End of the Road For Detroit Car Makers
Today was not a good day for General Motors and Chrysler. Rick Waggoner was shown the door by Washington and GM was told in no uncertain terms that bankruptcy was an option for them. Chrysler was told they have 30 days to convince Fiat they have a future or it was curtains for them. However what was worst was the realization that the future of bloated SUVs and mediocre mileage was well and truly over when Berkshire Hathaway announced that the BYD plugin hybrid vehicle will be on display in May at Buffett’s general shareholder meeting in Omaha.
The annual shareholder meeting is no Volvo driving latte drinking San Francisco set. These people represent the core General Motors constituent, middle America. The problem for Detriot is that if Warren Buffet, the true Anti Wall Street hero says it is okay for them to buy an attractive econo-box, then this is big trouble.
The BYD E6 will be a 5 seater with an acceleration of 0 to 100 kph of around 10 seconds. Top speed should be top speed of 160 kph (100 mph), and the battery pack, which is located under the rear passenger seats, will be based on BYD’s own lithium-ion iron phosphate technology. Range per charge is expected to be 300 km (186 miles).
The BYD E6 proves that a decent range electric vehicle is absolutely possible, which means that the Oil companies should take note as well.
Dr Bruce Smith, director of modelling and forecasting at the Electricity Commission, told biofuels and electric vehicles conference in Wellington that electric vehicles have the ability to smooth the peaks and troughs of electricity supply so efficiently they could triple the country’s capacity to use wind power.
He estimates that if 2.5 million of New Zealand’s roughly 4 million registered vehicles were electric, the whole electric fleet could run off 3000MW of wind generation – about three times the amount of wind power that is built or ready for construction today.
New Zealand generates approximately 70% of their power from renewable resources.
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So when are we going to see these electric vehicles in real-life? So far, I’m only encountering them on trade shows or public transportation experiments… Is the oil industry holding us back here?