red Tie Naked Emperors  Black Suit Red Tie Naked Emperors  Black Suit Red Tie Naked Emperors  Black Suit Red Tie Naked Emperors
Off with their heads ! (ie. use them or lose them..)
That's right guys -- when all else fails - reach for those trusty black box suits  and power  red ties ...

October, 2008

Rays of Hope:
Google backs Smartgrids, renewables,Nanosolar, EV's,Tesla, plug-ins
- opposes nuclear& coal

(Conference call, Oct 27-28)

Follow the Smart Money - as smart private and institutional investors avoid high cost, high risk nuclear like the plague , who will the nuclear flip-floppers side with now ?
With John McCain, the Brown Brothers(Gordon, Andrew), Nicolas Sarkozy..Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ?
Or with Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin ?

Who has an unequalled track record of rapidly delivering extraordinarily intelligent, elegant, low-cost/no-cost solutions almost anywhere in the world - smart solutions that just 20 years ago would have been confidently dismissed by most "experts" - and by the doubting James Lovelock's of this world - as impossible, ridiculous ?
EDF.org (clean, green) backs smart grids, smart solutions, the democratization of power supply(book etc) - whilst...

EDF.fr and Gordon far-from-green Brown condemn Britain to high cost, high risk nuclear future.

EDF Env. Defense Fund Book
Environmental Defense Fund's smart, green energy solutions: "The Race to Reinvent Energy and Stop Global Warming"

Green-Brown betrayal: The Independent capitulates to EDF/Brown Bros nuclear agenda
whilst..
.. The Guardian's Oliver Tickell stands firm

For the past 5-6 years The Independent has sought to attract and capitalize/cash in on the (inevitably) disaffected left with regular climate change-focused front pages and supplements - now, sadly, it all turns out to have been little more an elaborate pretext to advance the Brown/Sarkozy/EDF nuclear agenda.

So what was it that finally won over all those nominally "independent" journalists ? The EDF corporate hospitality, the rugby/rugger sponsorhip with those ever-so tasteful '20 metre-long "EDF Nuclear" - sorry, "EDF Energy" - logos 3D'd across the pitch and across TV screens up and down the land - even on the BBC ?

Funny too isn't it how EDF - like British Energy (formerly British Nuclear Fuels) have tried so very hard to hide, to bury that most embarrassing and inconvenient of core words - "nuclear".
We should all be very wary indeed when even the company name is a cover-up, a shameless PR euphemism, a bare-faced lie, deception by omission ...)

Or perhaps it was the all-you-can-eat haute cuisine that sealed the deal, the sellout-buyout with integral multi-billion Euro open sesame bribe - not to mention all those irresistible, deliciously haute couture'd PR "assistants" - so ready, willing and able to service almost any and every gastronomic and post-prandial pecadillo ?

"Britain's Family Uranium is Safe in French Hands" (Independent) - without doubt one of the most shamelessly sycophantic pieces of corporate journalism we've ever cast eyes on: we strongly suggest switching asap from The Independent to The Indypendent" and Indymedia - and naturally from EDF.fr to EDF.org - the Environmental Defense Fund.

And of course we have seen scarcely any condemnation anywhere in the corporate media - by our single hymn-sheet corporate chorus-line - of the outrageous banana republican nuclear nepotism involved in the EDF buyout/bribe: did Gordon Brown's brother Andrew(EDF PR), we wonder, personally pour the chardonnay & champagne and pass around the truffles and canapés at all those UK and Parisian press junkets and jamborees ?
The Guardian's Andrew Tickell thankfully denounces every aspect of the sellout & buyout and lays out a summary of all the genuinely smart green affordable safe solutions that the German government, for instance, is still being robustly obliged to fast-track. (Merkel would almost certainly have capitulated too by now were it not for the country`s uniquely resolute, (eco-)technologically savvy and future-oriented media, Green Party activists etc.)

Must read: "Nuclear Isn't Necessary"(Nature)
- the perfect antidote to all those nuclear flip-floppers, vacillators & capitulators - the James Lovelock's, George Monbiot's, Sir David King's... those Englishmen, male Anglo Saxons of a certain age and background who have stopped believing that the "impossible" is possible , have forgotten that the greatest achievements, innovations and inventions have often proven that the impossible is not only possible - but that the "new possible" can transform - even revolutionize - the way we live, think, prosper, progress and evolve as a species.

