<rss version="2.0">
  <channel>
    <title>Electric Vehicle</title>
    <link>http://evforeveryone.org/</link>
    <description>Electric Vehicle</description>
    <language>en-us</language>
    <ttl>40</ttl>
    <item>
      <title>HomePage</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Home Page&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Misson&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;To promote the use of electric vehicles by providing information about electric vehicle use and reviews of electric vehicles. Currently we focus mainly on electric scooters, but are also keep adding information about electric cars too.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Pages&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="Solar+Charging"&gt;Solar Charging Scooter&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="EVShow"&gt;EV Show&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="Return on Investment"&gt;Return on Investment&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="/Solar Power Rational"&gt;Solar Power Rational&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="/Carbon Numbers"&gt;Carbon Numbers&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="/Carbon Offsets"&gt;Carbon Offsets&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="/Reforestation"&gt;Reforestation&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="/Misc Numbers"&gt;Misc Numbers&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="/Topics"&gt;Topics&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 28 Feb 2008 18:56:05 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Topics</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Topics&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here are some various topics about electric vehicles and peak oil that would be interesting to have more information about:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; "&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Reviews of different electric vehicles (EV) and scooters&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Personal experience of EVs (your idea!)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;How much does regenerative braking really help?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Can the suburbs survive peak oil?&amp;nbsp;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Difference of energy use between cities and suburbs&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Average energy use of households in America&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Oil usage: where does it go?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Is there an&amp;nbsp;impending&amp;nbsp;peak for natural gas?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;How would we heat our homes and water without natural gas?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Is the &amp;quot;Johnson Thermoelectric Energy Conversion System&amp;quot; real?&amp;nbsp;http://www.johnsonems.com/jhtec.html&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;What new battery technologies will be available soon?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;How soon will households be able to get cheap thin-film solar cells?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;How to use the batteries in an EV to provide overnight power for a house?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;What is vehicle-to-grid and how could it allow EV owners to earn money?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;What are the current electric vehicles available today?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;What kits are available to convert a gas vehicle to electric?&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Are plug-in-hybrids (PHEV) worthwhile?&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 28 Feb 2008 18:55:43 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Topics</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Topics</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Return on Investment</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Scooter Return on Investment (ROI)&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Electric vehicles aren't cheap but they will reduce the money you are spending now for your gas car. This section looks at how much you can save, and what the total return on investment (ROI) for your electric vehicle will be.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Gas Car Operation Cost&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;There are four ways that gas cars cost us money: gas, depreciation, maintenance and insurance. Let's first look at how much we could save on these if we are driving a scooter.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The average fuel consumption for US cars is about 25 mpg. However, this is an average of both city and highway driving and normal gas cars get much worse mileage in the city. Let's assume that in the city, the average is 15 mpg. Let's also assume that gas costs $3.00 per gallon. This means gas costs about 20 cents (20c) a mile for a normal car.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For depreciation, let's assume that you pay $30,000 for a car, drive it for 100,000 miles and then sell it for $10,000. Then depreciation adds another 20c per mile.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Over that 100,000 miles, you will probably get 30 oil changes at about $30 each, and get 3 sets of tires at about $400 per set and also put in about $6,000 for repairs and tuneups (if you are lucky!). All this adds another 8c per mile.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You won't save anything on insurance since you still will have to pay this.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Overall, driving your car in the city will cost about 48c per mile.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Scooter Operation Cost&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Scooters normally use about 1c of electricity per mile, if your electricity rate is close to the national average of 12c per kWh. (If you live in an expensive region like we do, and go over your baseline, it can cost 33c kWh, which puts the electricity cost up to about 3c per mile.)