Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Harold From California

My name is Harold and I was born electric on August 19^th, 2014. 

There are two parts to my story here. The first is about my path to selecting and buying the i3, and the second is about my experiences owning and driving the i3.

PART 1:  

“IF YOU’RE NOT PART OF THE SOLUTION, THEN YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM.”

When it comes to global warming, I’m embarrassed to say that for far too long my wife and I were part of the problem.  We’re a two car family, and over the years we’ve driven a series of big, luxury, premium fuel guzzlers. As recently as 2007 we each had one of the full-size Range Rovers. Yikes, and yuck!

I gradually realized this was not tenable, but I found it very, very hard to give up the comfort (I’m 6’3 and don’t fit in most cars) and sportiness of a big luxury SUV. The very thought of shoehorning myself into the ugly and painfully boring Prius hybrid was enough to make me puke.

So my first tentative step in the right direction was to sign up to make annual contributions to one of those carbon-offset charities. I even got vanity license plates that said “I OFFSET.” Wow, how big and how brave of me!

Then BMW came out with a diesel version of their X5 so I dumped my Range Rover in favor of that on the theory that at least I would be burning a lot less fuel. As nice a car as the X5 was, it ended up only getting about 16mpg, and I also came to understand that the diesel wasn’t as clean as I had thought it might be.

Meanwhile, there were more hybrid cars coming on the market, but all still seemed to frumpy for me.  I’m sorry, but I live in California and I spend a ton of time in my car and I want it to look and feel great!

And then Audi launched their stylish little Q5, and I dumped the X5 in favor of this smaller, more fuel efficient vehicle. But even that only got around 20mpg. 

So about a year ago I started the search for my next car. I did my first exploration of EV’s. The RAV4 was too clearly a Toyota. The Leaf, which a neighbor of mine happily drives, drove like a turtle to me.  The Volt was claustrophobic – and a Chevy to boot. The Tesla was way cool, but I actually don’t fit very well in it and, at least in the San Francisco area, driving one has already become interpreted as a sign that you are an obnoxious snob.

So, I had resigned myself to getting the new edition of the X5 diesel, which promised to deliver significantly better – and cleaner – mileage than the original one. And then one day while I was checking out the new X5 on one of the BMW forums, I saw something about the coming of the i3. It looked weird as hell in the photo, but it sounded intriguing. I started to follow stories about it. 

I went to a car show in San Jose to see it in person. I fully expected to discover that I could not fit in it, but when I sat down in the model on display I discovered that it had more head room and leg room and better visibility than my Q5. (Of course at this point, BMW was showing it with a sunroof – more about that later….). Plus, the interior design was stunning. And the exterior, while weird, was weird in a sexy way.  So I was hooked.

When the test drives started happening in the Bay Area, I went to them at three different dealers.  Driving the car was a total blast (all the more so with the sunroof open…..) and I had to have one. I went to my dealer and said I’m willing to pay MSRP for one of the first ones you get, I just need to get two key options – the sun roof and the REX. Can you arrange that please?

And then things started to fall apart. For one, it turned out the sunroof was not going to be offered in the US.  No reason for this has ever been provided, but that alone was enough to put me off.  I’m claustrophobic, and I always felt I needed a sunroof to have the feeling of openness they give. And then some negative stories started to appear about the REX – a review in Europe said driving with the REX was like driving in limp-home mode, and then it was revealed that the REX was being modified in the US in ways that made it seem even less desirable.  And,  being new to EV’s, I was at that point too chicken to go the full BEV route.

So, I abandoned my quest for an i3. I signed off of the i3 forums and facebook group. I went back to my dealer and started haggling over prices on the X5 diesel again. But the x5 diesel remained in hot demand,  and I couldn’t get what I thought was a reasonable price. And then the i3’s actually arrived. I saw two in one day “in the wild.” I went behind my dealer’s back and went to another dealer to test drive an i3 again.  I found that even without the sunroof it still felt very open. And it was just as fun to drive as I had remembered. 

