Editors:
Steve Mertl got almost half of his facts right on GM's EV1.
http://www.canada.com/topics/technology/story.html?id=f304fa64-dd86-
4db4-a6ad-9776d5ee4f20&k=33398&p=1
He wrote of GM's: "...aborted US$1.5-billion effort to market the
EV1 in the 1990s... Only about 100 of the battery-powered two-seat
commuter cars were delivered into drivers' hands in Arizona and
California test markets despite heavily subsidized leases.
...experts who point to the EV1's well-known problems, including
limited range, especially if the heat or air conditioning was turned
on and its impracticality in power-sapping cold-weather regions.
The car's lead-acid batteries themselves had evolved little since the
days of the Ford Model T."
Not one of these "facts" is correct. GM claimed that it spent
US$1B altogether on the EV1, about what the automaker spent at the
time in redesigning an existing model. GM may be including the cost of
its Federal lawsuit to avoid mass-producing the car (that was also EV1-
related spending.) GM's actual cost of developing an electric vehicle
(EV) from the ground up and building 1150 EV1s has been estimated at
US$350M.
Next, all 800+ EV1s offered were leased (GM never sold EV1s,)
with waiting lists in the several thousands. Every EV1 offered to
individuals was leased; years later, enthusiasts offered over ten
million dollars to buy 77 EV1s that GM had sequestered in Burbank,
California. GM refused the US$10M: in early 2005, EV advocates held a
24-hour EV1 Vigil for a month outside the GM Burbank lot; two Vigilers
were finally arrested for blocking transporters loaded with EV1s bound
for the crusher. GM hunted down and crushed over a thousand EV1s: this
is all public record. Mr. Mertl did not check his "facts."
EV1 drivers reported no problems with their cars; they accepted
the original 50- to 75-mile range (as did thousands more would-be
lessees, who never got to drive an EV1.) Heating and air-conditioning
affected its range only slightly. Cold weather may have affected the
500 original, 1996 lead-acid EV1s, but the 650 Gen II 1999 EV1s, with
nickel-metal hydride batteries, had no such weakness and would propel
the car over 125 miles on a charge. Both EV1 builds took an 80% charge
in two hours.
The automotive and oil industries spent more than GM did (in
building EV1s) on anti-EV ads, planted op-eds, wildly
inaccurate "research" sponsorship and publication,
lobbying, "protests" by befuddled senior citizens bussed in with the
promise of a free meal and T-shirt, a lawsuit to gut the California
ZEV mandate and legal bills for efforts to stall EV mandates in a
dozen other US states.
Your reporter should know, as we do, to look up and verify, if GM
tells you that the sky is blue.
Breathe free,
Hugh E Webber
Florida Chapter, Electric Auto Association www.eaaev.org
Earth Shuttle Pedalcab: www.pedalcab.us
Breathe free,
Hugh E Webber
Florida Chapter, Electric Auto Association www.eaaev.org
Earth Shuttle Pedalcab: www.pedalcab.us
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