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Scooters don't require much maintenance except you will need to buy a new set of batteries about every 10,000 miles [1] and this will cost about $750 [2]. This adds another 8c per mile. You will also probably need new tires at about 15,000 miles, and they cost about $100, so add another 1c for tires.&lt;strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;The total cost for operating a scooter (without depreciation) is about 10c per mile.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Scooter ROI&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Let's say you buy a nice scooter for $3,000. Every mile you drive your scooter, you will be saving about 38c over driving your gas car. So it will take about 8,000 miles for your savings to equal the cost of your scooter.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;If you drive your scooter at least 20 miles 225 days a year (for instance, if you drive it to work which is 10 miles away), it will take less than 2 years to pay for the scooter. Even if you only drive it for errands, say 8 miles a day for 250 days a year, it will still take about 4 years to pay back the initial cost. And after that, you will be saving money!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;The ROI payback period for a scooter is between 2 and 4 years.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Summary&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Driving a car in the city costs about 48c per mile, while driving a scooter costs less than 10c a mile. If you use your scooter a lot, it will take about 2 years to pay off the initial cost. Even with more casual use, you are likely to pay it off in 4 years.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;References&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href="http://home.comcast.net/~awowk/Greensaver_silicon_batteries.pdf"&gt;Greensaver battery specifications&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Assuming 30 miles total range:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;50% discharge gives 15 miles and 500 cycles = 7,500 miles&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;30% discharge gives 9 miles and 1100 cycles&amp;nbsp; ~ 10,000 miles&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;p&gt;[2] &lt;a href="http://www.siliconebatteriesusa.com/batteries/35-batteries/48-electric-vehicle-sp"&gt;Greensaver SP36-12 Battery&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 27 Feb 2008 15:22:20 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Return+on+Investment</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Return+on+Investment</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Misc Numbers</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Misc Numbers&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This page is to record misc numbers about electric vehicles until a permanent home is found for them.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Gas/Electric Energy Equivalents&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;1 gallon of gas has 36 kWh of potential energy (&lt;a href="http://www.eia.doe.gov/basics/conversion_basics.html"&gt;Reference&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Gas cars are 13% efficient (&lt;a href="http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/atv.shtml"&gt;Reference&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Therefore gas cars utilize about 5kWh of energy from each gallon of gas&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;This means gas cars use 0.250kWh of energy to go one mile (at 20MPG)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Average Daily Commute&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Average US driver daily commute = 29 miles (enertiabike.com)&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 04 Dec 2007 16:41:23 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Misc+Numbers</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Misc+Numbers</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Carbon Offsets</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Carbon Offsets&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;There is a growing interest in buying carbon credits to offset our carbon footprints. However, there is evidence of &lt;a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/48e334ce-f355-11db-9845-000b5df10621.html"&gt;widespread failings&lt;/a&gt; in the market for carbon offsets. Some of these failings include:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Widespread instances of people and organisations buying worthless credits that do not yield any reductions in&lt;span csl="#0pt Indent"&gt; carbon emissions.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Industrial companies profiting from doing very little &amp;ndash; or from gaining carbon credits on the basis of efficiency gains from which they have already benefited substantially.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;A shortage of verification, making it difficult for buyers to assess the true value of carbon credits.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here are some other articles that discuss the failings of the carbon offset market:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/48e334ce-f355-11db-9845-000b5df10621.html"&gt;Industry caught in carbon 'smokescreen'&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/SC0709/S00011.htm"&gt;&amp;quot;Double Selling&amp;quot; of Climate Benefits&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.thisisby.us/index.php/content/the_greatest_scam_on_earth"&gt;The Greatest Scam on Earth&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In addition, many carbon offset projects &lt;a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-offsets2sep02,0,3441587.story?page=1&amp;amp;coll=la-home-center"&gt;don't pay for the whole cost of CO2 removal projects&lt;/a&gt;; they just kick in a little money and claim all the carbon credit of the project. Is this really going to significantly reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere?