Tony Ng, My Paper, Asia One 25 Nov 09;
BY SEPTEMBER next year, electric cars will hit our shores in a big way.
Japanese carmaker Mitsubishi will bring in electric cars for a three-year infrastructure study that will cost the Government $20 million.
Electric cars offer many advantages: By 2020, we stand to reduce our land-transport sector's carbon emissions by up to 4 per cent, even if only 2 per cent of our vehicle population is made up of electric cars.
But will these vehicles take off here?
After all, it appears costly and difficult to get Singaporeans to adopt the Japanese penchant for recycling - the most basic thing we can do to be environmentally friendly.
Past experience has shown that Singaporeans are not really keen on green and are more likely to adopt eco-friendly habits based on price and practicality.
For instance, compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles have failed to take off despite feasibility studies in the 1990s.
The inadequate number of CNG fuelling stations makes it impractical to own such cars. The gas tank also takes up a lot of space in the boot.
Even though there was a boom in CNG car sales last year, it occurred partly because of sky-high petrol prices. Once petrol prices went down, the CNG spike died off.
Clean-diesel cars aren't going anywhere either. As of the end of last month, there were only 36 clean-diesel cars on the road, up from four such cars in 2007.
Then there's the price tag to consider. The $160,000 i-MiEV - the electric car that Mitsubishi will bring in next year - is priced well out of the majority's reach.
Its petrol variant, in contrast, costs less than $60,000.
Meanwhile, carmakers have yet to reveal the carbon footprint of an electric car.
We may take pride in reducing our carbon emissions, but could we be indirectly contributing to emissions instead?
We have not, for example, taken into consideration the manufacturing processes involved in producing and transporting these vehicles.
Reportedly, the health and environmental costs of making electric cars can be 20 per cent higher than those of conventional cars.
What's more, the materials in electric-car batteries are hard to produce. Some of the carbon emission-friendly hybrids on our roads today use metals that are already becoming rarer as the demand for hybrids and electric cars takes off.
Neodymium is one such metal.
Already, there are predictions that the supply of this material will not meet worldwide demand in a few years.
Also, are drivers here willing to adapt to electric cars?
On an island where the most popular type of car is the large multi-purpose vehicle, can the tiny i-MiEV take off?
Carmakers will have to address the concerns over passenger space by adopting different body styles for electric vehicles.
Finally, let's not forget that electric cars are silent - they may cut back noise pollution, but it will take time for drivers to give up the addictive roar of a petrol engine.