September, 2008

BBC uses EV's as pretext to push nuclear & coal

Yes - surprise surprise - just a couple of months after we posted the following pre-emptive "premonition":

".. we will need all the free speech TV we can get if we're to stand any chance of preventing EV's being used as a 'fool most of the people' pretext for building hundreds more CO2 and waste-burying coal & nuclear power-plants around the globe(..not that the majority of Johnny-come-lately EV fans and converts seem to give a dime or a damn about anything except high gas/petrol prices ...) ..."

But the temptation would always prove too great for nuclear/coal lobbyists, yobbyists, opportunists and their BBC allies who have just cooked up the following cunningly mistitled crock of corporate service "journalism"
(extract from ""Plug-in Hybrid Boosts Electric Motoring" ):

This "electrification of transport" is particularly good news for the nuclear industry, which will see its share of the overall energy mix grow dramatically in the years ahead, both in the UK and across the world, according to John Ritch, director general of the World Nuclear Association."

"The launch could mark a dramatic change in how drivers spend money on automotive "juice", as the power generation industry - be they coal fired power stations such as Drax or nuclear power firms such as British Energy - enters the market. "

The China Syndrome - Jack Lemmon
The China Syndrome(5-star clip): rarely shown in nuclear and would-be nuclear nations - despite the all-star cast and multiple awards...

So here's perhaps the ultimate antidote from Greenpeace - an essential read for all proactively amnesiac nuclear shoulder-shruggers: "Nuclear Hazards: The Dangers of Operating Nuclear Reactors in the 21st Century,"

Related news - re the dirty tactics of predatory dinosaurs:
 -  Shell, Chevron, US Govt officials in sex, drugs, bribery scandal

 -  Volkswagen & Union officials in bribery & brothels scandal

Of course the above scandals involve government officials and union leaders - not journalists: the very idea that hard-working hacks could be - or would need to be - seduced or compromised by similar or lesser "treats" or favours is obviously completely outrageous.

As widely reported in the press, they always make their excuses and leave....

August, 2008

Rod Wilde: "Tell EVUK'ers to watch my new EV show on Discovery TV! "

(.. and you just don't say "No" to Roderick "Suck Amps" Wilde - alias "Hot Rod" / "Lightning Rod" / "The King of Electric Drag Racing" - a man of many extraordinary EV Parts )

Range Rover takes on Wilde electric Land Rover in Arizona desert on Planet Green..
Planet Green Wilde Arizona
Planet Green goes Wilde (Part I): the 21st century alternative to the BBC's "Antiques Road Show" - aka Top Gear

Planet Green Wilde Arizona  Planet Green Wilde Arizona
Planet Green goes Wilde Part II & Part III

Planet Green Wilde Arizona 4
... and Part IV - the killer hill climb

Planet Green - Action Planet - UK/EU Tumbleweed TV :

  - Planet Green TV is, to date, predictably(and ironically) not available in ever-so Kyoto-committed Britain/Europe - but is of course precisely the kind of stereotype-crushing, action-driven environmental programming that we've long been calling on UK/EU broadcasters to provide - still without success.

Alas, even our own slam-dunk "Action Planet" title suggestion has so far failed to persuade the BBC to do the right thing. (Memo to BBC TV execs:  for a modest sum that title could still be your intellectual property - we promise not to tell ..)

See also: EVUK-Wilde Q&A August 2007

(Greased) Lightning Rod Wilde
Born to be Wilde ...

Planet Green - New York Times
New York Times reports launch of Planet Green on Discovery Channel (US only !)


Lion on Land Rover .. and finally, from Arizona to Africa ...

Zero CO2 Rally Africa coordinator Peter Collingwood tells us that the inaugural rally has been postponed until June/July 2009 or Jan/Feb 2010.

But wait ! Are you thinking what we're hinting?
That delay need not be so negative if it were to tempt Discovery TV to jump on board... with a Planet Green Dream Team !

Headed up perhaps by Mr. Wilde himself - aided and abetted by Tommy Lee(see Planet Green's Battleground Earth) and with - dream on - Ludacris, Will.i.am(Black Eyed Peas, Live Earth show-stealer ) and reality show fave Flava Fav battling it out whilst re-Discovering their green / black African roots..?

