US: Kia Soul EV review

ABCNews.com: Finally, there is an all-electric car for people who thought they would never want one.

The 2015 Kia Soul EV is a normal-looking Soul with a useful travel range of nearly 100 miles on a single charge, stable ride and handling, generous and flexible cargo space, comfortable seating and fast-charge capability.

Indeed, the built-in, direct-current, fast-charge port in the Soul EV allows for 80 percent of the onboard battery to be recharged from empty in as little as 33 minutes.

Most importantly, the Kia Soul EV, which is rated by the federal government at 105 miles per gallon-equivalent in combined city/highway travel, has a starting manufacturer's suggested retail price, including destination charge, of $34,500.

This price includes, among other things, standard heated steering wheel, heated front seats and outside mirrors, rear camera, navigation system, AM/FM/Sirius satellite radio, Bluetooth hands-free phone connectivity, six air bags and a five-year subscription to Kia's UVO online services with EV features.

Kia's 10-year/100,000-mile limited warranty is included, too.

Plus, the Soul EV qualifies for a $7,500 federal government tax credit, so a buyer may reduce his or her income taxes by up to $7,500 for the year that the car is purchased.

This newest electric vehicle — and the first from South Korea's Kia — is sold now in California and will spread to more U.S. states in 2015.

It's in the price range of competitors.

Tesla's sporty-looking Model S sedan with 208-mile range as a base, 2014 model, has a starting retail price, including destination fee, of $71,070.

Meantime, the top-selling electric car in the United States — the Nissan Leaf — has an 84-mile travel range on a full charge and carries an MSRP, including destination charge, of $29,860.

Onlookers typically assumed the Soul EV was a regular, gasoline-powered Soul during the test drive. This Soul stood out because its roof was painted white while the body was bright blue; less noticeable was the fact that it had no exhaust pipe.

Competing all-electric vehicles are typically smaller in size and interior roominess than the Soul EV. For example, the 2015 Chevrolet Spark EV, which has a starting retail price, including destination charge, of $27,645 and a travel range of 82 miles, is 16.5 inches shorter than the Soul.

The Spark's cargo room behind the back seats is 9.6 cubic feet, while the Soul EV's cargo room nearly doubles that, at 18.8 cubic feet.

This is the same cargo space that's in a gasoline-powered Soul, and it expands to a sport utility vehicle-like 49.5 cubic feet when rear seatbacks are folded down.

In fact, during the test drive, the tall Soul EV Plus model sometimes felt more like an SUV than a car, because driver and passengers sat up a ways from the pavement on comfortable seats and had lots of headroom.

The rear liftgate opening was wide to aid loading, and cargo space was normal sized.

Some electric cars have restricted cargo space because of the intruding onboard battery pack. But Kia engineers use a highly dense, lithium-ion polymer battery pack that is shaped and spread out to fit under the Soul's floor. This also makes for a better center of gravity in the Soul EV, which aids handling.

To be sure, the Soul EV rides with more heft than its four-cylinder-engine sibling. At 3,289 pounds, it's some 450 pounds heavier than the gasoline Soul. Still, the electric motor and battery pack provide good get up and go with 210 foot-pounds of torque available instantly. The test car effortlessly zipped ahead of other vehicles from stoplights.

Total system horsepower is 109.

Brightly colored gauges encourage fuel-efficient driving, but an "eco" mode can be turned off for a less-resistant feel to the accelerator pedal.

Travel was mostly quiet. A high-pitch, electrical "whir" sound sometimes could be heard, particularly with the windows down, and the low-friction tires conveyed some road noise.

Additionally, Kia engineers installed a subtle, bell-like chime that activates when the Soul is in reverse to alert nearby pedestrians.

The rear camera is a lifesaver, since window pillars at the sides of the rear liftgate window are thick and obscure the view of approaching traffic as the Soul backs up.

The test car was fully charged by a regular, 120-volt outlet in a home garage overnight, and a 240-volt charger at a public parking garage cut the time to less than four hours.

The Soul EV's UVO telematics system lists the locations of 240-volt chargers as well as the fast chargers.

After most full charges, the tester showed a travel range of 100 miles, not the 93 miles that the federal government certifies.

According to the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration, 100 miles is sufficient for 90 percent of all household vehicle trips in this country.

