There are many electric vehicles being produced around the world.   Listed below is information on several of these vehicles.

EV1 - The first of the 1999 models began to be shipped to California Saturn Dealers on November 9, 1999.  GM appears to have leased all of the 500 that they built.  They have announced that they will not be building any more.  They have leased them in California and Arizona and have also delivered a limit number of these vehicles to customers in the Atlanta area.  The vehicles come with two battery options, the NiMH version that offers a range of around 130 miles and a version with advanced lead acid batteries from Panasonic that offer a range of about 90 miles.   660 0f the 1997 model have been built and of these around 550 had been leased.  There were even three of these vehicles leased in Colorado.  Florida Power and light had fourteen EV1s in their fleet and Southern Company, the Georgia power company had 25.  In March 2000, GM recalled these vehicles because of a possible overheating problem with the charging port.  GM has started to return some of these vehicles to their previous owners but has stated that they are only going to supply vehicles to those previous lessees who said they wanted them back.  Other people on the waiting list were told that there would not be able to get a vehicle.  In all about 200 vehicles will be put back on the roads.  GM has not indicated what they will do with the rest but it is thought that they will use them for spare parts.

Chevrolet S10 - An electric version of this truck is leased to fleet operators.  It comes equipped with Nickel Metal Hydride batteries that give it a range of around 80 miles.  It is governed to a maximum speed of 75 mph.  GM have sold 450 of these vehicles all of which are involved in the same recall as the EV1.  GM has also started to return these vehicles into service.

Sparrow - This is a single seat electric vehicle with a range of about 50 miles and a top speed of 70 mile per hour.  Corbin had orders for over 1000 of these vehicles but had only delivered about 230 by mid July 2001.   People who had been waiting months for delivery have cancelled orders so several dealers have vehicles available.   Much of the delay in production were caused  by problems with the controller and may vehicles were recalled to the factory.   They have now switched to a Kilovac designed controller and vehicles are slowly being returned to their owners.  Corbin has announced that it has stopped taking orders for the Sparrow to concentrate on getting the Sparrow II into production.  They promise that this vehicle will be much more reliable and better built than its predecessor.  

The vehicle is a three wheeler and registers as a motor cycle, which allows it to use the carpool lane in most states and to park in any motor cycle parking space.  However, the three wheel configuration and narrow wheel base make them relatively unstable and they have to be driven carefully to avoid a roll-over.  The vehicle is safer than your average motor cycle but not a safe as a standard automobile.  At a cost of about $15,000 the Sparrow is an affordable commuter vehicle.  The Sparrow pictured here was part of the Corbin exhibit at the 1999 alternate fuel vehicle expo held on the third street promenade in Santa Monica, California.

RAV4 EV - These are an electric version of the popular sports utility vehicle being supplied by Toyota to fleet operators only.  In 1998, 358 of these vehicles were leased making the RAV4 EV the most successful of electric vehicle of the year.  It leased for $475 per month or could be purchased at $42,000.   Currently there are over 500 on the roads in California.  This car is also being used on the island of Jersey in an experiment on converting the island to electrics.  Several of these vehicles are being provided to the island's hotels to be rented to tourists.   

Toyota recently announced that it was going to ship more vehicles to the USA and will be accepting orders through its fleet sales department.  They are also accepting orders for a vehicle fleet of one so to get one all you have to do is form a sole proprietorship and be prepared to take your vehicle to the feet location for servicing.  There is also a rumor that they will begin leasing the vehicles through selected dealerships starting in January 2002.  There is already a waiting list building for these vehilces.  Anyone interested in a RAV4 EV should contact Toyota Fleet sales in Torrance California.  If you find you are getting the run around check out the RAV4 EV group on Groups.Yahoo.com which has specific contact information.

Ecom -  They are also testing this small 2 seater city EV in a demonstration program based in Irvine, California.  The Ecom is powered by NiMH batteries and has a range of about 60 miles and a top speed of 58 mph.  So far Toyota has not announced plans to market the Ecom but they have been making a left hand drive version that has lead to speculation that they may have plans to eventually market the vehicle in the USA.

