Actually, if anyone wish to see any chance of EV on the road, one should not view it as a total replacement of present Diesel/Patrol guzzling vehicles. (at least in the early stage)

Put the battery life & range in the back seat & look & the economic of running cost + supply & demand.

Please tell me how many actually road users travel over 200km round trip daily? Tell me what is the percentage of car owners do outstation more then 10 times a year? Really… they are minorities… sure you want everything, but they aren’t available commercially… just yet… If can save in certain aspect, why not? where got so many little blue pills ler…

Actual User Needs (Not Wants)
I would say 80% of private car owners use their car either to travel to work (for wage earners) or running domestic arrant (house wives). What will their daily range be? if they have to do 200km per day, I would strongly suggest to relocate their job or home rather then asking for a longer range vehicle or cheaper batteries…

So if the daily mileage is less then 150km (most likely 20~80km) then how difficult will it be to plug-in house socket for overnight charging? Don’t tell me 80% of the population sleep less then 7 hours!!! If 90% of the car owners think the effort is worth the while, should we care about the picky 10%? I’ll tell the 10% they below to ICE cars…

For those who has to travel over 300km routinely for the sake of cari makan, then too bad, its not beneficial for them, until EV population on the road gain volume, say 300,00 to1million? By then even without help from G and resistant from Oil company, some resourceful businessman will dive into fast-charging business all over the country… Supply & demand ma…

Spin-off effect

With 1million EV on the road… do you think battery company won’t pour in billions to R&D better batteries??? Businessman stupid ???

Moreover, TNB has excess production capacity now… More excuse for pouring money into Bakun & Trans ocean cable… Consumer also not stupid, will aim at low tariff hours to charge… etc etc.. the limit is one’s imagination…

So G don’t have to subsidies fuel, Patronas can sell all Dino-left-over product oversea to earn more foreign exchange to sponsor 1Malaysia F1 team so that foreigner can take a ride…

Small Help from G
But to start the ball rolling, the G should give generous tax scheme (limited period) to con some businessman (or crony) to start selling import (opportunity to revive AP) or local EV (P3???)… While at it, make up some G look good story & generate some rakyat’s feel good factor… then when the ball start rolling… Harvard Business school will start another case study course on “Malaysian’s EV effort” after “Nazibnomy”….

And don’t forget to keep RTD & JPJ out of this, they will want the car be fitted with siren so that the noise pollution remains the same, safety belt for the batteries,.. water proof, amphibian capability, approval for changing light bulb inside the car, cabin temperature regulation… etc to ensure EV won’t touch Malaysian roads.

Malaysia Boleh!!!

Really?
For a typical hybrid car, how much the cost to replace the batteries then? How long the batteries can last? Range extender in what sense? Back forth further or just longer for one way trip? Using more batteries or install bigger engine capacity? What is the perfect/optimum hybrid of battery-engine for furthest range?

Detroit Electric is gonna be another scam, just like Hydrogen fuel hype. An automotive version of Swisscash.

Even an engineer can be as silly with their judgement.

Even worst, the hybrid car incentive somehow are ready with usual pre-installed crooks, cronies ready to loot.

i fully support this whole idea of fully electric cars.

I also like this idea, but.. what if the battery kong already after you use it for couple of hours or a few km, will you be back to the station and ask them for replacement?

btw, global warming is eating us, peninsula malaysia decrease inches every year to the sea.

are you germany? not malaysian?

Electric powered vehicles should be part of a broader automotive policy, as it will involve a lot of investment in infrastructure, environment, and affects electricity tariff that will affect everything else. And of course, it will affect the business of the oil companies, which will affect our country’s revenue.

Honestly, knowing our G, I don’t think this will go through. They are even undecided on NGV!!!!

interesting point dangermouse. if proton buy this detroit , i hope big G can execute this plan. proton will generate continues revenue from this plan and the rakyat will enjoy cheap n clean new tech

Firstly, I just hope Proton will develop after-market parts to adopt into their current models…that will help a lot coz current economic situation is not very encouraging to buy new cars…& i don’t think ppl will buy a 2nd hand proton?

Anyways…I just hope things goes well coz our environment is in very bad shape…need to stop somewhere. Although our electricity are 80% from diesel/coal fired power plants…these huge power plants are more efficient & produce much cleaner burn than a car’s engine. They’ll help…meanwhile we source for renewable energy for electricity.

Hope to see this come to pass.

Last time he was here as the boss of Lotus Engineering Malaysia.

After screwing Proton’s money on the Gen2 & Satria Neo project, he is back again to suck the money of our “just recently making money” PROTON.

ALBERT LAM’s M.O. , this is what we will be expecting. He will setup a Detroit Electric branch here in Malaysia, employ an overpaid HR manager to source out overpaid Whiteman friends( which are no longer wanted in their countries) or Korean or might even be Indian , off course here the Whiteman will be overpaid (like 5 figures USD/month) which eventually be charged to Proton and if there are local engineers that will join this local company, they will be paid peanuts ( most probably) guys from his previous company in Malaysia or guys from Perodua or might even be Proton.

Whatever it is, he is here again and if Proton is not carefully enough, millions will be lost to this guy.

So, wait and see….

There are ways around the charging time issue, basically you own the car & lease the battery. Charging stations can hold a stock of batteries which they could slot in & out to replace on the spot instead of waiting for a recharge. This means one company owns the batteries & charging infrastructure, and can upgrade the whole fleet through time too.

