Hybrid and Electric vehicles: is RP ready for the future?

[KERSMcRae]

we're having a coffee break in the office(staff with different nationality) when someone asked what's the future of cars using gas. One of the them- a car & F1 enthusiast "predicted" & say:

"soon our parking space will be planted with outlets on every corners for charging vehicles. worse if they (the provincial govt) creates a law that would say if you have more than one car in a household- one should be electric or hybrid. As long as they know how to make/create laws on getting more money from the people's pocket- it will come and it will happen.. same thing what they did with the winter-tire law & "0" (zero)-tolerance on teen drivers caught under DUI"..

acquiring vehicles here is easy. cars are considered to be necessity. competition is wide open with lot of brands to choose, financing scheme are "light" on pocket and 1 brand has warranty period up to 15 years ... (their 15-yr tv ad made me laugh the first time)..

- - - - -
I was thinking back home. I think our country is far behind- not just with our military- even our public transport that sucks and road infrastructures are too bad and ugly. in short, NOT READY for it.

[niky]

The Philippines can handle a few, but by and large, we're not ready. How do you collect revenues from electric tie-up points? How do you secure them? How sure is a plug-in owner that he will be paying only his electricity, and not that of the squatter colony behind the wall, tapped into the refill line?

Plug-ins and hybrids are great for developed economies where consumers have a high percentage of disposable income... although since the meltdown, the percentage of US consumers that can afford the up-front costs is vanishingly small... but for a country where even a lowly Suzuki Alto is a luxury, with a monthly amortization equalling some office workers' entire salaries... fat chance.

[fourtheboys96]

I am for plug-in hybrids.

In the thesis I am currently doing, survey results show that vehicle owners have more preference for diesel than gasoline engines which I attributed to lower price of diesel and higher fuel economy of diesel engines. Surprisingly, hybrids are preferred more than gasoline vehicles. Now, that is a big surprise but my sample is non-random hehehehe. My initial guess is that my sample represents only Class A or B people (maybe 10% max 15% of private vehicle owners in MM) which of course has the financial capability to buy this vehicles (they call them pioneer adapters).

But the recent model of Prius took a big price cut (but also change in vehicle size) but additional vehicle incentives may be enough to lure some pioneers if they can reduce the price further.

And some additional important matter is the daily travel these people make. Filipinos' daily travel is quite low (less than 50kms) which can be suitable for EVs but plug-in hybrid will suite us better because we sometimes travel long distances on weekends for a vacation or a family visit.

Annual travel is also low for Filipino vehicle owners compared to the Americans (20K miles = 32K kms). For Japan, they also travel more in terms of annual kms.

But I am not all out for these "hi-tech" automotive solutions. We can also tap our own natural gas (and even LPG) because it still has lower CO2 emission.

I hope some local engineers or scientists can develop a low cost solution appropriate for the Philippines. And I hope they publish the results in a peer-reviewed journal first before publish it the newspaper.

[GSHME]

It would not be to hard to build an electric vehicle as long as the buyer didn't want all the add on's which will keep the cost down, some government assistance would help immensely in passing laws and new rules.
The Chev Volt cost the US tax payers 250K each and not selling plus the drama of replacing batteries and disposing of the old and a small problem of catching fire.

[ghosthunter]

If you are looking for a no-frills electric car that you can buy now, proven durable and at a relatively low price, its available now!



It even has six seats, more than enough for the whole family!

Any takers?....

[ghosthunter]

But I am not all out for these "hi-tech" automotive solutions. We can also tap our own natural gas (and even LPG) because it still has lower CO2 emission.

I hope some local engineers or scientists can develop a low cost solution appropriate for the Philippines. And I hope they publish the results in a peer-reviewed journal first before publish it the newspaper.

We already have Auto-LPG in the Philippines or at least in Metro Manila and other cities in the Philippines. It has proven results by taxi and private users.

The plus side, this solution fits very well into the filipino society where we tend to buy more used cars than new ones and keep them longer than they were designed for. Nearly any gasoline fueled car can be converted to Auto-LPG and the cost of the conversion pays for itself in terms of fuel cost savings over a year or so depending on use.

Unfortunately the filipinos are also a very conservative bunch who prefers to listen to rumors & hearsay than actual testing done. The result is still a big amount of false facts circulating around Auto-LPG which hampers the wider adaption of Auto-LPG in the country.

As for natural gas, no supply and expensive equipment. You'll just end up with a chicken or the egg problem of getting it off the ground. Even the pilot CNG project failed because lack of support from the government and CNG supplier. Bus companies who already invested in purpose built expensive CNG buses were left in the air.

In the end, the Philippines is NOT ready for hybrid and electric vehicles, especially when the cheapest hybrid still costs twice more than a regular car of the same size (with all the tax breaks already included). Only the rich can afford to buy new expensive hybrids and electric cars. Often, they would be buying the WRONG kind of hybrid... like the ubber expensive Lexus RX450h hybrid SUV which is simply an insult to "green" technology and a crass display of wealth.