What a ride - compulsive viewing, surely ?


August, 2008

Exclusive! Quiet Car Co: powered by top British li-ion & wheel-motor pioneer Steve Green

Unsurprisingly it's quickly become a widespread blog-FAQ:

"This Quiet Car Company - who the dickens are they - and where did they 'suddenly' and silently appear from ?"

Quiet Car 2 lithium hub Yes - a gaping name recognition void urgently needs to be filled - so now would seem like a very good time to share a little exclusive, essential, eye-opening background info with a possibly puzzled populus...

Two weeks ago - just after posting up our Brit Motor Show piece(below) we decided out of the blue to renew long-lapsed contact with Steve Green of Greener Energy(li-ion Jester EV) - just to ask for a general update on Life, the Universe and EVerything Green...

"I've been working with The Quiet Car Company...." began the completely unexpected, uncannily well-timed response !

Wow - what a revelation, what a game-changer, what a void-filler !

Why exactly? Well, at this point - with major trusted(relatively speaking) manufacturers poised to move in - consumer/customer confidence is the name of the EV game: confidence in the product, confidence in the company - and above all - confidence in the long-term future and viability of both.

Anyway, we have now spoken at length again with Lymington-based Steve Green(much of what he's told us is still hush-hush) and feel quietly confident that this new but surprisingly very well-connected company could in fact be uniquely positioned to genuinely deliver on its ambitious low-price, high-tech promises.
(Odd to reflect that less than a month ago we - like almost everyone else - had never heard of the Quiet Car Company...)

Back to 2003 - and Quiet Car's trailblazing lithium legacy ...
Jester EV
Steve Green's 200 miles/charge, 70 mph lithium-powered Jester EV not only beat Lightning by a couple of years it achieved UK Dept of Transport approval - and graced a very Green wedding - almost two years before Tesla Motors, the NICE Car Company or the new rethunk Th!nk even existed on paper - and at a time when a fledgling company by the name of GoingGreen(G-Wiz) was still based (oddly) only in Leeds.

A few more essential, exclusive Green bullet points:
 -  Hi-Power lithium batteries power the company's line-up and come with a very rare and reassuring 3 year warranty. Steve tells us that the HiPower cells are virtually indistinguishable from the ever-improving ThunderSky cells that have proven so popular with grassroots EV'ers over the past 6-7 years. See long-running UK ThunderSky Discussion Group.
HiPower claim up to 2000 charge cycles and a 6-7 year life-span for certain lithium cells

 -  Quiet little idyll of Lymington(Google map): when company director Vaughan Richmond began scouting around for a talented EV specialist to help convert Chinese vehicles he at first contacted experts in the US/Calfornia. But they recommended he get in touch with Steve Green. And what a bizarre stroke of luck or fate that he too - what are the odds - was based in the quiet little idyll of Lymington(limerick, anyone ?)

   And what a videogenic location - just a short, silently serene e-drive from the Solent, the Isle of Wight, Southampton Docks(and China !), Bournemouth, Poole Harbour, Corfe Castle - and ferries to Jersey, and France(St.Malo and Cherbourg). See Lymington on Youtube: video 1, video 2
Unfortunately no video clips yet of Quiet Cars cruising the South Coast - but we've been hinting as hard as we can...(But why are many EV startups so slow to post video..?)

 -  Quiet lithium-powered E-scooter : 2000 (!) full charge cycles & 40 miles/charge ! Is this what we've been waiting for for so long ? Is this Piaggio's and Vespa's worst nightmare ? An affordable, ultra-durable, alternative to noisy, anti-social, stench-belching, EU-approved(ha!) 2-stroke mopeds ?

Quiet Car 2 lithium hub vs.  Noisy Filthy mopeds


From the EVUK archive:
1) August 2004: Steve Green's "State Visit" to China and ThunderSky factory

2) February 2004: Steve Green's Jester li-ion EV sets UK range record


  Would you like to comment on the above article? Visit Britain's leading - EVUK-linked - EV Discussion, Campaign & Media Watch Group Electric Cars UK.


July, 2008

EV Village - tough questions from cash-strapped consumers needed at Brit Motor Show!

