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The Chevrolet Volt
General Motors has a lot riding on this vehicle—thanks to the taxpayers, it has been spared the ultimate doom met by other automobile manufacturers: total collapse. The Chevrolet Volt isn’t GM’s first foray into electric cars: that was the EV-1 leased at the now-defunct Saturn dealerships in the 1990’s. GM eventually abandoned the EV-1, but now it aims to get back into the electric game with the Volt.
While the Volt’s price of admission is high (although made somewhat more reasonable by the federal government tax savings credit of $7500), the Volt has a distinct advantage that may make it a more viable option to the everyday driver that its foe, the Nissan Leaf, doesn’t have: a built in-range-extending option—in this case, a small gasoline engine that can extend its range to 300 miles. That’s a viable option for potential electric car owners worried about “range anxiety.”
It’s more appropriate, then, to call the Chevrolet Volt a “plug-in, gasoline-electric hybrid vehicle.” The Volt has an initial range of 40 miles (or 64 km) on an electric charge, via the Volt’s electric motor. The Volt’s range is boosted by a 1.4 liter Ecotec 4-cylinder gasoline engine that powers an on-board generator. The generator starts when the 16-kWh lithium-ion batteries for the electric motor have been depleted. This is important, because drivers who wish to take longer trips can do so by filling up the gas tank when it’s empty—instead of having to wait to recharge the electric motor’s batteries. Drivers should be able to drive about an additional 300 miles (or about 482.80 km), depending upon the manner in which the car is driven, driving conditions, temperature, etc.
The Volt’s electric motor doesn’t have nearly the projected 100 mile range that the Nissan Leaf claims to offer, but having the ability to drive an additional 300 miles with an economical gasoline-powered generator (with the ability to drive further in needed) seems like a good trade-off.
Also, keep this in mind: if a driver ever needs to flee a natural disaster or some other unforeseen calamity, it makes sense to be able to have the ability to potentially go farther in the Volt (if the gas tank is at least half or three-fourths full) than to be limited by the range of an all-electric vehicle that would need to be recharged when its batteries are completely drained and need to be recharged for at least several hours—if not much more—in order to continue to drive any farther.
Certainly, it would be nice to be totally emissions-free, but in a reality of uncertainty it would seem to be logical to want to have ability to utilize a back-up means of propulsion if the driver ever needed it in an emergency situation. By the way, the Volt can be charged in any 120v household outlet (about 10 hours for a full charge), but a quicker charger can be had by charging it in the Volt’s 240v charging station (about four hours for a full charge). Charging times also vary depending upon temperature extremes (extremely hot temperatures over 95 F and 20 F, for example).
Some other facts and figures about the Chevrolet Volt: it is a four-passenger car that has a hatchback instead of a trunk. It has remote vehicle start, a Bose stereo system, a 7” LCD touch screen, a navigation system with voice recognition, XM satellite radio, eight standard air bags and an 8-year/100,000 mile warranty for its lithium-ion batteries. Like the Nissan Leaf, the price of the Chevrolet Volt is high—the M.S.R.P. is $41,000, but decreases to $33,500 with the federal government tax savings credit of $7500. If a customer chooses to lease a Volt, they can expect to pay at least $350 per month for 36 months (three years).
Will the Volt succeed? That’s difficult to gauge right now; it hasn’t gone on sale just yet. Also, $33,500 will put it out of the range for many consumers, especially with a sagging U.S. economy. If it does succeed, it may do so because General Motors found a technological design that could prove to be a winner.
Manufacturer's Suggested M.S.R.P.: $41,000
Source: Chevrolet (http://www.chevrolet.com/pages/open/default/future/volt.do) 9/22/10
P. Scott
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