Driving the Soul EV with care and coasting extended the range.

Buyers just have to like the Soul's boxy exterior styling. Thoughtful features include big, bright blue lights atop the dashboard that tell if the car is charging or fully charged. They can be seen from all sides of the car.

Range Anxiety

CleanTechnica.com: I spend a fair bit of time following press on electric vehicles (EVs). I see stuff that’s pro-EV, anti-EV, and neutral. I see some good stuff, but a lot of poorly researched crap from every angle as well*.

One thing that really bugs me is stories talking about the “huge disadvantage” EVs have in charging time and that “People don’t want to wait hours and hours for their cars to charge.”

Stories like that create what I call “range anxiety anxiety”. Range anxiety is an infrequent thing, but people unfamiliar with electric cars read articles hyping short range and long charge times and they develop anxiety that they’d have range anxiety if they owned an EV.

The problem isn’t in the statement itself, but in the underlying assumption. People are used to how gasmobiles work. You drive for a week or two on a tank, running it down close to empty (often inducing range anxiety). Then you stop at a gas station for a few minutes, drop 50+ bucks and then repeat the cycle. If you apply that model to an EV, it’s horrifying. Imagine getting up to go to work and your EV battery is empty! A Model S takes 10 hours to charge at a level 2 charger! I’d miss a whole day of work!!!

What people don’t see is how idiotic that model is. They’ve trained themselves to put up with the nonsense gasmobiles create and they just assume it applies everywhere. If you offer to get rid of a major annoyance people experience all the time and are used to, but the cost is a new less-frequent annoyance that gets hyped by the press every 2 seconds, people will often pass on getting rid of the major annoyance.

Think about the last time you had to put gas in your car. If you’re like me, you noticed the gas gauge getting low on your way home from work, but you were tired after a long day and decided to wait til morning. Morning always comes. It’s always the morning when everything is going wrong and you’re running late and you climb in the car, and “CRAP!” you’ve gotta get gas on the way to work.

Imagine instead that a magic energy fairy showed up every night and refueled your car. All the fairy asks in return is that you pay about ¼ of what you used to pay in gas, and that you spend a bit more time and planning on long trips. That’s it.

I took a look at my gas patterns before I bought the Model S and since. I used to buy gas about every 2 weeks. Each stop always added at least 10 minutes to my trip to or from work (I timed it). In the year and a half I’ve owned my Model S I would have made 40 gas stops**. That’s 6.5 hours I would have blown going out of my way when what I really wanted to be doing is getting on with life.

EVs use a different pattern than gasmobiles do. They work like the magic energy fairy. I spend far less time recharging than I did buying gas. I just take two seconds to plug in at home and by morning I have a full battery again.

There’s only once where I haven’t woken up to a full battery. I’d done a ton of driving the day before, down to downtown San Jose, up to El Sobrante and back, then back and forth to Mountain View. I pulled in at 10:30 that night with only 25 miles of range left on my car. It started charging at 12:30 and I had to leave again at 8 the next morning. I went out to leave and saw that the car was still charging. Oh no! I only had 190 miles of range to cover the 40 miles of driving I needed to do that day! I unplugged, went about my day, and the next day I woke to a full charge.

The only time I wait for my car is if I’m on a road trip. Those are the exception and, for me at least, the convenience of not having to get gas the other 99% of the time easily outweighs the bit of extra time and planning I have to do on a long trip. For me, a road trip is when I’m explicitly NOT rushing. I just take my time and enjoy the drive. Most of my road trip charge stops are 20-45 minutes and I spend the time hitting the restroom, grabbing a quick bite, talking to other drivers, or just stretching my legs.

There ARE some things that don’t really work yet due to lack of infrastructure, but those are getting better. They’re the reason I still wouldn’t have an EV as an ONLY car. In 2-3 years I expect those problems to be solved and I’ll dump gas for good.

* The hyperbole-infested pro-EV/pro-Tesla stuff bothers me quite a bit. There are plenty of good reasons to own an EV. Spinning a bunch of BS doesn’t help anyone. I might write something on that later.
** Actually, more than that. That’s just based on the driving I used to do in my old car. We now drive my wife’s car about half as much as we used to, and she buys gas much less often now too.