Can it beat the RAV4 EV benchmark of 100,000+ miles on original batteries, up to 120 miles/charge, 75 mph...?
Quiet Car 2
Quiet Car 2: the right look and the right size at the right time - and wheel motors should mean even more interior space.
(PS. does "quiet" also mean the invention of unslammable doors...at last ?)

Whilst there is obviously a part of us that would like to unabashedly shake the hands and kiss the feet of (almost) all of the participants at the inaugural EV Village, tough questions need to be asked: after all, price competition and the pace of technological progress always ultimately depend on how informed, discerning, demanding, sceptical, assertive, pernickety and downright impatient consumers(once known as "people"..) are !

Toughest Question(perhaps) : How many of the EV's on display would pass the 1998 Toyota RAV4 EV benchmark test for instance - now, in the real world...in the sci-fi year of 2008 when "partying like it's 1999" means a retro-bash 24 years after 1984 ?

Remember we're talking here not about concept promises or rolling prototypes but about 10 years of proven electric RAV4 benchmark performance as in: well over 100,000 miles of battery life expectancy, up to 120 mile range, 75 mph, regenerative braking - with around 400 RAV4 EV's still on the road in the US.
And the amusing fact is that if the unmentionable(still taboo in the EU) RAV EV was on display now in the middle of the Green Pavilion at ExCel it's likely that only the Tesla and Lightning would turn more heads.
And even more amusingly - almost all visitors would assume the electric RAV4 to be an all-new concept from Toyota !

Yes, it's a sad fact that even now - with the truth for so many years just a curious Google click away - most casual visitors to the EV Village will still be of the relatively clueless EV newbie persuasion - as in...
"Wow - things have come along way since the Sinclair C5 and the old milkfloat - eh? Ha ha !"

(Though it has to be said that levels of EV ignorance & silence are even more exasperating in Mediterranean, Eastern and "New" European countries - where the corporate, political and media establishment have been able to lose in translation bury, ignore most of the EV developments and news reports in English emanating from the US, Japan and latterly from Northern Europe, India, China ...)

So if you are visiting the Motor Show and the EV Village - please don't hide that brilliant electric light under a bushel of English politeness and restraint. Let rip and keep up the pressure!

We always find it particularly good fun for instance - naturally always incognito - to begin any tete-a-tete with EV company reps by initially selling a dummy and pretending to be just another wide-eyed, average know-nothing "milkfloater" - then gradually, out of the blue, letting slip a few annoyingly informed comments or questions - try this at the NICE Car stand perhaps:

"So - lead acid batteries are the standard option on the Ze-0 ? Hm - so how would life expectancy of those batteries compare say, to the NiMH batteries in a 1998 Toyota RAV4 EV We're talking decade-old technology there of course."(Sprinkle comments & questions with multiple "Of courses"....)

(Continuing ..)
"Many RAV4 drivers in the US say they've managed well over 100,0000 miles on the original batteries of course. In fact I was checking the original Toyota specs just yesterday: 1200 full recharge cycles at up to 120 miles per charge. So they could reach 140,000 miles if they're well looked after - and we're basically talking 1996-1997 technology. "

(Keep pressing - think of all those journalists and "milkfloaters" who won't ...)
"I mean - if you have to replace the Ze-0's lead-acid batteries after just 20,000 miles - for the best part of £ 2000 - that works out at 10 pence a mile just for the battery."
"It's not such a good deal really is it - in 2008 - 11 years after the RAV4 EV was launched ?! "
(Now really rubbing it in...)
"Don't suppose you went over to the Channel Islands to try the RAV4 when it was in Jersey did you ? I can tell you it's a great drive - no surprise that it was so popular with the police and car rental customers there."
"I drove one in Hollywood in '98 too. Tom Hanks' favourite car until he swapped it for an AC Propulsion eBox of course - an EV with the Tzero pedigree that Nissan have now imitated with the li-ion Denki Cube of course. Adds a whole new twist to the phrase "thinking outside the box !" (ie. two years after AC Propulsion)

NICE Ze-0 lead acid
NICE Ze-0 : if priced at £12,000 for the li-ion version the competition might be quietly concerned...