&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Carbon Capture On Coal-Fired Power Plants&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In my opinion, the only worthwhile and effective way of cutting back on CO2 increases in the atmosphere is to install CO2 scrubbers on coal-fired power plants.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;To put this in perspective, if the developing world struggles and spends all the money needed to reduce it's emissions per the Kyoto treaty, we would cut our emmissions by almost 500 million tons by 2012. Not bad. However, in the same time period, the 850 new coal plants planned by the US, China and India will generate 5 times more emissions than this, about 2,500 million tons! Planting new trees or building wind generators is not going to put much of a dent in this number.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;So paying for carbon scrubbing on coal-fired power plants, especially those in China and India, is the only realistic way to make a dent in the increase in CO2 emmissions.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here are some references that discuss the importance of this:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1223/p01s04-sten.html"&gt;     New coal plants bury 'Kyoto'&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.greencarcongress.com/2007/03/mit_blueprint_f.html#more"&gt;MIT Blueprint for Coal Identifies Carbon Capture and Sequestration as Essential&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.ecobridge.org/content/g_cse.htm"&gt;Causes of Global Warming&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2007/05/coal_report.html"&gt;Global Warming and the Future of Coal&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Carbon Scrubbing Costs&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;How much does carbon scrubbing of coal-fired power plants cost? Hard numbers on this are not easy to find, but here is one set of numbers:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/mar2006/2006-03-15-06.asp"&gt;Europe Tests Carbon Capture at Coal-Fired Power Plant&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The pilot installation is intended to capture one metric ton of CO2 per hour.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The cost of conventional processes for CO2 capture in the flue gases of large industrial facilities, already operational in Japan, is estimated at between &amp;euro;50 and &amp;euro;60 per metric ton of CO2.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The Elsam industrial pilot is expected to halve the cost per ton of CO2 avoided, to between &amp;euro;20 and &amp;euro;30.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The total pilot project cost of &amp;euro;16 million is about half funded by the European Commission, with the remainder being funded by private partners.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;So operating costs to scrub one ton of CO2 from a coal-fired power plant is between $24 and $71. (I used (Euro/Dollar = 1.3, Metric ton/US Ton = 2204.6/2000 = 1.1). If we figure that the equipment has a 20-year life span, this adds another $108 per ton. So taking the average operating costs to be $50/ton adding depreciation of about $100 a ton and storage/sequestration costs of $10/ton (&lt;a href="http://www.coloradorea.org/documents/2007Feb19-CORECACleanCoal.pdf"&gt;EPRI Briefing&lt;/a&gt;, slide #30), then the total cost of adding CO2 scrubbers to coal-fired power plants is $160/ton of CO2.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Carbon Offset Costs&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The average American carbon footprint is about 50,000 pounds per year, (References: &lt;a href="http://www.carbonfund.org/site/pages/land/zerocarbon_climate_tags"&gt;Carbon Fund&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a href="http://mdgs.un.org/unsd/mdg/SeriesDetail.aspx?srid=752&amp;amp;crid="&gt;UN&lt;/a&gt;) or about 25 tons.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Some &lt;a href="http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/carbon_offset_wind_credits_carbon_reduction.htm"&gt;carbon offset organizations&lt;/a&gt; will charge you as little as &lt;a href="http://www.carbonfund.org/site/pages/land/zerocarbon_climate_tags"&gt;$100&lt;/a&gt; to offset this amount.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;However, based on the cost to clean a coal-fired power plant which is probably the only really effective way to make a dent in CO2 emissions, the true cost to offset the American carbon footprint should be $4,000 per year ($160 x 25) not $100/year!&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 17 Sep 2007 20:30:48 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Carbon+Offsets</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Carbon+Offsets</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Solar Charging</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Solar Charging Scooters&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;(From J.R. Tozer) Want a way to charge your scooter for free? Check out the low-cost solar charging system described below.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;It looks like for less than $400, you can generate 60 watts, or about 400 Watt-hrs/day in your back yard. Since scooters use about &lt;a href="http://evforeveryone.org/Scooter+Electricity+Cost"&gt;1 kW-hr of charge to go 10 miles&lt;/a&gt;, this would give you 4 free miles per day. Probably not near enough for heavy commuting, but maybe okay for errands - just a fun idea.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200263174_200263174"&gt;Northern Tool 15 watt solar panel on sale for $80&lt;/a&gt; (As of September 2007)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?addon=true&amp;amp;storeId=6970&amp;amp;catalogId=4006970&amp;amp;langId=-1&amp;amp;productId=200320199&amp;amp;R=200320199"&gt;Bracket, charge controller and wiring $69&lt;/a&gt; (As of September 2007)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;ROI&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;ROI?