UK; EV sales surge (charts)

UK passes 700 rapid charge points

The 2014 UK 340% surge in EV sales is in part thanks to the surge in the charging network. With something like 17,000 electric cars now on UK roads, there are now an impressive 700 rapid charge points publicly available.

Impressive.

Tesla's Top 10 Countries for Model S Sales

CleanTechnica.com: Tracking Tesla Model S sales isn’t easy, but we’ve routinely got the numbers down to within a few percent margin of error. With a strong degree of certainty, we can report on the Top 10 countries for Model S sales for 2014 through the end of Q3.

#1 – United States: ~11,300

#2- Norway: 3,535

#3- China: ~2,800

#4- Netherlands: ~958

#5- Germany: ~576

#6- Canada: 467 plus an unknown quantity of September sales (possibly over 100 units)

#7- Belgium: ~361

#8- UK: ~350

#9- Switzerland: ~346

#10- Denmark: ~302

US: Which Electric-Car Makers Are Serious?

GreenCarReports.com: Two years ago, we pointed out that several electric cars now on sale were purely "compliance cars," built in minimal numbers purely to comply with California rules that require sales of zero-emission vehicles.

But almost four years after the first Nissan Leaf went on sale in December 2010, it's become pretty clear which carmakers are serious about plug-in electric cars--and which aren't.

We looked at U.S. sales of all cars with a plug--whether battery-electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles--for the 10 months of this year, and calculated what percentage of a carmaker's total sales they represented.

(The exception was BMW, which only started selling its i3 electric hatchback in May--so for that maker, we used only the May-October total sales.)




We grouped the cars by maker so that, for instance, General Motors includes both Chevrolet and Cadillac plug-in sales.

And we included compliance cars; even if they're limited in volume, they do have plugs.

Here are the percentages of a carmaker's total U.S. sales this year that are made up of battery-electric, range-extended electric, and plug-in hybrid sales:
Tesla: 100 percent
BMW: 2.3 percent (4,534 of 201,000)
Nissan: 2.1 percent (24,411 of 1.17 million)

Ford: 0.9 percent (18,859 of 2.07 million)
GM: 0.7 percent (17,969 of 2.43 million)
Toyota: 0.6 percent (12,321 of 1.98 million)

Surprised?

A couple of things stand out for us.

First, in just six months, BMW is selling a greater percentage of total vehicles with plugs than any other maker except Tesla.

And if you look just at October sales, the number rockets from 2.3 percent over six months to 3.8 percent for last month alone.

BMW's average for the last three months--netting out the MINI and Rolls-Royce brands, in this case--is an even more impressive 4.9 percent--meaning 1 in every 20 BMWs sold from August through October has a plug.

Second, Ford often doesn't get a lot of credit for its efforts, primarily because it has trash-talked the Ford Focus Electric, its sole battery-electric vehicle.

But the plug-in hybrid Energi versions of its C-Max hatchback and Fusion sedan are logging consistent and respectable sales, with the two combined outselling Toyota's plug-in Prius in eight of 10 months this year.

Finally, the top three makers in terms of percentage all sell battery-electric cars. The second tier all sell vehicles that are partially electric and partially gasoline-powered.

Two other analyses of this question largely support our analysis.

A brand-by-brand review of carmakers' commitment to electric vehicles on PlugInCars.com listed all major automakers alphabetically, evaluating the "street cred" of each one.

It cited BMW, Nissan, and Tesla as the most aggressive makers pursuing vehicle electrification.

A second take comes from noted battery skeptic Menahem Anderman, whose perspective stems from organizing the Advanced Automotive Batteries Conference for close to two decades now.

He has a consistent track record of criticizing optimistic predictions of electric-car growth, which has offered a useful counterweight to some of the frothiest projections made a few years back.

Even Anderman has complimented Tesla for its impact on the industry, writing, “Tesla has already shattered many of the [auto] industry’s deep-rooted convictions” about electric cars and lithium-ion battery cost.




Battery Electric Vehicle Efforts by Major Automakers (Anderman, Advanced Auto Batteries, Oct 2014)

Recently, Anderman ranked the major automakers for their efforts in battery-electric vehicles only (he ignored plug-in hybrids and range-extended electric cars).

He puts Tesla at the top, as "committed," followed by the Renault Nissan Alliance, which he views as "developing markets" for electric cars.

Then comes BMW, which he says is "exploring niche markets" with its i3, i8, and future products.