So I went back to my CA, said you’re not going to believe this, but I want the i3 after all. He laughed very heartily. We worked the numbers for a while. I ended up doing the two year version of “owner’s choice.” (Went with owner’s choice vs. lease to get the full advantage of the federal tax credit,  and went two years rather than three just because I expect the EV technology is going to advance pretty rapidly over the next couple of years and I may want to move to the next edition sooner rather than later.) And within just a few weeks I was driving my new Andesite Silver Terra i3, loaded up with everything except for the 20” wheels.  And, surprise surprise, I even got over my fear of running out of juice and went with the BEV instead of the REX.

PART 2: 

“WHO SAYS MEDICINE HAS TO TASTE BAD TO BE GOOD FOR YOU?

As I mentioned earlier, a key factor that kept me from switching sooner to a more environmentally correct car was that they all just seemed too ugly, too uncomfortable, and too boring. I wanted to do the right thing for the planet – but I wanted to still be able to enjoy driving at the same time.

Thankfully, my i3 has solved all three of those problems for me. 

While I will admit that the exterior is a bit of an acquired taste, there can be no denying that the interior is stunning. Yes, the materials are all very environmentally friendly, but more important to me – they are gorgeous. The design is very fresh,  very high tech,  and yet very simple. Among the features I like most are the floating high definition screens (one for the instrument cluster stuff, one for the navigation and multimedia stuff) and the eucalyptus dash. I also really appreciate the openness of the cabin and the great sight lines.

The interior is also quite comfortable. I was initially skeptical about the thinness of the seats.  As a veteran business road warrior, I have equated the steady thinning down of airline seats over the years with an equally steady decline in the comfort of those seats. Well, I can only hope that the designers at Boeing and Airbus get to drive an i3 soon so they can see how to make a thinner seat super supportive and comfortable.

And as for the driving experience, well, I haven’t had so much fun driving a car since the very first one I owned.  First comes the peppiness. As the folks at BMW are fond of saying,  the i3 is the fastest car they make from 0 to 30 mph.  And I believe them now!  Zipping in and out of city traffic is as easy as can be – aided by how tight the turning radius is. Likewise, accelerating on to freeway ramps and passing at freeway speeds is also quick and easy. When we had a meet up of Bay area i3 drivers recently,  I had t-shirts printed up for everyone that carried this message: “I drive a BMW i3.  So you can eat my dust, not my exhaust. You’re welcome.” Trust me, the message is appropriate: this car hauls ass.

It's hard to see in the picture, but the blue T-Shirts everyone is wearing are the shirts Harold made up for the Crissy Field i3 meet. He was even gracious enough to send me a couple in the mail. Photo credit: Dino Ignacio

The steering is also very tight. I’m sure it has some degree of electronic assistance, but it doesn’t feel in the least bit mushy or vague. If anything it’s too responsive – you have to be attentive or it’s a bit too easy to oversteer.

The ride is firm, but in a good, BMW way. If you don’t want to feel the road at all, then this is not the car for you. But if you like to get some feedback from your driving, you should like this.

I really like the quietness of the car. If you keep the windows rolled up, it is super quiet; there is of course some wind noise at higher speeds, but I have not found it to be objectionable. And, at the same time, if you drive with the windows open, you can actually hear the sounds of nature!

I’m still learning all the fancy new tech tools.  Love the Harman Kardon stereo, love being able to use apps like Pandora and TuneIn. Appreciate that iDrive has gotten clearer and more manageable, though it still requires a learning curve. Love the collision avoidance system and the adaptive cruise control.  Haven’t yet tried the self-parking thing – but haven’t felt the need either, as this is the smallest car I have driven in ages and I would feel like a total wimp if I couldn’t park it by myself.  : )

As for downsides of the i3, anyone who buys this car has to accept that they are on the bleeding edge of technology and that things may go wrong. And they have for some of the early owners. But, knock on wood, after just about 1,000 miles, the worst thing that has happened to me so far is that one morning while I was driving along a nearly empty six lane freeway a warning message popped up on my screen that said something about “Danger – objects detected in roadway.” There were no objects to be seen, so I ignored the message and kept on driving and the message ultimately disappeared.