&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Okay, so 0.4Kw/day * 300 days/yr * 30 yrs = 3600 kW-hrs over it&amp;rsquo;s lifetime for $400, which suggests about 10 cents per kW-hr generated &amp;ndash; better than some high electricity rates - and no CO2 produced!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Complication&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;(Max Note) One challenge with this is that with silicone lead acid (SLA) batteries hooked up in series, the charging is much more sensitive than normal flooded lead acid batteries. If you overcharge SLA batteries, they will boil off some moisture and since you can't replace it, they will die quicker. Also, SLA chargers normally do a two stage charge where it first pumps them at constant current and then switches to constant voltage to make sure they all are charged completely. So a simple charge controller wouldn't be appropriate for SLA batteries.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Panels On the Scooter&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;font face="Arial,Helvetica,Monaco"&gt;&lt;img width="147" vspace="0" hspace="5" height="112" border="0" align="right" alt="" src="http://www.electric-bikes.com/motorc28.jpg" loop="0" /&gt;&lt;/font&gt;Would you like to put the solar panels on the scooter so you can charge at work? Here is someone that did!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/PV/pvscooter.htm"&gt;Don's Solar Scooter&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 17 Sep 2007 20:15:15 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Solar+Charging</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Solar+Charging</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Scooter Electricity Cost</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Scooter Electricity Cost&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;To determine the total amount of electricity used in recharging, which also includes the inefficiencies of the charger itself, we hooked a &lt;a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/redirect.html?ie=UTF8&amp;amp;location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fgp%2Fredirect.html%3Fie%3DUTF8%26location%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.amazon.com%252FP3-International-Kill-Electricity-Monitor%252Fdp%252FB00009MDBU%253Fie%253DUTF8%2526s%253Dhi%2526qid%253D1188699293%2526sr%253D8-1%26tag%3Dmaduswesi-20%26linkCode%3Dur2%26camp%3D1789%26creative%3D9325&amp;amp;tag=maduswesi-20&amp;amp;linkCode=ur2&amp;amp;camp=1789&amp;amp;creative=9325"&gt;Kill-A-Watt meter&lt;/a&gt;&lt;img width="1" height="1" border="0" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=maduswesi-20&amp;amp;l=ur2&amp;amp;o=1" alt="" style="border: medium none  ! important; margin: 0px ! important;" /&gt; up to the charger and recorded how many watt-hours of electricity were used to recharge the batteries after various different amounts of driving our &lt;a href="/Zap"&gt;Zapino&lt;/a&gt; (3000w motor 60v-36ah batteries).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Cost&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The cost worked out to just about &lt;strong&gt;1 cent per mile&lt;/strong&gt; (c/mile), at an electricity rate of 11 cents/kWh. (Our highest rate is 33c/kWh so it could cost as much as 3c/mile.)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Electricity Used&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Another interesting figure that comes out of these charts is that it is taking about &lt;strong&gt;900Wh of electricity from the wall to go one mile&lt;/strong&gt;. Since the charging process is only about 80% efficient, this would mean that the batteries need to provide about&amp;nbsp; 720Wh of electricity to drive a mile. This corresponds well to the &lt;a href="/Scooter+Info"&gt;range figures&lt;/a&gt; we have observered.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Data&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here is the actual data I recorded to get this information. I am planning on keeping this for the first few weeks, and then periodically recording it again to see if the battery performance goes down.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;table width="100%" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1"&gt;
    &lt;tbody&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Date&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Odometer (kilometers)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Distance (k/0.621 = miles)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Recharge power (kWh)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Cents/charge (at 11c/kWh)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Cents/mile&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Aug 29, 2007&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Aug 29&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;19.9&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;11.7&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.21&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;13.3&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.14&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Aug 30&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;43.6&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;14.7&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.37&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;15.1&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.03&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Aug 31&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;60.8&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;10.7&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.12&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;12.3&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.15&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Sep 1, 2007&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;111.2&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;31.3&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;2.68&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;29.5&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;0.94&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Sep 2&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;141.6&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;18.9&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.64&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;18.0&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;0.95&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;Sep 3&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;176.5&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;21.7&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;2.08&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;22.9&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&amp;nbsp;1.05&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