"Now if the NICE Ze-0 cost £ 12,000 with lithium batteries we'd be blown away - as would the competition. Might even worry Mitsubishi come 2010. But Tata will likely undercut everyone on the block !"
How long before the price of lithium finally drops ? And how on earth can NICE (et al) realistically hope to compete with the Big Boys - on price, performance, battery life come 2010-12 ..when the men-from-the-boys shake-down begins in earnest?"

And - just for fun - why not try these titillating little "Talking Points" at the Tesla stall:

"Do you have any idea how Tesla have managed to keep the price so low - at least compared to the Venturi Fetish ? Most people seem to assume it's being sold as a loss leader."

"The price has crept up a lot though hasn't it - from the initial $89,000 that the "Economist" confidently quoted when it was launched in July 06.(EVUK didn't share that optimism of course - see our 2006 comments re Economist...). That soon became $92,000 and now it's reached... what... $111,000 ?"
"And in Britain the price has gone right through the roof...
Just how much exactly would I have to pay in £ Sterling now - with the dollar so low ? £60,000 maybe?
Of course the car's being built in Britain - so it won't even need to be shipped across the Atlantic - so does that mean I'd pay even less than US customers ??"
What - £79,000 !! You cannot be Siry-ous ! That's around $160,000 - so $70,000 - or 80% - more expensive than the original $89,000 that the Economist reported post-launch in 2006 and over 40% more than the dollar price that US customers will pay. So a lot cheaper to buy in the US and import back to the UK where it's being built !
Who says Americans don't do irony ! "

"And isn't it amazing to think that you wouldn't be standing here at all and Tesla Motors and the Roadster wouldn't exist if it weren't for the Tzero and the AC Propulsion battery & drivetrain platform !"
"Makes you think, eh !? Of course the French got here first - twice - with the Venturi Fetish and the Zooop - both adopted the TZero platform as well of course.

"The jury of gurus is still out - but can you say on the record - for the EV history books - if Tesla have definitely improved on the Tzero drivetrain ?
Of course the Tzero's range was a lot better at 300 miles and the 0-60 time was slightly quicker at just under 3.7 secs - but obviously the Tzero was a much more spartan sports EV. Even ACP's Tom Gage says he won't know if the Tzero drivetrain has truly, genuinely been "improved" by Tesla unless he actually gets to look under the hood himself and take the roadster for an extended freeway spin.... "

So hopefully exhibitors at the EV Village will - by August 3rd - have been subjected not just to well-deserved praise and compliments but to copious, probing questions from an endless procession of unapologetically informed, budget-conscious customers.

And why not ? Let's not forget that just "across the border" - just outside the EV Village - in Petrolhead City - car buffs will have no qualms at all about relentlessly picking the brains of exhibitors right down to the finest, most arcane detail - as would super-savvy visitors to any other expo or fair - consumer electronics, video gaming, mobile phone etc.

So please - if you do possess an all-too rare, encyclopedic knowledge of EV's, EV batteries, drivetrains and the like - past, present and promised - don't hold back.
Let it shine !

See Smartplanet photos: 16 best green cars at EV Village.


July, 2008

CNN Asia's Eco Solutions: Eco Elvis, battery-swap EV's in Nepal, Green Tomato cabs in London

Eco Solution - clip 1:
Eco Elvis sings Compost Hotel
Eco Elvis's heart-rending "Compost Hotel" - a 100% recyclable version of the heartbreaking original.

Sigh! So many "treading water till 2010" EV press releases to wade through - eg. Tesla to build saloon in CAL, Mitsubishi to partner with Peugeot etc ...
... but sorry - all of that has been totally eclipsed for us this month by Eco Elvis's stunningly hilarious double-whammy star-performance on CNN Asia's special July edition of Eco Solutions(a very rare gem of a green TV series formerly titled Global Challenges and highly recommended by us several times us over the past 3-4 years....).

What's more, this month - to kick off CNN's Going Green week - the show was for once(by popular demand?) broadcast primetime in Europe(19.30 CET Sunday). Here in the West it normally occupies what statistically must be the grimmest graveyard slot of the entire TV week - Mondays at 05.00 UK time - presumably to ensure that only the most environmentally dedicated and determined of viewers will tune in and thus minimizing the risk of corporate-political blowback.

