Thursday 8 September 2011

Opel EV microcar concept


The micro city car trend continues. First it was Renault and Nissan, then Audi and Volkswagen, now Opel will be revealing a two-seater 'One Euro' microcar 'serious design concept' EV called the RAKe in the design style of the Ampera with a range of 60 miles and a top speed of 70 mph. 

 I tweeted  a week ago that this looked like the start of something and I am feeling confident that we are looking at a future tipping point in personal mobility as economics and ecology pushes governments and automakers towards smaller, energy efficient vehicles.



Now, what do we do about large, heavy, energy inefficient vanity cars? Time for policy makers to step up to the plate and provide a framework that incentivises and prioritises this new breed of microcars.


 Interestingly, the RAKe is twice as 'fuel efficient' as the Leaf and could retail for £9,000.