EV Plus - Honda leased 276 of these vehicles in two years through a limited set of dealers in the Los Angeles and San Francisco areas.  In addition they have leased a few in New York state and in Switzerland.  a total of 300 of these cars were built.  They have announced that they are not going to lease any more of these vehicles but will continue to support existing owners.   They have switched to production of a hybrid, the Insite.  I have heard that there is a large demand for re-lease on the EV Plus.  Existing owners of this four passanger EV will be able to renew their lease for 2 years at $250 per month but they are not going to extend the lease beyond December 31, 2002.

Honda has not been accepting requests to lease vehicle returned to Honda at the end of a lease.  Instead, those that are in good condition with low mileage will be used in Honda's fuel cell program while the rest will be destroyed.  By the end of 2000, Honda had removed about 25 cars from service.

 Altra - A big boxy EV that reminds me of a cross between a station wagon and a mini van.  The car was origonally powered by a Lithium-ion batteries that were developed in partnership with Sony.  However, there were reliability problems with the Sony batteries so Nissan eventually switched to Li Ion batteries from a different vendor.  The battery gives a range of 80 to 120 miles on a single charge.   Nissan has adopted the same inductive charging system used by GM's EV1.  The car seats 4 and has plenty of room for luggage.   Nissan has about 120 of these vehicles on the road at the moment, used by Nissan employees and some fleet operators. 

 Hipermini - Nissan is  also demonstrating this city EV.   They have them in service at several locations around California including two being used by the city of Vacaville.  The Hypermini is also powered by the same Li Ion batteries as the Altra.   At this time, Nissan has not announced plans to market this vehicle in the USA and the vehicles shipped to date are right hand drive vehicles built for Japan. 

Ranger - This is an electric  version of the Ford truck.  It is being leased mostly to fleet owners but they can be ordered through a very limited number of dealers in California.   The US Postal Service ordered 500 postal trucks which will use a Grumman body on the Ford Ranger chassis.  Some will be used in the Washington DC area with the majority being used in California.  They have an option to purchase an additional 5500 of these vehicles.  Deliveries Started in the second quarter of 2001 and this order is taking all their 2001 capacity.  There are currently over 1000 Ford Ranger electric trucks on the road in the US and Canada, including 379 in California. 

Ford has also announced that it will be selling a range of vehicles through its Th!nk group.  It started selling two models of E-Bikes at the end of 2000,.  Sales of its NEV, the Th!nk Neighbor, was scheduled to  start in March of 2001 but has been delayed to the end of the year.  Production of this vehicle began at the end of October with the first vehicles being shipped to California.   The Neighbor comes in 2 and 4 passenger versions and will be sold starting as low as $6,000. The Neighbor is street legal on roads where the posted speed is 35 mph or less.  Pictured is the 4 passenger Neighbor exhibited at the 2001 LA Auto Show.

Th!nk City - The acquisition  of Norwegian EV Builder Pivco gave Ford a City class EV called the Th!nk City.  This vehicle is currently being modified for the US market and should be on sale here  by mid 2002.  Ford has made a nuber of  the Scandinavian version of  the Th!nk City available as part of the Presidio demonstration project in San Francisco, and at a BART stations as part of a station car project.  Ford Subsiduary Hertz is also offering Th!nks for rent at its office near Fisherman's Wharfe and in Palo Alto.  

Ford are bringing about 750 Th!nk Cities into the US for demonstation project between now and the official launch in 2002.  Five California Ford dealers have been provided with cars.  These dealers are Grody Ford in Buena Park and Carlsbad, Pearson Ford in San Diego, Barber Ford in Ventura and S&C Ford in San Francisco.  They lease for $199 per month for 34 months and this includes the charger.  These dealers will only lease to people who live within 35 miles of the dealership so that the cars can be brought in for service without range problems.  Barber Ford in Ventura were one of the first to recieve vehicles and they have already leased the 40 vehicles that they were allocated, mostly to Fleet operations at Vandenberg air base.

Force - Solectria is based in Massachusetts and manufactures a series of vehicles including the Force, a four door electric vehicle based on a four door  Geo Metro chassis. So far, they have sold about 400 of these and started selling in Canada in 1999.   