Eco Solution - clip 2:
Eco Elvis sings Viva Las Vegans
Eco Elvis sings "Viva Las Vegans"(At 5:25 - fast Forward past Biotour Bus and Heartbreak/Compost Hotel - Viva Las Vegans clip sadly not yet Youtube'd).
OK - while this song may have little to do with electric cars, it is an astonishingly brave piece of free speech corporate television from CNN's Asia affiliate - and we will need all the free speech TV we can get if we're to stand any chance of preventing EV's being used as a 'fool most of the people' pretext for building hundreds more CO2 and waste-burying coal & nuclear power-plants around the globe(..not that the majority of Johnny-come-lately EV fans and converts seem to give a dime or a damn about anything except high gas/petrol prices ...)

Eco Solution - clip 3:
Nepal Katmandu electric minibuses
Nepal(Katmandu) battery-swapping electric minibuses.
Footnote: in 2001 EVUK met up with two very optimistic leading Nepalese EV activists in a West London electric bike shop. But getting electric transport onto Nepal streets has proven to be more of an uphill struggle than any hitech-assisted stroll up nearby Mount Everest.... See Shree Eco Visionary homepage

Eco Solution - clip 4:
CNN Green Tomato Cars Cabs London
Tom Pakenham of London's Green Tomato Cars(cabs) - still no word on long-promised plug-in Priuses however ...

Base Notes:
Eco Elvis homepage. Monty Python, Mom and Pop were seminal influences says the man behind the mask - Matt Riggs. Why not put Eco Elvis on your personal "Watch List"? (After this subversive CNN performance the NSA almost certainly have..)
Personally we'd like to see Eco Elvis hook up with Reverend Billy(clip) and the Church of Stop Shopping's glorious Gospel Choir(clip).
And perhaps Neil Young could lend them his Linc-Volt for the video shoot - with the evergreen Blues Brothers at the wheel - this time on a (carbon-neutral) Mission from Mother Earth ...

CNN Asia Eco Solutions homepage. Let's face it, no UK, European or US-based major TV company(especially not the BBC !) would ever dare to air Eco Elvis singing "Viva Las Vegans" - so why not email Eco Solutions at ecosolutions@cnn.com - as we have - urging them not to be cowed by the Meat Lobby or any other corporate bullies, lobbies etc. who may try to persuade or force CNN to water down its undiluted green solutions ?

June, 2008

Desert solar(1% of Sahara for entire planet) could zap nuclear & coal

Sahara solar(CSP) set to solve water, energy, immigration crises.

CSP - Concentrated Solar Power

CSP Saves The World
Watch "CSP Saves The World" video(T-Shirts also available..)

TREC Desertec Supergrid
Click to watch CNN Just Imagine: Gerhard Knies(CSP/TREC coordinator)

Still confused, non-plussed, sceptical ?
As in "I haven't heard Paxman - or any other smooth-talking, smart-suited political pundit - discussing "CSP" on BBC Newsnight - so it can't be true".

This must surely be some kind of far-fetched. far-out, wacky, hippy, new-fangled, New Age nonsense - or everyone would be talking about it, right?"

Well - think again. And if you need Hollywood visuals or tabloid imagery to fire your imagination - then think perhaps of Christopher Lee and "The Man with the Golden Gun"(you see - we're not talking silver bullets here..) - and recall Scaramanga's awesome solar-powered secret weapon the Solex Agitator.Bond Solex Agitator The following eerily topical wikipedia 007 plot-extract may jog the memory:
"Scaramanga was hired by Hai-Fat to assassinate a British scientist named Gibson, thought to be in possession of solar energy information and technology crucial to solving the energy crisis. Gibson is assassinated and his invention, the solex agitator, is stolen from the crime scene...".

Well, we know of no CSP-related assassinations in the real world to date - but this fantasy-turned-reality, laser-like technology might just as well be "Top Secret" as far as most people are concerned: Concentrated Solar Power is still - scandalously - being denied the regular primetime oxygen of publicity it so clearly deserves in the context of $150-a-barrel oil and a planet in peril from climate change, vanishing resources, the threat of nuclear annihilation and - above all - from weak, lobbied-to-death political leadership.

But hopefully, with the help of a few million informed solar activists - solar agitators if you will - that familiar drumbeat "consensus"(fuelled largely by willful ignorance and lazy group-think) that "nuclear must be part of the energy mix" could soon be blown apart as CSP - Concentrated Solar Power - continues to prove itself in the real world and on an ever more impressive scale.