Also, if you choose as I did to go with the BEV instead of the REx, you will probably find yourself being more than a little bit paranoid about monitoring how much charge you have left. I have been running somewhere around 75 miles per full charge – a little less than what the EPA says, but then I drive with a bit of a lead foot and I leave the AC on all the time. So far I’ve only once gotten the dreaded verbal warning “you have 15 miles of range left,” and thankfully that happened when I was only about a mile from my house.

One other downside is that, to my way of thinking, the i3 is not practical as a family car. The “suicide”  doors (aka coach doors) make access to the back seat just too awkward for regular use, especially if you are trying to cope with child seats.

OK, so the i3 is good looking, it’s comfortable, and it’s fun to drive. But how does it do on my original overall reason for getting it, which is to help address the problem of global warming?

Well,  for one thing I have not been to a gas station since I got the car. And will never have to go to a gas station with it. Take that, Exxon and BP and the rest of you big oil companies! (The vanity plates I have on order for my car will read: “I86DGAS”) And, at least according to the i3 mobile app, so far I have already saved 530 pounds of CO2 from being pumped out into the air.

So,  in sum, thank you BMW for giving birth to the i3 so that I can at last do my part for solving global warming – but do it in a way that fits my own selfish needs for style, comfort, and fun!

PS- The i3 may not be right for everyone, but there are now plenty of EV’s on the market – surely one of them will be right for you!
_________________________________________________________




Thanks for participating Harold! If you drive an i3 and want to share your Born Electric story here, just send me an email and we'll set it up! tom.moloughney@gmail.com

Born Electric Guest Blogger: Meet Christopher from Massachusetts

Christopher on pick-up day! Born Electric 8/6/14

An EV Awakening

Hi, my name is Christopher and I was born electric on August 6, 2014.

In retrospect, ending up behind the wheel of BMW’s new electric i3 feels like it was inevitable.  If you let it, life has a funny way of getting you where you belong.  My path into an i3 took about seven years, but with the benefit of hindsight, it feels like destiny.

The car I took to college in the late 80s was an Inka orange 1972 BMW 2002. That was followed by a jade green one, which I still vividly remember driving across the country in the summer of 1989.  I have been a fan of the BMW brand since those days and have owned five of them of various types in a continuous chain over the last 30 years.  For me the design, the handling, the safety, the quality, the purity of focus, the racing heritage - all of these things made BMW a brand I kept coming back to.  I have also always been drawn to the geeky technical side of things in life, so the cutting edge in technology, including as applied to automotive design, has been an enduring interest of mine. 

But as I have grown older I have become more and more concerned with trying to protect some semblance of our environment for my children’s generation.  And, probably in part because of my kids, as I have matured, I have become a more conservative and less aggressive driving, realizing that while pushing hard does not really shorten your trip, the stress and increased risk of aggressive is likely to shorten your lifespan.  Work, urban living, extreme road congestion, and family responsibility all conspired to make storming around in a sporty car less of a priority.  Given my day to day reality, a thirsty high performance car is simply the wrong tool for the job.

So not surprisingly, over time, the BMW brand’s focus on luxury, power, speed and performance slowly drifted out of sync with my mental frame of reference.  I still loved and admired the cars, but the idea began to gnaw at me that burning gas just for the joy of it was an irresponsible thing to do, especially day in and day out while commuting. At least for me, there had to be a better way.

As my daily driver, a beloved BMW 3 Series wagon, tuned somewhat severely by Dinan Engineering for more performance and handling, hit about ten years old in around 2010, I began to feel the first stirrings of a need to replace it with something better suited for the job at hand. Something more reliable, more comfortable, more efficient, more sustainable.  I began, as a sideline, to leisurely consider the options available in the market at that time. 