MORE: Tesla Battery Cost: New Report Suggests Model 3 To Cost $50K Or More

Then General Motors, VW Group, and Mercedes-Benz are listed as "compliance +"--fair for GM, which has focused on its Voltec range-extended electric powertrain.

And he notes that BMW, GM, Mercedes, and Volkswagen are all "considering" offering a battery-electric vehicle with at least 200 miles of range.

We'd suggest that Daimler (parent company of Mercedes-Benz) may be the odd man out in that group, with significantly lower commitment to pure electric cars than the others.

Either way, though, it's clear that three companies are most committed to making and selling plug-in electric cars: BMW, Nissan, and Tesla.

The second tier is comprised of GM, Toyota, and (surprisingly) Ford.

The rest? Not so much.

Tesla sets delivery record

Autonews.com: Tesla delivered a record 7,785 Model S cars worldwide during the third quarter.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Tesla Motors Inc. will delay the first deliveries of its Model X crossover until the third quarter of 2015 to ensure the all-electric vehicle will “delight customers,” the automaker said Wednesday as it reported a wider third-quarter loss.

“There’s no big thing” delaying the Model X, Tesla CEO Elon Musk told analysts Wednesday. “There are a whole bunch of little things. It’s really about getting the details right. I think people will appreciate that we got the details right.”

Tesla posted a net loss of $74.7 million in the third quarter under generally accepted accounting principles, better than analysts had expected, which sent Tesla shares upward after the close of trading on Wednesday.

Revenue during the period nearly doubled to $851.8 million from $431.3 million on record vehicle sales during the period. The company lost $38.5 million in the third quarter of 2013.

Tesla delivered a record 7,785 Model S cars during the third quarter. That was slightly below its previous guidance of 7,800, but up 42 percent from the same quarter a year ago.

Operating costs rise

Operating expenses, mostly r&d tied to Model S engineering upgrades and the Model X launch, rose from $133 million to $291 million in the third quarter. Capital outlays in the fourth quarter will reach $350 million, mostly to hike production capacity, it said.

Tesla is investing heavily to expand in markets in Asia and Europe while also developing the Model X. Research and development costs rose 28 percent in the third quarter compared to the second quarter. Overhead expenses rose 18 percent, and the company spent $284 million on capital outlays during the latest period.

The company reported $2.4 billion in cash and cash equivalents at the end of the latest quarter.

Tesla continues to generate significant cash from selling emissions credits to other automakers. During the latest quarter, the company said it sold $93 million in credits, which allow other automakers to offset deliveries of less fuel-efficient cars and light trucks.

Tesla also also realized $31 million in revenue from electric powertrain sales.

Model S targets

The company told shareholders that it now expects to deliver 33,000 units of the Model S in 2014, a 50 percent increase over 2013, due to the completion of assembly-line upgrades at its Fremont, Calif., factory this summer.

That is about 2,000 cars below Tesla’s original target, which the company attributed to snags in starting production of cars with a dual-motor all-wheel-drive system and “autopilot” features.

The automaker is targeting an annualized production rate of 100,000 vehicles by the end of 2015, after assembly of the Model X begins.

Musk told analysts that he expects orders and deliveries of the Model S to increase by 50 percent in both 2015 and 2016, as he continued to push back against a recent report in The Wall Street Journal that suggested demand for the Model S is cooling.

“There are a whole bunch of things we could do to stimulate demand if that were our problem,” Musk said, pointing to the company’s lack of paid advertising. “That is not our problem.”

The company’s challenge, he said, is manufacturing constraints. And in a letter to shareholdersreleased Wednesday, Musk and CFO Deepak Ahuja wrote that it would be “legitimate” to criticize the delayed start of Model X deliveries.

Tesla is now testing early prototypes of the three-row crossover, which sports “falcon-wing” doors and a second-row that slides all the way forward to allow for easier access to the third row of seats.

Musk: 'Great respect'

“People don’t appreciate how hard it is to manufacture something. It is really hard. I have great respect for people who manufacture complex objects,” Musk said on the call with analysts, referring to delays in the Model X launch.

The Model X crossover, first unveiled as a concept in early 2012, uses the dual-motor all-wheel-drive system that Tesla started offering in the Model S this fall.

