https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/114647583/sorry-petrolheads-i-think-electric-vehicles-are-just-better Sorry petrolheads, I think electric vehicles are just better Aug 01 2019 Johnny Moore
[image https://resources.stuff.co.nz/content/dam/images/1/w/9/8/g/z/image.related.StuffLandscapeSixteenByNine.1240x700.1w9an3.png/1564541263850.jpg A Volkswagen e-Golf electric car charges near the Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg, Germany, in March. Johnny Moore and his sister drove a similar vehicle in Auckland / GETTY IMAGES ] OPINION: I spent the weekend in Auckland. I know it's a requirement as a Cantabrian to hate on Dorkland but every time I visit I'm charmed by the place. I'm sure that visiting a place and living there are quite different prospects. And yes, I know it's a tough place to be anything other than rich, but there's just a certain buzz that makes you feel like you're getting around in a proper Pacific Island city. For our weekend away, my sister hired a rental car. A shiny, new, electric VW Golf. An electric Volkswagen. Even VW doesn't have to lie about the emissions on this one. READ MORE: * New Zealand, say goodbye to petrol stations and hello to EVs [ https://www.stuff.co.nz/motoring/109960489/new-zealand-say-goodbye-to-petrol-stations-and-hello-to-evs?rm=a ] ... I've written about electric vehicles in this column before. About my realisation that they are the future of transportation in this country. But my experience to date has been on electric bikes and scooters. I've never actually driven an electric car. I have now and I'm changed for the experience. I find myself wondering if all my petrolhead brethren who seem hellbent proving what a terrible idea electric vehicles are have actually driven a half-decent e-car? Because - quelle horreur -- I think a brand new electric is a better vehicle than the same thing propelled by petroleum. Sure, they're not suitable for covering vast distances, but they'd certainly do the majority of us who use our car to get to work, go to mum's for a feed on sunday and stop by Pak 'n Save once a week. So the Government is trying to work out how to incentivise us into the things. It seems making them cheaper is the first port of call. Great start. The next step, I'd suggest, is to get people driving them. Because I wonder if others like me have watched the technology yet never experienced the joy of this type of power delivery. Now, as with anything the Government does, there's a vocal minority on the internet screaming "foul". The claim is that electric vehicles are worse for the environment than their petrol-sipping counterparts due to the fact that manufacturing the cars is more energy-intensive than a comparable petrol car. Then you gotta dispose of the batteries once the car's life is over. This isn't insurmountable and is, I think, what governments are for. It just needs to find a bunch of eggheads to think their way around the problem. Electric cars aren't new. Did you know the first ever Porsche was electric hybrid? And as a fan of vintage and veteran cars I can tell you that lots of early attempts at the car weren't petrol-driven. There were steam cars, electric cars and petrol cars all vying to be the horse of the future. Even nasty old Henry Ford was a pusher of biofuel. What stopped the development of alternative technologies? Cheap oil. The oil companies bought up and closed down a portion of the market and for the next century we were stuck with buying their product, which increasingly got more expensive. The exciting bit for me is the fact that the power we produce in Te Waipounamu is clean, because driving an electric car powered by electricity generated from dirty old coal seems a bit counterintuitive now, doesn't it? And wouldn't it be nice to not have to rely on dirty oil sold by countries like Saudi Arabia - whose behaviour towards journalists should give us an indication of their ethics. Wouldn't self-sustainability be an appealing alternative to being oil slaves? Besides, after my weekend in a flash new electric, I think they're just better cars. [© stuff.co.nz] ... https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/french-english/quelle-horreur For EVLN EV-newswire posts use: http://evdl.org/archive/ {brucedp.neocities.org} -- Sent from: http://electric-vehicle-discussion-list.413529.n4.nabble.com/ _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