This is already happening around the world by the way – take a look at project Better Place, there is a link to a good article in Wired mag which is worth a read. If Proton / DE can get vehicles on the market to sell into the better place infrastructure, then they will be ahead of the game & do well.

http://www.betterplace.com/

First and foremost, selamat berpuasa,

Proton move towards researching electric and hybrid car is a very good move. Now the main issue is not about people’s acceptance, in fact majority car users (Malaysia and the rest of the world) would like the idea of having alternative energy other than fossil fuel (gasoline, gas and diesel). Now, we just have to see whether the Government is clever enough to catch this new hype and bring in a motion that will accelerate the growth of hybrid and electric cars in Malaysia. Of course, I have to agree, a through study will be needed on how to implement a proper infrastructure to cater these cars. As for now, I can only see Hybrid car is more applicable to our current infrastructure because it still uses either Gas or Gasoline as primary fuel and electric motor as its secondary-support engine.

As for fully-electric powered-by-battery car (by Detroit or others), unfortunately the much needed infrastructure/tech is still not there;

What we are lack of:
1) Charging for 7 hours is rather long and the instance 30 minutes charge I believe is meant for short distance driving. One of the comments up there says about installing solar panels on the car’s roof which I must say a very brilliant recommendation. This means the car can actually use and recharge at least some of the energy it uses.

2) Furthermore the Government will have to prepare a lot of car-battery-charging facilities not just along the main highways but even in the main cities. We need to consider that the car’s battery life span will be affected by heavy traffic jam as well. We do not want to worsen the jam by having a lot of stall electric cars along the roads.

3) I’m not sure whether the electric car design allows it to cross partially flooded roads (I hope it doesn’t fry the circuit, the batteries and the car occupants!) considering our beloved Malaysian roads are always flooded during heavy rain.

4) The Government will need to do an EIA study with our electricity providers (TNB and SEB) whether our national grid can cater sudden energy demand when electric cars become a reality. Nuclear powered plant is a sensitive issue, everybody says its safe but its funny, and nobody wants it to be built at near their backyard/city/kampung. Not to mention, we will have to sacrifice some portion of our land to use as nuclear waste storage facility. If this is not properly conduct by nuclear professionals (scientist, engineers) another Chernobyl is bound to happen.

5) Electric car and even some hybrids are very quiet cars. In fact some countries in Europe and US set a minimum ‘noise’ an electric car should be producing. Its just plain dangerous to pedestrians having these cars moving fast while not making the usual rumble sound.

6) And the list of problems goes on. Don’t get me wrong, I love the idea of having electric powered car as soon as possible. Its just, we need to be reminded, improper planning of these “grand master plan” can be disastrous (improper use of public funds? Cronyism? Faulty in the electric car design because of “nak untung cepat scheme” Etc.). As an engineer myself I could only say this, everybody could be a hero or an idealist (just plain talking) but in reality, you will still need scientists, engineers, and technical people to run the show. Proper study and planning will be needed. Just add in more ideas! I’m eager to see what future has stored for us…

LOTS OF CORRECT AND POSITIVE STATEMENTS

<<>>
40 times oil change(mineral oil) = 75 x 40 = 3,000
Overhaul every 100k km = 1000 x 2 = 2,000
new engine cost = 10,000
Running cost (RM0.25 per km at current petrol price) = RM50,000
TOTAL ——————– RM65,000
Note: all the cost above are more likely to increase over time when petroleum price climb.
Note: Global warming, pollution, petroleum peaks, etc.

<<>>
Battery cost according to wikipedia* = RM65,000
Running cost (RM0.03/km at current electric tarrif) = RM6,000
TOTAL ——————– RM71,000
Note: all the cost likely to decrease due to mass production.
Note: high efficiency, near zero emission, possible way to utilize clean energy.

See the potential?

*Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster#Battery_system

*************************************************************

Talk about environmental issue
– running on electric just give us the flexibility to utilize a wider range of energy source: petroleum fossil, coal, natural gas, biomass, renewable, nuclear, fitness first…
– controling pollution on a centralized area is easier then controlling the emission of millions of vehicle.
– recycling one battery pack is suppose to be easier then recycling 100s of litres of spent engine oil.

Talk about convinience:
– Charge at your home plug is much easier then visiting Petronas
– 300km is more then enough, a typical worker who stay in Klang and work in KL only need about 2 full charge per week.
– range extender option is possible

but under these circumstances only:

*electric is obtained from renewable energy only (hydroelectric, solar,wind).<< it is not eco-friendly to get electricity from coal-fired powerstation, keep aside nuclear powerstation for its waste storage problem.

*battery replacement is affordable, charging amenities is well-provided & waste form battery recycling process is monitored.<<if it is entended to save the world, then full resposbilities should be taken, buat sungguh2, jgn bagai melepaskan batok di tangga!

*car will drive well like their ICE’s sibling.<<car engineers should tackle the change in weight distribution & handling dynamic due to the new electric motor & cells installation.

err..if rm80k e-persona, it’s ok,
but rm80k e-savvy..hm..better stick to fossil fuel la :p

it’s “Dutch-based Detroit Electric”.
I think it is Chinese onwed, Dutch-based, American named, Malaysian chasis, Detroit Electric

made by philips? malaysian chasis??a real nighmare

Zap however, wasn’t really a profitable company to begin with. Proton and Youngman aren’t exactly rich either. So, besides technology (battery lifespan) and infrastructure (charging points), financing could be another stumbling blocks. Project like this requires massive funding to be truly successful.

So, keep ur finger crossed.