Main links:

DESERTEC - TREC(Trans-Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation) homepage. Clean Power from Deserts.

TREC UK - watch 2-part interview with TREC UK founder Gerry Wollf. And click here for (Financial) Guardian CSP feature - as (re)commended by TREC.

While it is true that a number of quality TV/press reports about CSP/desert solar have appeared over the past few years, the subject is still - conspicuously - not being woven into the day-to-day 'need for nuclear' mainstream debate.

TREC Desertec Supergrid

A highly efficient, high-voltage('HVDC') Supergrid would transform N.Africa(energy, desalinated water,economic prosperity) and help power all of Europe - day and night.

Sustainable security - avoiding a "Nigerian Nightmare" scenario: the technological challenges have now been met - the key challenge will be to ensure that the ordinary people of N. Africa genuinely reap the rewards - and that energy revenues do not end up in the hands of a wealthy powerful elite - as is so often the case in oil and gas-rich regions of the world.


June, 2008

Neil Young: "EV's - not songs - could change the world"

Neil Young 59 Lincoln

OK - that may be a slight paraphrase - it's music to our ears all the same.
Here's the full quote(from AP's "Neil Young Feels Driven to Work on Electric Car") :

" I thought long ago you could change the world by writing songs. But you can't change the world by writing songs. Oh, you can inspire a few people, get some of them to change their thinking about something. But you can't change the world by writing songs."

"But we could change it with this car."

The legendary Canadian(still !) songster and activist's 2007 worldwide hit "Let's Impeach The President"(official video) seems to precisely prove the "singing in the wind " point - but let's dare to hope that Neil's new-found EVangelism and - talking of unimpeachable presidents - Lincoln Continental hybrid H-Line conversion will help to change a lot more than just the way we drive.
Young has renamed his car the Linc-Volt - so is clearly aware that GM and others 'got there' before him. The Unique - or Unusual - Selling Point here of course is the legendary singer's back-to-the future focus on soulful classic cars.
The times are they a-changin' - at last?
(Click for full Dylan Youtube track - and see Dylan-Obama postcript below)

- Talking of Lincolns and presidents and changing the world - perhaps Barack Obama might think about leaving the campaign bus once in a while and cruising the neighborhood instead in a Linc-Volt emblazoned with suitably 'customized' campaign slogans :

"Driving CHANGE we can SIT in"

"It's the FUEL economy stupid !"

"Elect Electric - vote for a green, black White House"

"100 mpg Lincoln - of the people, by the people, for the people "
(Gettysburg Address,adapted)

And since it was Lincoln who abolished black slavery, the Linc-Volt seems a perfect, symbolic match-up.
But then again - given what befell another president* in '63 in a Lincoln Continental convertible in Dallas - maybe a bomb-proof version of H-Line's "Hummer-Volt" would be a wiser choice. (*OK, Obama isn't President yet - like many, we're jumping the gun a little here)

Videos links:
Video 1: Neil Young driving Lincoln - and explaining "why electric?".

Video 2: Neil Young and ace EV customizer Johnathan Goodwin of H-Line Conversions take Lincoln Continental for a spin.

Video 3: Neil Young, Goodwin, Lincoln - more.

Video 4(June 3, 2008 MSNBC TV) : Forget 100+ mpg and retro time travel: Aptera hybrid 300 mpg how does 330 mpg sound - Jetsons cartoon-style ?
London-Barcelona on just £20's worth of petrol ? Paris for a fiver ?
The 2-seater 90 mph plug-in hybrid Aptera is set for launch in the next 6 months.
A stretched 4-seater seems quite likely before long - according to Aptera' s
FAQ pages.

...from classic 100+ mpg plug-in Lincoln
Aptera hybrid 300 mpg
...to futuristic 300+ mpg plug-in Aptera
- click to watch recent TV report
(June 3, '08: MSNBC Nightly News airs over Europe Mon-Fri 00.30 CET via Astra 19°)

Postscript: sixth sense or what ? The above EVUK piece - including the times are they a-changin' ? line - was posted up by us on June 4th - one day before the Times Online broke the exclusive news - in a very rare interview - that Bob Dylan was (more or less) endorsing Barack Obama.
OK if we use that word 'spooky' once again ?

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