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gnfargbl | 28 days ago

The EPA range of the NiMH EV-1 was 105 miles. That was, and is, sufficient for a good proportion of real-world use cases.

If the EV-1 had been allowed to succeed, who says we wouldn't have had lithium batteries sooner?

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cucumber3732842|28 days ago

It's sufficient in the same way 1991 Ford Escort that needs every fluid checked every gas stop is "sufficient" for most commuting in the present day.

Just because you can make it work with a lot of care doesn't mean that most consumers don't want more.

gnfargbl|25 days ago

Correct. It was never going to be a mass-market vehicle; it was an early adopter's product. Those products can still succeed, and their success proves the market and drives further innovation.

necovek|28 days ago

With so many discharge/recharge cycles common for a 105-mile range vehicle, how long would that NiMH battery last?

rcxdude|28 days ago

It's not obvious it would have succeeded, whatever meddling occurred. It's all a bit speculative.

Wolfenstein98k|28 days ago

Who didn't allow it to succeed?

michaelt|28 days ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_Killed_the_Electric_Car%3F

> Mobil and other oil companies are also shown to be advertising directly against electric cars in national publications, [...] Chevron bought patents and a controlling interest in Ovonics, the advanced battery company featured in the film, ostensibly to prevent modern NiMH batteries from being used in non-hybrid electric cars.

> car makers engaged in both positive and negative marketing of the electric car [...] In later days it ran "award-winning" doomsday-style advertising featuring the EV1 and ran customer surveys which emphasized drawbacks to electronic vehicle technology

> the federal government of the United States under the Presidency of George W. Bush joined the auto-industry suit against California in 2002. This pushed California to abandon its ZEV mandate regulation.

> A portion of the film details GM's efforts to demonstrate to California that there was no consumer demand for their product, and then to take back every EV1 and destroy them. A few were disabled and given to museums and universities, but almost all were found to have been crushed. GM never responded to the EV drivers' offer to pay the residual lease value; $1.9 million was offered for the remaining 78 cars in Burbank, California before they were crushed.