My 3 Series Dinan-tuned wagon

Some of the BMW diesels were interesting, but they were a bit too expensive - the pay-off was way too long given the high price of diesel in my region of the US.  The early BMW hybrids were not serious, or credible, efforts.  The small nimble 1 Series cars were sort of appealing, but there was no reason to downgrade to one of these from the beloved Dinan wagon.  So I began to look at other options. When we converted our home to solar my search began to look more seriously at the growing market for non-BMW hybrids and electrics.  I had always followed the hybrid and EV technology, but the cars suddenly seemed like plausible alternatives for the first time. 

So after a bit of research, we took the plunge and replaced my wife’s BMW 5 Series Wagon with a Prius V wagon.  With its arrival, the surprising pleasures of driving as efficiently as possible first became apparent to me.  The car was a bit of an eye opener. Setting the cruise for 65 and just chilling out in the right lane was a whole new experience for me.  Before long, between the hybrid joining the motor pool and the solar house generating a surplus of electricity each year, I had been bitten by the EV bug badly.

But there was still nothing I was tempted to bite on for myself.  I really didn’t like the way the Prius felt and drove and handled (it might crash test well, but in reality, to someone used to the solidness of a BMW, the Prius feels like a pretty flimsy car and drives like the transportation appliance it is).  Given the demands of my work and lifestyle I didn’t feel comfortable with a 60-70 mile range EV - I needed to be able to jump up and drive 125-250 miles at a clip if necessary, and couldn’t imagine spending good money replacing a car that could easily do that with a more expensive one that couldn’t.  And I didn’t want a big sledge-hammer of a car like the 16 foot long, 4700 lb, Tesla.  They are undeniably excellent cars in many ways, but the engineering approach, the size, the cost, and the short track record of the manufacturer completely ruled them out as an option for me personally.  So I was kind of stalled. (pun acknowledged)

The concept i3 is revealed

Not surprisingly, BMW’s announcement of the i Division in 2011 really caught my attention. The first BMW i car was still years away, but I began following the project closely and learning everything I could.  At each step of the way, I felt BMW made the right choices.  The emphasis on total sustainability in design and manufacturing.  The emphasis on lightness as a way to make the car more efficient and get to longer range (a sharp contrast to the just-add-more-batteries school of design).  The willingness to do radical things and use radical materials to advance the state of the art.  The focus on trying to keep the price reasonable.  The boxy, geek-chic utility of the package.  I began to feel certain that this was going to be my next car.

As the project progressed, I continued to read everything I could find to keep up to date.  The leaks and speculation grew increasingly enticing.  I was biting my nails that BMW would not make a design choice that suddenly disqualified the car for my needs.  My main concerns, even in those days of exaggerated range estimates, was whether it would go far enough on a charge and whether it would be prohibitively expensive.  If the rumors of reasonable pricing “between the 3 and 5 series” were comforting, the announcement of the Rex was a total revelation.  Once it became clear that this car was going to be available with a very smartly-designed range extender, it became inevitable that it was going to be my next car.

Tom and Dr Julian Weber, BMW's Head of Innovation Projects E-Mobility at the i3 launch in July 2013 in New York City

With great excitement, I watch the world-wide unveiling of the i3 on my laptop at work one morning in July 2013 . And I followed the European launch of the first customer cars that Fall very closely.  As the US release drew closer, and final US pricing was announced, I began to make my plans.  I joined Tom’s excellent i3 Facebook group and began to learn about the real-life issues reported by cars in the field.

Oddly, my first opportunity to put down a deposit and order a car came before the first test drive cars were available in my area.  But the deposit was refundable, and demand was projected to be through the roof, so I put down a deposit in early February 2014.  The Launch Edition requirements were a bit of a headache, but my first few test-drives confirmed all my instincts were correct.  It was clear from a couple test drives that this was a very special car.

