Introduction
The race for the electric car is on. Chevrolet has made news with the Volt, a range-extended electric car with a gasoline engine to charge the battery, but now Dodge has announced its intention to produce an all-electric car as early as late 2010. The Dodge EV will be an all-electric car with no gasoline engine. Based on a new rear-wheel-drive platform, the EV is a 2-seat sports coupe with sports car-like performance.
The Dodge EV draws a natural comparison to the Tesla roadster. Both are all-electric vehicles and both use a body/chassis design by Lotus. The Tesla is based on the Lotus Elise, and the Dodge EV concept vehicle is a rebadged Lotus Europa. While the Tesla costs almost $100,000, we expect the Dodge EV to come in far below that figure.
The Dodge EV is being developed by Chrysler LLC’s in-house organization ENVI. ENVI, which takes its name from the first four letters in “environmental,” has been tasked with looking at the future of the automobile without the internal combustion engine. Through ENVI, Chrysler and General Electric are working with the Department of Energy to explore advanced energy storage (battery) technologies. Advances here would make the EV’s batteries smaller and less expensive.
Chrysler has also announced range-extended electric vehicles for Chrysler and Jeep. Chrysler LLC says one of the three will be available by the end of 2010. We suspect that the Chrysler and Dodge vehicles will be available first, with the Dodge EV most likely coming in 2011 or even later.
