Making the Switch to the Electric Car:
Initiatives Governments Can Do:
- Mandate car makers to provide minimum quotas of ZEV’s for all new cars sales.
Join with and encourage other jurisdictions to do the same.
- Upgrade the building codes to require electric plug-ins installed to new
multi-unit residential parking stalls, public parking lots and curb-side
parking meters.
- Until battery electric cars become established, provide free parking or
road toll discounts to ZEV’s including battery electric cars and implement a
fee-bate system to shift demand from internal combustion engine cars to
electric battery and hybrid electrics.
Initiatives Individuals and Businesses can Do:
- Convert your favourite or important ICE vehicles to electric,
or buy an existing electric car.
(Canadian Electric Vehicles, Errington, BC)
- Consider purchasing a neighbourhood electric car
(A low speed vehicle or LSV – limited to 40kmh) if you only
require a car for short distances around your home.
A great car for new and young drivers.
(Dynasty Electric Car Corp, Delta BC; Feel Good Cars, Toronto ON)
- Order a full battery electric car from manufactures now coming
into production. (Tesla Motors; Commuter Cars Corporation;
NICE; Electrovaya; Venturi; Universal Electric Vehicle Corp;
Smart Cars - UK; Hybrid Technologies Inc.;
Phoenix Motorcars, among others)
- At work, provide plug-in outlets to those employees driving
electric cars and plug-in hybrids.
Tell your car company that you want
an electric car. Tell them you can hold off buying another new car until they
have electrics available.
Join VEVA: Learn more, meet other
enthusiasts, source parts and information to do your own conversion.
Other Background information:
The California Air
Resources Board enacted a ZEV sales quota mandate back in 1990. That ZEV
mandate was voted down in 2003 after all the major automakers had built and
provided to the California market a number of successful electric cars,
including the GM EV1 and the Toyota RAV4. The whole episode has been
captured in a movie released last year "Who Killed the Electric
Car?".
The annual cost for electricity
to drive a typical car with an electric motor 20,000 km a year would be
approximately $250 at current prices. A modern electric motor has one
moving part, compared to 640 moving parts in a typical internal combustion
engine (ICE).
VEVA holds an annual Ride Electric Vehicles! event for the public in
June, and will also have its 1912 Detroit electric car on display at the
upcoming EPIC Sustainable Living show March 16-18th
at the Vancouver Trade and Convention Centre.
Vancouver Electric Vehicle Association Website www.veva.ca
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