“We prefer to forgo revenue, rather than bring a product to market that does not delight customers,” Musk and Ahuja wrote. “Doing so negatively affects the short term, but positively affects the long term. There are many other companies that do not follow this philosophy that may be a more attractive home for investor capital. Tesla is not going to change.”

Tesla shares rose $11.18, or nearly 5 percent, to $242.15 in mid-day trading Thursday after closing on Wednesday at $230.97, down $7.96 a share, in Nasdaq trading in New York.

Lithium-Ion Battery Can Be Recharged To 70% In 2 Minutes

NTU Assoc Prof Chen Xiaodong with research fellow Tang Yuxin and PhD student Deng Jiyang

Well, 100 kW might not be enough

CleanTechnica.com: Scientists at Nanyang Technology University (NTU) recently announced a major breakthrough in batteries – ultra-fast charging capability. The novelty is anode material:

“In the new NTU-developed battery, the traditional graphite used for the anode (negative pole) in lithium-ion batteries is replaced with a new gel material made from titanium dioxide.”

Recharging up to 70 percent takes just 2 minutes.

The second breakthrough is a long expected lifespan of over 20 years.

According to the NTU team, this could have “a wide-ranging impact on all industries, especially for electric vehicles.”

So, let’s think about this.

2 minutes to charge ~15 kWh (70%) of car like a Nissan LEAF needs 450 kW of power. This is 10-times what typical CHAdeMO chargers put out.

To do the same thing with a Tesla Model S 85 kWh, you must be well above 1 MW of power or maybe even at almost 2 MW.

It sounds like we definitely will need some new standard for that, maybe two additional heavy duty pins on the Combo plugs?

It’s hard to believe that we will get something like this anytime soon, however there could be applications for it, at least where currently available lithium-titanate are not up to the task (under 10 minute charging).

There is one question we’re left wondering what the answer is. We don’t see in the press release any indication of energy density, so what is it?

Here is the full press release:

“Scientists at Nanyang Technology University (NTU) have developed ultra-fast charging batteries that can be recharged up to 70 per cent in only two minutes.

The new generation batteries also have a long lifespan of over 20 years, more than 10 times compared to existing lithium-ion batteries.

This breakthrough has a wide-ranging impact on all industries, especially for electric vehicles, where consumers are put off by the long recharge times and its limited battery life.

With this new technology by NTU, drivers of electric vehicles could save tens of thousands on battery replacement costs and can recharge their cars in just a matter of minutes.

Commonly used in mobile phones, tablets, and in electric vehicles, rechargeable lithium-ion batteries usually last about 500 recharge cycles. This is equivalent to two to three years of typical use, with each cycle taking about two hours for the battery to be fully charged.

In the new NTU-developed battery, the traditional graphite used for the anode (negative pole) in lithium-ion batteries is replaced with a new gel material made from titanium dioxide.

Titanium dioxide is an abundant, cheap and safe material found in soil. It is commonly used as a food additive or in sunscreen lotions to absorb harmful ultraviolet rays.

Naturally found in spherical shape, the NTU team has found a way to transform the titanium dioxide into tiny nanotubes, which is a thousand times thinner than the diameter of a human hair. This speeds up the chemical reactions taking place in the new battery, allowing for superfast charging.

Invented by Associate Professor Chen Xiaodong from NTU’s School of Materials Science and Engineering, the science behind the formation of the new titanium dioxide gel was published in the latest issue of Advanced Materials, a leading international scientific journal in materials science.

Prof Chen and his team will be applying for a Proof-of-Concept grant to build a large-scale battery prototype. With the help of NTUitive, a wholly-owned subsidiary of NTU set up to support NTU start-ups, the patented technology has already attracted interest from the industry.

The technology is currently being licensed by a company for eventual production. Prof Chen expects that the new generation of fast-charging batteries will hit the market in the next two years. It also has the potential to be a key solution in overcoming longstanding power issues related to electro-mobility.

“Electric cars will be able to increase their range dramatically, with just five minutes of charging, which is on par with the time needed to pump petrol for current cars,” added Prof Chen.

“Equally important, we can now drastically cut down the toxic waste generated by disposed batteries, since our batteries last ten times longer than the current generation of lithium-ion batteries.”

The 10,000-cycle life of the new battery also mean that drivers of electric vehicles would save on the cost of battery replacements, which could cost over US$5,000 each.

