Reality, development and the electric car

From hydrogen-powered cars to solar-powered golf carts, drivers are looking to vehicles with alternative power sources — the kind that don’t require a sinking feeling when filling up at the pumps.

Unfortunately, like many alternative energy technologies, most of these transportation alternatives are still in development, years away from being ready for the real world. Solar-powered cars exist, for example, but they’re still body-hugging prototypes designed more to showcase the challenge of solar power than its imminent adoption. And electric cars like GM’s predatory-looking Volt or its more benign predecessor, the EV1, remain concept cars (a condition that received feature-length condemnation in 2006’s Who Killed the Electric Car?).

But, as reported by the CBC, while major car manufacturer’s concepts idle in the research phase, Canadian businesses like REV Consultants are bringing the concept to Canada’s roads. By replacing engines with rechargeable batteries, REV Consultants has been able to make the electric car a reality.

But making the electric car a reality also brings another, more unpleasant reality to light — the conversion’s prohibitory cost of about $20,000 for a complete retrofit. The move may lower the car’s greenhouse gas emissions, but not its cost.

(Then again, who knows? The hefty price tag might even afford buyers some much-needed social status in the bargain.)

In singing the emission-reducing capability of an electric engine, it’s also important to note that any vehicle using electricity drawn from the provincial grid would still be contributing to Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions. Aside from companies like Bullfrog Power, or offset programs, power is still generated in large proportion by coal and other emission-heavy fuel sources.

An electric engine may defray emissions, but it doesn’t eliminate them. The technology necessary to complete our energy revolution is still in development.