As manufacturing issues stacked up, I tracked the Leipzig production weeks and watched with despair as my build date slipped repeatedly from mid-March into late April. However finally in late April the build began. As a projected single week in the factory turned into an inexplicable six week delay in the Leipzig plant, I vicariously enjoyed the tales of the first cars being delivered in early May to the Electronauts who had tested the i3 drivetrain in the Active-E program.

  

MY ClipperCreek EVSE

Widespread reports of initial quality hiccups, combined with mounting delays, really tested my patience (and at times probably the limits of some of my online i3 friendships.)  But the joy most people took in the car combined with the knowledge that BMW would stand behind their multi-billion dollar investment in this project and the certainty that a large silent majority was not having any issues, was enough to keep my tattered faith intact. Having Tom and some of the other experienced Electronauts there to answer questions and offer advice was indeed extraordinarily helpful.

Tracking the Don Juan

Researching and installing a charger kept me somewhat busy as May and June dragged on and my shipping delays mounted. Eventually, my car made it to the port of departure in Bremerhaven in mid June and, after another wait, finally got on a boat in early July. Tracking the boat was painful given how close, and yet so far, my car was.  But eventually I caught a glimpse of my ship on a webcam in Halifax Nova Scotia, and it suddenly started to feel very real for the first time. Arrival at the vehicle processing center in New York was like entering a black hole - the car sat in processing for three weeks before being released to trucking, and that was only after placing a couple calls to get it prioritized.  And, naturally, the trucking took forever.  Long enough, in fact, that the car arrived about two hours too late to take on a multi-state loop to visit family that had been planned to take advantage of the car’s arrival. 

So off we went in the Prius, and in a great irony, the just-arrived car sat for several days before I could pick it up.  But eventually I made it to the dealer, and after 30 years of BMW enthusiasm, 7 years of evolving awareness, three years of studiously following the i3 project, 6 months of post-deposit waiting, the perfect car for me arrived, and I was born electric on August 6, 2014. 




Has the car met my initial expectations?  Without a doubt.  The design and build quality is outstanding, and the car is as comfortable as any I have driven.  But the way it performs has been the biggest surprise.  This car is just such an amazing juxtaposition of serenity and fury.  Driven hard, it leaps off the line with instantaneous torque - you can drive a week and never meet a car that can beat it from a green light down a city block Out in the country, when accelerating out of tight corners, it has enough power to break the rear wheels loose (and trigger the traction control) even on dry roads.  But driven more gently it is supremely smooth and silent and tranquil.  The ride is firm as to be expected of a teutonic car, but the drivetrain is so quiet, and the cabin so tight and noise-free, that the car is just amazingly relaxing to travel in.  Further stress reduction is afforded by the optional automatic cruise control, which allows you to set your maximum speed and forget it from there forward.  The car will track the traffic in front of it and maintain a safe distance regardless of traffic speed (even down to stop and go speeds) and then silently leap forward when the road opens up in front of it.  A dream for urban and suburban commuting.  This is a car that will play when you want to play, and lay down the miles without tiring you when you just need to get efficiently from point A to point B.  To paraphrase E.B. White’s famous words about Wilber: “That’s one swell [automobile].”

Christopher Mirabile is an early stage investor in Boston MA, USA.  He is the co-Managing Director of Launchpad Venture Group and the co-Founder of angel portfolio management site www.Seraf-Investor.com. He blogs about technology, investing and entrepreneurship at www.scratchpaperblog.com. and Tweets under the name of @cmirabile

Electric Vehicle Sales In The US Hit All-Time High In May!

The Introduction Of The BMW i3 Helped May Set A New Plug-In Selling Standard (Above: First i3 REx Delivered To US -mine!- shown)

Note: This post was written by Jay Cole and first appeared on InsideEvs.com. The news was just too good not to share here! The times, they are a-changin!

Since the start of the ‘current generation’ of plug-in vehicles in the United States, no one month has ever failed to delivered an improved result over the year prior.  Ever. Including this month, that number is at 42 and counting.