Easy to manufacture

According to Frost & Sullivan, a leading growth-consulting firm, the global market of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries is projected to be worth US$23.4 billion in 2016.

Lithium-ion batteries usually use additives to bind the electrodes to the anode, which affects the speed in which electrons and ions can transfer in and out of the batteries.

However, Prof Chen’s new cross-linked titanium dioxide nanotube-based electrodes eliminates the need for these additives and can pack more energy into the same amount of space.

Manufacturing this new nanotube gel is very easy. Titanium dioxide and sodium hydroxide are mixed together and stirred under a certain temperature so battery manufacturers will find it easy to integrate the new gel into their current production processes.
Recognised as the next big thing by co-inventor of today’s lithium-ion batteries

NTU professor Rachid Yazami, the co-inventor of the lithium-graphite anode 30 years ago that is used in today’s lithium-ion batteries, said Prof Chen’s invention is the next big leap in battery technology.

“While the cost of lithium-ion batteries has been significantly reduced and its performance improved since Sony commercialised it in 1991, the market is fast expanding towards new applications in electric mobility and energy storage,” said Prof Yazami, who is not involved in Prof Chen’s research project.

Last year, Prof Yazami was awarded the prestigious Draper Prize by The National Academy of Engineering for his ground-breaking work in developing the lithium-ion battery with three other scientists.

“However, there is still room for improvement and one such key area is the power density – how much power can be stored in a certain amount of space – which directly relates to the fast charge ability. Ideally, the charge time for batteries in electric vehicles should be less than 15 minutes, which Prof Chen’s nanostructured anode has proven to do so.”

Prof Yazami is now developing new types of batteries for electric vehicle applications at the Energy Research Institute at NTU (ERI@N).

This battery research project took the team of four scientists three years to complete. It is funded by the National Research Foundation (NRF), Prime Minister’s Office, Singapore, under its Campus for Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE) Programme of Nanomaterials for Energy and Water Management.”

What Does A SolarCity/Tesla Storage System Cost?

CleanTechnica.com: We’ve written about SolarCity’s residential and commercial storage systems a couple of times before. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen a price tag on these. If you go to SolarCity’s home energy storage page, you can see that it asks you to “Get a free quote.” Not having a home in the US (and my legal home base in Florida not being in SolarCity territory), I couldn’t really do so even if I had thought to, but one of our readers (Kyle Field) actually went and got a quote.

The first thing Kyle found out is that SolarCity is only offering the residential storage solution to SolarCity customers at this moment (“due to limited supply of batteries”).

Even so, he did get some figures that would apply to his case if he was an existing SolarCity customer (he has solar but got it elsewhere, btw). He could (hypothetically) get a 10-kWh Tesla battery (to power the refrigerator, lights, etc. in a power outage) under a 10-year lease for a $1500 upfront cost + $15/month. That amounts to $3300 over 10 years. Not super cheap, but is actually less than I would have guessed off the top of my head. I’m curious to see how much the price for this comes down by the time the Tesla & Panasonic Gigafactory is pumping out batteries. I imagine it will come down a lot, as SolarCity has said that it plans to sell battery storage with every solar system within 5-10 years.

UK: 2015 £30k Kia Soul EV first drive

WHatCar.com: According to figures compiled by Kia, the fastest growing segment in the car market is electric vehicles, so it's not surprising that the Korean giant has chosen to make it’s popular mini SUV, the Soul, available as an electric-only version. The Soul EV goes on sale in the UK before Christmas.
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Far from simply ditching the conventional engines in favour of an electric motor and a battery, the Soul has undergone a fairly radical rethink in order to go zero-emission. With Kia also working on hybrid, plug-in hybrid and hydrogen technologies, it is fair to say that the firm is hedging its bets a little, but the Soul is its first attempt in the UK, at least, to push something that doesn’t run on petrol or diesel.

Kia is going to appoint a selection of its dealers to sell and service the EV, but it has modest sales expectations, with around 170 units a year expected to find homes. As a result, only one trim level and two colour schemes are available.

What’s the 2015 Kia Soul EV like to drive?

