An EV Solution | Green Energy News

October 27, 2002 – Vol.7 No.31

AN EV SOLUTION.

Here’s a nagging question. If electric vehicle enthusiasts want to buy a sophisticated, state of the art, electric vehicle (EV) why wait for the big auto manufacturers to develop one? Why not just pool their resources, invest in a new company, and build their own? From a technical standpoint all the parts and components are already available, already developed, to build a perfectly good, very usable battery electric vehicle. Why wait for Big Auto to do it?

An idea from ZAP comes close to this notion.

ZAP, through wholly owned EV subsidiary Voltage Vehicles, has made an offer to buy Th!nk Mobility from Ford. Though in this editor’s opinion the offer is too small and will be rejected ($10 million in cash, stock, and/or warrants), the idea to buy Ford's Th!nk assets including the City electric car is a good one. ZAP claims Ford has $123 million in the project, which it has almost abandoned.

The City would be a good place to start to build a large fleet of electric vehicles - and it is fully developed, ready for mass production. The car meets all necessary safety standards, is built with only 370 parts, and is one of the only freeway-capable vehicles designed (originally in Norway) specifically, from scratch, as an EV.

As it stands the City seems destined for museums and wrecking yards. It’s a good EV that needs to be rescued. Visit ZAP at http://www.zapworld.com/ .