They did design an advanced vehicle, the Sunrise, that they drove over 250 miles from Boston to New York on a single charge.  However, it appears that they just do not have the capital to turn this vehicle into a production model.

Solectria have recently announced that they are no longer going to be building vehicles but will be concentrating on production of components.

Epic Mini Van - This is an electric version of a Chrysler Mini van.  It's liquid cooled Nickel Metal Hydride batteries give it a range of 90 miles and a top speed of 80 mph.   It was built on the same production line in Ontario where they build the Dodge Caravan, and is being supplied to fleet operators, mostly in California, through select Dodge dealers.  Chrysler  built about 200.  The US Postal service recently took delivery of twelve of these vehicles to use in Harbor City and 45 for San Diego.  Express Shuttle has also ordered 50 of these vehicles which represents 30% of their fleet.  The first 11 went into service at LAX on January 6, 2000, and more were delivered in June.  In early February 2000, Chrysler announced that it had sold all the vehilces it has built and no new ones will be made until the 2002 model year.

GEM - Chrysler recently acquired  North Dakota NEV maker Global Electric Vehicles from ZAP and has begun to sell electric vehicles again. 

The GEM is a NEV with a top speed of 25 miles an hour.  It comes in 2 seat or 4 seat configurations and can also be obtained in either a short bed and long bed configuration for use as a utility vehicle.  Pictured here is a 4 passenger model.  The GEM is street legal on roads where the posted speed is 35 mph or less.

 

eMotionMobility is a joint venture between Dailmer Chrysler and specialty carmaker Panox.  They are currently establishing a manufacturing facility in Atlanta Georgia to build an electric version of the Smart.  The Smart was origionally produced in a joint venture between Swiss watchmaker Swatch and Daimler Benz.  The small two seater city car is with an internal combustion engine is widely available in Europe but only a small number have been brought to the USA by enthusiasts.  

An electric version was built by Lotus in England but eMotionMobiity has elected to use parts supplied by Solectria.  Panoz have had some experience with electric vehicles, racing a Hybrid in the 24 hours of  Le Mann race.

The Smart EV will be used as a station car in the Atlanta area starting towards the end of 2002 with expansion into California in 2003 followed by the north east in 2004.

Korean Automaker Hyundai has produced a small number of Electric Santa Fe SUVs for a demonstration program in Hawaii.  These SUVs, using electrical systems developed by Enova, look the same as the standard SUV.  They are 5 passenger 4 door SUVs.  They are equiped with Korean made NiMH batteries that give them a range of approximately 75 miles.  They can be fast charged and are capable of freeway speeds.

Bombardier is a Canadian company that produce an electric vehicle designated the Neighborhood Electric Vehicle or NEV.  It is targeted at planned communities and is being sold through a network of about 30 dealers mostly in California, Arizona and Florida.  The car is a souped up golf cart and will do a maximum speed of 25 mph.   The Bombardier is street legal in Canada and most states in the US on roads where the posted speed limit is 35mph or less.   A recent article in EV World indicated that Bombadier was getting out of the NEV business but there is no mention of this on their web page.

Elcat produces electric vehicles in Finland.  The vehicle, the Elcat Citivan is designed to work in Arctic conditions.  They have sold about 200 so far.  Of these, 60 were bought by the Finish postal service.  Apparently these vehicles have proved to be so good that they are going to order several hundred more.

Daihatsu is currently building electric vehicles in England.   They have three vehicles including a six passenger mini van.  There plan was to build 1500 of these vehicles between 1998 and 2000.

T-Zero - AC propulsion make the hot T-Zero electric sports car.  This car has a range of about 100 miles and can out accellerate almost anything on the road including Corvettes, Porches and Ferraris.  So far the company has only built two prototypes both of which are pictured here at the ZEV mandate workshop in Diamond Bar on May 31, 2000.  The vehicle will sell for around $80,000 and they already have orders for 3.  AC Propulsion do not have the financing to market these vehicles so the are concentrating on development of EV components.  It is unlikely that these cars will ever be produced commercially.   AC Propulsion has also done some  conversions using  Volkswagons as a donor car.