Thursday, February 12, 2009

Battery electric vehicle from Toyota





New CONCEPT vehicle from Toyota
This is a BEV- a battery electric vehicle, able to drive up to 50 miles a charge, and up to 70 mph.
This kind of car is really great for commuters, and for people like me, I rarely drive more than 15 miles away in a day.
I was really excited as I read about it on Toyota's website - excited that is, until I read that it is a CONCEPT vehicle, and won't be available until 2012! What is wrong?
It is like a car already being sold in Europe and Japan, why not here? What is wrong with Toyota? Now is the time for such a vehicle to be sold in the US. NOW! I don't get it, how long do we have to wait for progress?
I wonder what is holding them back, is it Toyota themselves, or maybe the US government?
If you would like to explore the new Toyota CONCEPT vehicle (I am SICK of concept vehicles) click on this link.
The technology has been around long enough, actually, cars like this have been around for a long time, and are being offered for sale right now online. What is taking Toyota and other mainstream automakers so long?