More Than 3,100 Americans Hopped In The Front Seats Of A New Nissan LEAF

However May still caught anyone who follows the EV selling trends off guard, as what had been expected to be a solid month turned out to be the best selling month of all-time.  Any month.  Any country.
In total just over 12,000 plug-ins where sold, compared to the previous all-time high set in August of 2013 when and estimated 11,273 moved onto American’s driveways.  Compared to May of 2013, sales improved by a massive 62% when 7,454 plug-ins were sold.

Unlike August of 2013 when the Chevrolet Volt single-handed propelled the number higher (3,351), May’s record month was a combined effort from 3 automakers – Nissan, Toyota and Ford.
All three OEMs saw new record highs for their best selling plug-ins.

• Nissan LEAF – 3,117 (previous best – 2,529 – Dec 2013)
• Toyota PHV – 2,692 (previous best – 2,095 – Oct 2013)
• Ford Fusion Energi – 1,342 (previous best – 1,087 – Oct 2013)

Also adding to the totals was the BMW i3, which sold 336 copies during the month (story on that here) – the best debut month for any plug-in to date in the US.  In total 11 of the 17 mass produced plug-ins sold in America set a new yearly high.

The top five selling plug-in  manufacturers for May were:

1. Nissan – 3,117
2. Toyota – 2,841
3. Ford – 2,301
4. General Motors – 1,918
5. Tesla – 1,000*

Other plug-ins that set new all-time highs in May:

• smart ED – 206 (previous – 203, Apr 2014)
• Chevrolet Spark EV – 182 (108 – Mar 2014)
• BMW i3 – 335 (1st month)

2014 YTD Sales Chart

2014 Monthly Sales Chart For The Major Plug-In Automakers *Estimated Tesla NA Sales Numbers (Q1 Sales reported @ 6,457-3,000 Intl Delivers) *Fiat 500e data estimated for Jan/Feb

"Monroney Hold" Has Hundreds of Range Extended i3s in Limbo

i3s lined up at the port in New Jersey

For a little over a month now, cargo ships from Bremerhaven, Germany have been arriving weekly at the port in New Jersey to unload anywhere from dozens to hundreds of shiny new i3s. My i3 arrived last week on the Fedora, which left Germany back on April 30th. Back when I learned it was booked on the Fedora and would arrive here on  May 15th, I assumed that by the 20th or 21st of May, I'd be at the dealer signing the paperwork and driving my i3 home. I was wrong.

The BEV i3s Monroney label

I now have no idea when I'll be getting my car, and neither do the hundreds of other people that ordered an i3 with the range extender and whose cars are currently here in the US sitting at a port somewhere. Officially the holdup is a "Monroney Hold" - the fact that the EPA certification has not been completed so BMW doesn't have a Monroney label (window sticker) to post in the window before the car leaves the port, which is required by law. The range extender option changes (shortens) the car's electric range, and also requires an official MPG rating so BMW couldn't use the same Monroney label as they did for the all electric i3. The i3 REx would need to be fully tested and certified as a completely different car. To make matters worse, the majority of i3's sold in the US have the range extender option. For example, my client adviser Manny Antunes of JMK BMW has sold thirteen i3s so far and only two of them are the BEV version. Eleven of the thirteen have the range extender and his clients are beginning to call him frequently now, wondering when they can expect delivery. He has no information to offer other than he'll contact them as soon as he hears something from BMW - or a truck somehow magically pulls up to the dealer with a load of i3s with range extenders!

Where's mine?

