Auto Trends

1996 GM EV1 Electric Vehicle 013 N, originally uploaded by Corvair Owner

Chelsea Sexton was involved with the development of the electric concept vehicle, the GM Impact, which was an electric vehicle project killed back in the early 1990’s. The Impact has since been brought back into the limelight by the popular documentary, Who Killed The Electric Car and its sequel, The Revenge Of The Electric Car. The first film exploited the events that led to the destruction of the GM Impact, while the second film will look at the future in store for the electric vehicle.

Why are some people so excited about the resurgence of the EV? Well, let’s ask Chelsea Sexton herself.

What are some of your opinions of the new technologies coming into play under the current legislation?
Chelsea: “I am a big fan of the electrification of vehicles. Whether that means pure electric or plug-in hybrid, that is what I think is the Holly Grail of Vehicle technology at this point. I don’t personally believe we will see hydrogen in cars on a mass scale for decades, and I’m not sure we should ever go there. There is certainly some stationary applications, but when you look at the features and benefits, there is nothing that hydrogen provides that electrification doesn’t provide. Yet, hydrogen does so at a huge technological and economic cost. Hydrogen is kind of the perfect example of just because you can, doesn’t mean that you should.”

What are the costs you are referring to with hydrogen?
Chelsea: “Hydrogen has a number of challenges technologically. The vehicles are still about $1 million dollars. Some of the automotive manufacturers have told us that they have got it down to $600 or $700 thousand, and I don’t know about you, but that is still a little out of my price range. It is also very energy intensive. You can basically make hydrogen two ways. You can either form it from natural gas or make it from electricity, driving it through water and splitting the hydrogen and oxygen. If you do it with natural gas you use about three times the natural gas than if you just put natural gas in a car to begin with. If you do it with electricity, you use about four times the electricity than if you just charged an electric car.”

What has been the most exciting moment for you this past year?
Chelsea: “I think the most exciting thing is that the EV’s are coming back. In some sense it is really old technology that is finally making its way back in. We went through this faze back in 1990, when GM showed this compact car at the LA auto show called the Impact. So there is a certain sense of irony that this is all coming back again. We had years of darkness of all these auto makers trashing anything with a plug on it. Now we have a horse race of all these car companies competing with each other to be the first and the best.”

What do you say to the people who comment that electricity is still using coal, so is it really making that much of a difference?
Chelsea: “This is one of the more frustrating arguments and we deal with. There are 30-plus studies that specifically show that even with coal, electric cars are cleaner than gasoline. Yet, no matter how many studies are done, there are some people who won’t believe this. I understand this on some level, especially with the newer climate change movement, which coal is the enemy for that movement. I get that, and we are not happy that coal is on the grid. We wish it were less, but it will be better and the grid is getting cleaner. Coal is bad, but oil is worse. Electric cars are the only kinds of cars that will get cleaner over time. We are used to a paradigm where we drive a clean gas car off the showroom floor and it gets dirtier. With a plug-in, the dirtiest day from an emissions perspective that car will ever see, is the day you drive it home.”

Is there is big difference between the plug-ins and the hybrids that run on gasoline?
Chelsea: “Oh yes, absolutely. The challenge with the regular hybrids and the reason I won’t buy one, is because they are still gasoline cars. They have motors and they have batteries, but you can only ever charge those batteries with gas. The difference with the plug-in hybrids is they have a bit more battery capacity and you have the ability to both plug them in over night and go to a gas station if you need to. You drive home, go in your garage and plug-in and it takes 2-seconds. Then you go inside, have dinner, and go to bed. You don’t even notice the refueling part. It happens while you sleep and you have a car that is always full in the morning. We are so used to going to gas stations, but when you don’t have to anymore, it is a wonderful freedom. The people who had to go back to gas when their cars were taken away in the 1990’s, it was a traumatic experience. You would think there was this death in the family.”

Love em’ (like Chelsea) or hate em’, the EV is coming to a showroom near you in 2010!