DOE's Steven Chu says $25,000, 140-mile electric car might be here in 10 years

Apparently, Mr. Chu is clueless. We had 140 mile range EV's in 1997 with the EV1 and now he says we have to wait until 2022 to buy one for $25,000? Something wrong with that picture. If the NiMH batteries in the EV1 could have been perfected over the past 15 years we would have the 140 mile, $25,000 car today.

Here's some non-news: the Department of Energy Secretary, Steven Chu, supports plug-in vehicles. Want proof? Click here, here or here. Want to know how he can still get headlines? By saying that electric cars that offer twice the range of the Nissan Leaf (so, around 140 miles) while costing $25,000, "is a very real price that we can maybe achieve in a decade." Chu made the statement in a DOE workshop in Dearborn, MI last week.

Is Chu being too ambitious and positive here? Hard to know for sure, but he's been even further out there before. In 2011, he said, "To buy a car that will cost $20,000 to $25,000 without a subsidy where you can go 350 miles is our goal" possibly by 2017.

Chu also admitted in Dearborn that plug-in vehicles are too expensive today, calling out the Leaf for being $10,000 too much for many buyers. Plug In Cars reports that the tone of the speech "suggests that [Chu] believes that plug-in cars with relatively smaller batteries, and a back-up gas engine on board to extend range, might be a more feasible way to bring down costs." The West Coast Energy Secretary Tesla Motors' Elon Musk has other ideas.


Source: Autoblog Green