Electric Vehicles. Socio-economic Prospects and Technological Challenges
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Author(s): R. Cowan and S. Huultén (Eds)
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 0754613992
Format: hardback
303pp
Price: £49.95
Review Date: 29 June 2001
Review: The electric vehicle, which looks so attractive to social scientists, has never developed its mass market potential. This is because, up to now, the battery gave the vehicle a performance that was inferior to the internal combustion car. Now, with the improvement in batteries, the electric car may become technologically feasible, but the batteries may be so expensive that the car appears to be an economic impossibility. This book looks at the problems of the electric vehicle from a variety of perspectives and looks at: localised development; niche strategies; policy interventions; excessive prototyping; premature launches; and entrenchment of the internal combustion car.