Frances Leate
THE drive to get more electric cars on the roads of Spain has gathered pace.
City hall bosses in Malaga are the first in the province to introduce 20 municipal vehicles that are 100 per cent electric.
As well as the new cars, the Mayor of Fuengirola, Esperanza Ona, recently opened the first rapid charging station for electric vehicles in Spain.
The charging station will be open to the public at the end of March.
The opening is part of the Zem2All (Zero Emissions Mobility to All) international project.
There are also due to be other electric charging stations in Malaga city and Marbella as part of the three year project.
The stations are able to recharge 60% of the battery in just 15 minutes.
The local TV channel, FTV, who are supporting the project, will be using two electric vehicles which are expected to save €2,500 per year on fuel.
There will also be a charging point at the television station’s headquarters.
Recharging costs €1.60 per 100 kilometres.
Electric cars, which have already been introduced in some parts of London and are widely available to buy in most developed countries, are believed by many to be the future of motoring.
The environmentally friendly vehicle requires no petrol and can cut down on harmful CO2 emissions.
Spain will probably have to give up the wind energy and go back to nuclear in order to power all of the recharging stations. Ironic really.
Electric cars are not very good in Andalucia. The hilly, mountainous aspect of Spain means that they rapidly run out of power on the inclines. They work much better in the Netherlands, where they are very popular.
Great News !
Why would you use electric cars here in spain with the prices Endesa charge for electric!!!
Electric power generation in decline and they introduce electric cars, how stupid can you get, not to mention the horrendous cost of charging it.
It would be great to have a future where electric cars are charged up by solar stations when technology improves to make this viable – I know it’s been tested small scale. At the moment current charging stations make it not that green really, but a step forward!
The guarantee on the batteries is 5 years while the real life expectancy is…..5 years. so your battery pack which costs more than the car will have to be renewed every 5 years. Unless someone will be giving away free batteries this is a no hoper idea. In France the Tulip car system pelied on the state paying for the batteries and the cars were leased from the organisation. This has run for 25 years and still does.
Seemingly against the laws of physics
80% performance gain.
Stuart and Peter 15th. March – do you get your petrol for free then?
@Victor
No I don’t get my diesel for free but at least for the moment I can get it-not so confident about continuing to get electricity.
Until charging points are readily available throughout and costs are reduced for car charging as opposed to household rip off charges, no none in their right mind would buy one. I would LOVE to buy one for the wife to drive the 65KM a day each way, well within the range of most cars, plug it in for 1.6€ instead of 30€ for fuel, BUT, what if she wants to go to Seville for the day, no charging points and a huge mountain to clime both ways, never make it there, let alone back. OK to potter about Malaga or Marbella but not for serious use.
Not again….. I have very old pal now retired, trained and worked all his life as an electrical engineer and innumerable times looked into all the possibilities. I am not going into detail here as I would take up the rest of your newspaper but take it from one who knows that ‘Electric cars’ with present known technology DO NOT WORK. There is/was a company in Israel who had a great idea of battery changing stations which were drive-in and only took seconds + charging points. They just went broke for zillions of dollars. Google them.
Sorry I forgot, the company was called Better Place.
Tesla are doing the self same thing in the States and although there are die hard supporters of the Tesla system I can see them facing the same problems plus the Tesla S is not what you might call an economy commuter car. Problem is the Americans still think BIG when it comes to cars (and their engines) and such cars as the BMWi3, Nissan leaf, etc face stiff opposition because they do not fit in the American concept of a ‘compact’ car which we call a ‘mid-range’ car.
Also Tesla are facing the same problems as ‘Better Place’ did and they went bust last year,
From Wikipedia;
“Better Place was a venture-backed international company that developed and sold battery-charging and battery-switching services for electric cars. It was formally based in Palo Alto, California, but the bulk of its planning and operations were steered from Israel, where both its founder Shai Agassi and its chief investors resided.
Israel was also the location of the company’s first large-scale commercial pilot for battery-switching services. The company opened its first functional charging station the first week of December 2008 at Cinema City in Pi-Glilot near Tel Aviv.[1] The first customer deliveries of Renault Fluence Z.E. electric cars enable with battery switching technology began in Israel in the second quarter of 2012,[2] and by mid September 2012, there were 21 operational battery-swap stations open to the public in Israel.[3]
After implementing the first modern commercial deployment of the battery swapping model in Israel and Denmark, Better Place filed for bankruptcy in Israel in May 2013. The company’s financial difficulties were caused by the high investment required to develop the charging and swapping infrastructure, about US$850 million in private capital, and a market penetration significantly lower than originally predicted by Shai Agassi. Less than 1,000 Fluence Z.E. cars were deployed in Israel and around 400 units in Denmark.[4][5][6] After two failed post-bankruptcy acquisition attempts, the bankruptcy receivers prepared to sell off the remaining assets.[7][8][9] In November 2013, the remaining assets were sold to Grngy for only $450,000”.
Until the fusion reactor is a reality there is only one alternative to fuel and that is the hydrogen fuel cell.