The Economist: An electric car that really works
… One South Korean firm, however, is taking a different tack. CT&T, whose main line of business until now has been making electric golf carts, is producing a range of battery-powered cars more suited to low-speed, short-distance urban driving than to cruising the freeways of the American West. Its flagship model, the eZone, is a quirky two-seater aimed at housewives, the elderly and those making the daily school run. It has a range of 100km and can clip along at 70kph if you really put your foot down.
It is a proper car, though. In particular, it is the only low-speed electric car to have passed international front and side crash tests, meaning that it can go on general sale. That will happen in Europe any day now, with a starting price between $8,000 and $16,000, and CT&T has plans to introduce the eZone into Hawaii (one part of the United States where journeys are, by definition, short) in two years’ time, when a local factory is up and running. It is also cheap to run. The firm claims that 1,500km of urban driving—about a month’s worth—will cost a mere $7 in electricity bills. …
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