The standard Soul drives pretty neatly anyway, but it would reasonable to expect the extra weight of the batteries and electric motor to dull things dynamically. Oddly, that is not really the case. From behind the wheel, the Soul feels more than eager enough, as many electric cars do, thanks to instant availability of torque from rest. It can sprint to 60mph in around 11.5 seconds which is around a second slower than 1.6 diesel models, but the EV does so in virtual silence. The claimed range for the EV is 124 miles on a single charge and the top speed is 90mph, which mirrors the official figures of the Soul EV’s natural predator, the Nissan Leaf.

In order to take the additional weight of the batteries, the floor of the Soul has been beefed up with extra steel crossmembers, which has the effect of making it more rigid than the standard car. There's also some 277kg of batteries beneath the floor, although if you are going to add weight anywhere, between the wheels and low down is not a bad place to do it. Aerodynamic improvements have also been made to make the EV slip through the air as cleanly as possible and this has reduced the wind noise at speed.

The effect of all this is that the Soul EV drives really very well. For town driving, there is a mode with extra regenerative braking to keep the batteries topped up, which allows one-pedal operation, where backing off the accelerator pedal essentially applies enough braking force. For most conditions, the standard drive mode requires less thought.

Refinement is usually a strong point of any electric car and so it is here. The ride is a touch firm, but is never uncomfortable, even over poor road surfaces.

What’s the 2015 Kia Soul EV like inside?

At a glance, the interior of the EV looks much like the standard Soul's, but there are a few key differences. First up, Kia is keen to ensure that buyers know the EV is as green as it can manage, which means a lot of the interior materials are greener versions than those seen on the standard car. Items such as the dashboard panel, headlining and various plastic panels are made using bio- rather than petroleum-based plastics with a view to the car being more recyclable at the end of its life. It is nice place to be, though, regardless of what it is made out of.

There is only one interior finish available, and no options, because it's already very well equipped with a large colour touch-screen infotainment and nav system. The cabin is finished in light grey with light blue piping; despite the floor being 80mm higher than in the standard car, to accommodate the batteries, the EV has reprofiled seats which ensure headroom is just as good as in the very roomy normal Soul. Both front and rear seats are comfortable and there's plenty of room for four adults.

Boot space is also slightly reduced by the need to house all the electric paraphernalia under the floor, reducing the regular capacity by 30 litres, at 324 litres with the seats in place. All told, though, the boot is big enough for a car in this class and easily eclipses the BMW i3's.

One thing that Kia is very proud of in the Soul is the hyper-efficient heating system. Typically, running the heater or air-conditioning in an electric car has a devastating effect on the range. Kia has developed two key technologies to mitigate this as much as possible. First is a setting which heats or cools only the occupied part of the cabin when there is one person on board. This means considerably less energy is expended and there is no detriment to the comfort of occupants.

The other clever development is that, rather than having an electric heating element to put a bit of warmth in the car on a cold morning, the Soul harvests warm air from around the car’s complex electronic systems, and from the 'back end' of the air-conditioning system, to ensure that no warm air is wasted when it might be put to good use. Kia reckons this system gives the car a significant advantage over rival cars, which lose considerable range in order to keep the cabin comfortable in hot or cold conditions.

Should I buy one?

Maybe. Kia suggests the price is likely to be around £30k, with the government grant for plug-in cars dropping that to around £25k. That puts it at a slight disadvantage to the Nissan Leaf, which costs £23,590 after the grant when comparably equipped, and assuming you want to own the batteries - which is your only option with the Soul.

Nissan also offers the option of leasing the batteries for a monthly cost with the Leaf, which means you won't be responsible for any maintenance, and also brings much lower initial purchase costs, with the top-spec Leaf Flex costing £18,590. Renault offers the an even cheaper rival to the Soul - the Zoe, which is smaller and can only be had if you lease the batteries from £70 per month, but will still seat four comfortably and be practical to live with, and costs from just £13,995.

Viewed in isolation, the Soul EV is a very appealing, technically clever and nice to drive electric vehicle but even with the government discount for plug-in cars, it is still likely to be too pricey for the majority to consider as a stylish second car. If you like the Soul, a petrol version in a comfortable trim level will be £10,000 cheaper, and that buys you a lot of petrol.

That said, if an electric car fits into your lifestyle, the Soul EV is a very likable, practical addition to the market and should be considered a genuine rival to the Nissan Leaf, Renault Zoe and even the BMW i3.