Drive an Electric Vehicle and Never Buy Gas Again
(Page 2 of 9)
April/May 2006
By Bill Moore
The motors of electric cars are elegantly simple — there’s just one moving part, the rotor shaft. Whereas a gasoline engine requires complex emission sensors and controls, as well as catalysts and a muffler to make its exhaust a bit cleaner and less noisy, an EV generates no emissions and is wonderfully quiet in comparison. It also can have surprisingly brisk acceleration and speed. General Motors’ Impact, later re-christened the EV1, once held the land speed record for production electric cars at 183 mph and could go from zero to 60 mph in less than nine seconds. Of course, you give up range when you hotfoot it in an EV. But unlike their distant cousins — golf carts and forklifts — electric cars don’t have to be slackers in performance.
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Gasoline-powered passenger vehicles account for 40 percent of U.S. oil consumption. And as we know all too well these days, much of that oil has to be imported and prices are expected to skyrocket as supplies decline. In contrast, most of our electricity comes from domestic fuel sources — coal, nuclear power, natural gas, hydropower and wind. This means that the more people who choose to drive electric vehicles, the more we can reduce our addiction to imported oil.
Tens of thousands of people already have opted to “go electric” by leaving the family sedan in the garage and driving an electric vehicle, such as the previously mentioned GEM. With sticker prices from about $5,000 to $15,000 and efficiencies equivalent to just pennies per mile, these low-speed “carlets” are catching on. And faster, longer-range models are on the horizon.
Neighborhood Electric Vehicles
The GEM and other low-speed electric cars are referred to as NEVs — neighborhood electric vehicles. They are intended solely for use on slow streets, airports, university campuses and industrial parks where speed is less of an issue than lower operating costs, convenience, and reduced noise and air pollution.
Officially, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) designates NEVs as “low-speed vehicles.” This regulation enables manufacturers to build battery-powered vehicles — usually designed for two to four passengers — that have top speeds of 25 mph. More importantly, the federal government allows these EVs to operate on public roads with speed limits of 35 mph or less, if state and local authorities also approve. To date, 44 states and the District of Columbia have legalized NEVs for these conditions. (Find the NEV laws in your state.) Because mixing slow-moving NEVs with heavier, faster automobile traffic raises safety concerns, NHTSA requires manufacturers to equip their vehicles with a number of safety features, including automobile-grade windshields, wipers, headlights, turn signals and seat belts.
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