Why was the electric car killed?

Question

Who killed it?

Answer 1

The electric car isn't dead - we just can't wait for the big companies to make them - they don't want to. There are affordable electric vehicles, it's just that most of us don't know about them. Check this out:
*
http://www.squidoo.com/cheap-electric-car/
*
An electric conversion car can be had for as little as $5000, it looks like a normal car, and it does freeway speeds. But what if you want something a little better?
*
The fully practical electric car is finally arriving, thanks to new battery research. Look at this car below - it gets up to 250 miles per charge, holds 5 passengers plus cargo, does 95mph, and can be charged in as little as TEN MINUTES. Yes, it's a real car, it can be pre-ordered right now for delivery THIS YEAR:
*
http://phoenixmotorcars.com/models/fleet.html
*
It's not perfect because it's too expensive (about $45000). But all it takes is for people to start buying them, for the price to come down. Remember when DVD players cost $1000? Some people had to be willing to buy them at that price so that we can have $50 DVD players today.
*
Besides, your operating costs for an EV are far, far lower than a comparable gas vehicle, due to the increased efficiency of electric drive. I know this is true because I drive an EV.
*
I can prove this. About how much does gasoline cost per mile? It varies of course, but it's somewhere around 10 to 15 cents per mile. How much does it cost to drive electric? The Toyota RAV4 EV gets 4 miles per kilowatt-hour. Off-peak (nighttime) electricity costs about 3 to 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, depending where you live. This means driving electric only costs about a penny per mile - MUCH cheaper than gasoline.
*
Why is this so? Fuel is burned wth up to 85% efficiency at power plants, and an electric motor is 95% efficient. In your typical car, gasoline is burned with less than 25% efficiency. Also, distributing electricity by wire to electric cars is 95% efficient, which is far less wasteful than trucking gasoline around the country.
*
Increased efficiency means less costly fuel - and it also means far less pollution, regardless of what is burned at power plants.

Answer 2

The electric car wasn't killed. The motoring public has never really got into the idea of altrenative fuels. Also the oil companies have bought up any ideas for electric cars,patents,etc.
Earlier versions of electric cars required the driver to stop and recharge the batteriesor plug it in over night. It had limited driving range and speed.
Automakers have started producing hybrid cars,but still have limited seating and cargo space although improvements have been made.
An old T.V. show called "I've Got A Secret" had a man who converted a model T Ford into an electric car and drove it in under the studio lights.
Producers of photo-electric cells say that we do not have the ability to produce photo cells that sensitive yet.
The show was on back in the 50's when T.V. was in black and white.
An electric car using photo-electric cells,batteries and some kind of generator set similar to those used on bicyles could possibly run 24 hours a day without having to plug into an outlet to recharge the batteries.

Answer 3

It killed it’s self. First you must understand something about energy. The power to drive the car has to come from somewhere. If it is an electric car the batteries must be charged, and that electricity has two major problems, (1) it costs over twice as much per BTU as the fossil fuel it replaced, and (2) the source of the charging power is still going to be supplied for the most part by fossil fuel burning power plants. In the final analysis, when you buy an electric car, you are paying double for nothing. Hybrid cars (gas and electric) are a bit more efficient than pure electric or gas, and although very expensive now, they are gaining a market hold.

Answer 4

I'm skeptical about that take on it. When the electric car was "killed", gas was very cheap, so the electric car just didn't make economic sense. Now gas is more expensive again, and sure enough we are seeing alternative fuel making a comeback, with the Tesla Roadster being a fine example of an electric car. So I don't think there's a conspiracy.

Answer 5

If we live that long, they'll be back. Even better ones.
Friend of mine is an inventor. He developed a product that would damage some large companies product base. These large companies got together and bought the product from him and put it on a shelf. We still pay high prices for their products. The environment is chiseled further but the large companies continue to make money. Life in the USA.

Answer 6

Go to any video store, ask for Who Killed the Electric Car, there are too many villains to name, and for all the progressive thinkers, the technology for hybrid cars has existed for a hundred years and that's how long it took for America to build one again. As for the widget analogy, does it help the economy if somebody builds a better widget and it is kept from the consumer?

Answer 7

According to everyone, from Al Gore to Michael Moore to Oliver Stone, in the not so distant future, we're all going to bear witness to a mighty big s**tt storm (academics have adorably nicknamed this happening "the Apocalypse"). Thusly, everyone from your grandmother to the brother of the guy who directed Capturing the Friedmans is working on a documentary to pinpoint what exactly will be the cause of this s**t storm. At last we left it, Al Gore and Davis Guggenheim were telling us that it will be good ol' Mother Nature who finally exacts much-needed revenge on us in An Inconvenient Truth. Chris Paine adds a footnote to that story with Who Killed the Electric Car?

In the '90s, there was a brief moment where it looked like all these oil concerns could be alleviated. Many of the most prominent car companies had designed a car that, much like a cell phone, could simply be plugged in at night and would be ready to drive to and from work when you got up. However, most of these cars never saw the light of day and those that did were quickly called back, even ones that were given to celebrities....

GM gave up and our President and his Dad own Oil companies...they'd be out of business if we had electric cars.

Answer 8

It wasn't killed, they just could not develop a car that met the demands of people. I believe that if you make a product that the people want that is within their price range, it will succeed. The electric cars developed were either under-powered or over priced. Simple capitalism.

Answer 9

Not sure it's been killed completely.
I think the main problem is that our whole transportation system, including the automotive industry, car parts industry, oil companies, etc. are so dependent on the gasoline engine that no one has quite figured out a reasonable transition for our society to electric power without major job losses and profit losses for major companies in the interim.

Answer 10

1) they are too expensive

2) they a can only go so fast, i would take people 3 times as long to get anywhere

3) the ones that need to be plugged in have no way of being plugged in when you are not at home... Can you imaging going to the mall and having a thousand cars plugged in? All the money and environment you saved just went down the drain bc of all the power it has to pull!