By Benedict De Meulemeester on 20/02/2010
Old-fashioned petroleum addicts tend to deride the idea of electric cars as 'unsexy'. In their conception, the eco-friendly cars of the future will be square-edged clunky mini-automobiles. They think they will resemble the Fiat Multipla rather than an Aston Martin. Just take a look at 'Top Gear', the car TV-show on the BBC, and you'll know what I'm talking about. Below is their idea of the electric car. How wrong they are!
This week I ran into the pictures of the Karma, a car built by Fisker from California. Just have a look and tell me if you haven't fallen in love. This is not only an eco-friendly car, it's also an absolute beauty. If this is what the electric car future will look like, then let it start tomorrow. The combination of aerodynamics and the eco-chic snobs at which these cars are aimed results in absolute beauties. (By the way, in many blogs the car is described as an 'electric' car, that is false. It is a plug-in hybrid. This means you drive the car electrically for the first 80 kilometers. After that a gasoline engine will start to work to charge the battery.)
The economics also start to look better. The autonomy of this car is almost 500 kilometers (with the help of the gasoline battery charger). The price is 90.000 dollar. This is obviously a huge amount of money. But then you have to consider that this is, what Jeremy Clarkson of Top Gear would describe as a 'Supercar'. This car won't be bought as a replacement of an Opel Astra. It will be the people that now drive Porsches that will drive this. The rest of us will have to wait for Renault to bring out its eco-models.
Cars and mobility have a lot to do with emotion. I truly think that Fisker can bring the instant Karma that will make the car lovers accept the idea of driving a sexy car without a huge exhaust pipe.