BMW is indeed delivering i3s to customers now, but all of them sold so far have been the fully electric BEV i3. The i3 RExs keep arriving in the US alongside their BEV brothers, but they cannot be released and trucked to the dealerships until they have the EPA Monroney label. BMW isn't communicating the exact reason for the lack of EPA certification, but it appears to be a combination of BMW providing the EPA with the required information a little late, and the fact  that the i3 REx is different than anything the EPA has certified before so they are taking their time to make sure they get the certification right. The closest thing to the i3 REx would be the Chevy Volt, which for most of the time the gasoline engine is running is a series hybrid and only charges the battery. However under certain conditions the gasoline engine of the Volt does indeed directly power the wheels, and in those conditions it is a parallel hybrid, like a Toyota Prius. The i3 REx is the first (second actually. The Fisker Karma was also a series hybrid - thanks to reader Andrew Chiang for pointing that out to me. Fact is, I've tried to block out all memory of the Karma!) true series hybrid the EPA has ever certified and the range extender will only serve to charge the battery. I don't see why that would be a problem because to me it seems like the Volt would have been even harder to certify because it is both a series and a parallel hybrid depending on the driving conditions. In any event, BMW claims to have furnished the EPA with everything they need for certification and are cooperating with the EPA in an effort to get this issue resolved as quickly as possible.

Battery log sheet courtesy George B

This is clearly an example of a "first world problem," but those who have been waiting patiently for their car are growing anxious as the days pass and their car is simply sitting at the port and waiting for the label. Some have even wondered what the state of charge of the cars are, and if by sitting so long (some have been sitting at the port for over a month now!), have the "vampire loads" reduced the charge level to dangerously low levels? Personally I don't believe this is an issue, and I'm sure BMW is monitoring them. BMW ships the cars with only about 25% state of charge and charges them up at the port. All of the cars used for test drives had a battery log sheet in the glove box which shows BMW is certainly monitoring the SOC of all the cars from manufacture to delivery. Plus, if the i3 is anything like the ActiveE, then the car will hold the SOC very well when not in use. My ActiveE would only lose about one percent per week when sitting unused. I doubt sitting for a month or so will have any noticeable reduction in charge and unless the cars arrived with less than 10% SOC and weren't monitored and charged I doubt there is anything to worry about. However, let's hope this "Monroney Hold" gets resolved soon and BMW can begin deliveries of the i3 REx cars that are already here and waiting - and mine in particular!

BMW i3 Selected the Best Green Car of 2014 by Kelly Blue Book

The awards keep piling up for the BMW i3. Less than a week from winning the 2014 World Green Car and the 2014 World Car Design Of The Year, Kelly Blue Book just awarded the 2014 BMW i3 the "Best Green Car of 2014".

The Nissan LEAF finished second  with the Toyota Prius third. Four of the top six cars were either all electric or PHEV's. Here's how the top ten placed:

BMW i3: The Intersection of Policy, Business, & Carbon

I recently came across this interesting report. It's titled "BMW: i3 Electric Vehicle. The Intersection of Policy, Business, & Carbon" and was written by Lauren Blasch, Jeremy Pomp, Marla Stancil, Shyam Vijayaraghavan.







The report focuses on electric vehicles and their carbon footprint in general, as opposed to being i3 specific. It demonstrates that depending on the source of the electricity used for charging the car, EV's can range from better to worse than a Toyota Prius in carbon emissions. It's interesting that they used the most efficient hybrid currently available to compare electric vehicle emissions to. I think it might have been more useful to use the Pruis and also show on the graph the average internal combustion engine cars carbon emissions also. They even go as far as to detail which states are better suited for electric cars based on their electricity generation mix. The good news is that New York and California, the target markets for the i3 since they both have "megacities" were two of the states that were "EV favorable" The report is only 28 pages long and many of the pages are graphs so it doesn't take long to read. There are some interesting fact in there so I recommend reading it if you are interested in electric vehicles and their impact on the environment.

One thing to consider though, the report is strictly focused on the carbon emissions of vehicles and I advocate electric cars for more reasons than just their carbon footprint. Even if you live in a state that produces 100% of it's electricity from burning coal, and by using an EV you are producing more carbon than if you owned a Toyota Prius, you are still spending your energy dollars on a DOMESTIC product. You are not contributing to the crushing trade imbalance, much of which is created from importing foreign oil and you are not sending some your money to radical Middle Eastern regimes, many of which hate us. Electricity is produced and distributed by local and regional companies, and 100% of the money you spend on it stays local. If you ask me, that's reason enough to drive an electric car.