Radio Australia Today Editorial

At long last, Australia gets an electric car.

25 March 2009

Yesterday I blogged about the Tata Nano, the world’s cheapest car, being built in India with the aim of getting Indian people off their smelly old motorbikes into a somewhat safer little car.

On this same day, Mitsubishi unveiled its new electric car which is destined for the Australian market. It’s called the iMiev (and we have no idea of how this is pronounced. It goes into the silly name category like the Nissan Tiida and the Mitsubishi Starion). The car plugs into your electric socket, just like your toaster, and charges overnight.

The car is billed as the first emissions-free car to hit Australian roads, although this is not strictly true. Most electricity in Australia comes from coal-fired power plants, and this means that this emissions-free car runs on coal burnings. That sorta does create nasty emissions. Unless your house is connected to 100% renewable energy, like windpower.

The other thing is that you must be able to park your car where it has secure access to that power point. Running an extension lead to the street, like what I would have to do, is not the most secure way of accessing your power. Not to mention the probability of having pedestrians trip over your cord as it drapes across the footpath.

These things aside, an electric car is a long time coming to the land down under. I remember reading a car magazine as a child in the 1970s and we were being promised electric cars back then. Like the much-vaunted and efficient Ralph Sarich engine from Perth, the electric motor never came to Australian roads. Governments didn’t see the need, motorists were too addicted to fumes,  and car companies couldn’t have cared less about the environment. Increased fuel prices and Al Gore’s film has changed all that. Falling sales in gas guzzlers has also brough recalcitrant companies like General Motors to the brink of bankrupcy. Greens might  say this is karma. I would say it’s a tragedy for millions of auto workers across the world, a tragedy of Greek proportions that can be laid at the feet of the boards of these companies.

                                                          – Phil

.