    &lt;/tbody&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Other Data&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;These numbers correspond to what PJD found, that his &lt;a href="http://evforeveryone.org/Extreme"&gt;XM-2000 scooter cost&lt;/a&gt; about &lt;a href="http://visforvoltage.net/forum/motorcycles-and-large-scooters/1509"&gt;1c per mile&lt;/a&gt; too.&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 17 Sep 2007 19:26:56 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Scooter+Electricity+Cost</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Scooter+Electricity+Cost</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Solar Power Rational</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Solar Power Rationale&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;(From J.R. Tozer) Partly as an exercise for myself, I've detailed some of the rational&lt;br /&gt;
for installing the solar system below.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; You might find it interesting:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Property Values&amp;nbsp; (in case we decide to move for some unforeseen reason)&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Articles in &amp;quot;The Appraisal Journal&amp;quot; say that a home will sell for $20 more for each $1 reduction in annual expenses.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; The logic is that the person can put $1 additional towards their mortgage, which at a 5% interest rate increases the size of the mortgage by $20.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; While this is a sweeping generalization, I am sure there is some merit to it.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Our solar system should decrease monthly expenses by $1800/year, which translates to a $36K higher property value.&amp;nbsp; Since the system will only cost $28k, one could say the system is break even (or better) right from day one.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Reduction in CO emissions&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;By one calculation, our 5Kw system will reduce our CO2 emissions by about 10,000 pounds per year.&amp;nbsp; To make it easier to quantify this, it is about the same amount our Corvette would output during 11,000 miles of driving (3 yrs at current rate).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;According to the &lt;a href="http://carbonneutral.org/"&gt;carbonneutral.org calculator&lt;/a&gt;, we are personally causing the emission of a total of about 50,000 pounds per year from all sources.&amp;nbsp; So the solar system reduces our personal &amp;quot;carbon footprint&amp;quot; by 20%.&amp;nbsp; This compares to the 5-15% reduction called for by the Kyoto protocol that over 160 countries have committed to.&amp;nbsp; Amazingly only the United States and Australia have declined!&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Our other major carbon emissions come from food (12,000), the Sportsmobile (12,000), and our other cars (8,000).&amp;nbsp; I'm trying to reduce our driving some by riding my bike (or 200 mpg motorized bike) on local errands.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Interestingly, one can purchase a &amp;quot;carbon offset&amp;quot; for the whole 50,000 lbs for just $99.&amp;nbsp; A pretty cheap way to minimize our impact - if it really works.&amp;nbsp; Non-profits like &lt;a href="http://carbonfund.org/"&gt;carbonfund.org &lt;/a&gt;take your money to subsidize the creation of new wind farms, etc.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; The theory is that without these additional funds, the wind power wouldn't be viable and so wouldn't be built. With the funds, wind farms are built instead of coal-fired plants, thus reducing the carbon being output. (See &lt;a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-offsets2sep02,0,3441587.story?page=1&amp;amp;coll=la-home-center"&gt;Carbon Offsets&lt;/a&gt; about some possible downsides to this.)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;U.S. dependence on foreign oil&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In order to help reduce our dependence on foreign oil, I think we'll have to find a way to use less gasoline.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Electricity in the U.S. comes primarily from coal (50%), natural gas (19%), and nuclear (19%).&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Here in San Diego, 65% of it comes from nuclear (San Onofre), with the remainder from natural gas.&amp;nbsp; Thus solar power isn't really going help reduce our dependence on foreign oil by itself.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;However, I'd like to purchase and drive an electric vehicle (or plug-in hybrid) when they become available.&amp;nbsp; They are not yet for sale, but there are lot's of nascent efforts underway, and I imagine we'll be able to buy an electric car in the next five years (e.g., the GM &amp;quot;Volt&amp;quot;).&amp;nbsp; Doing this will surely help reduce our dependence of foreign oil, but it will require electricity from somewhere.&amp;nbsp; By getting this solar system for our house, we'll be in a better position to make this transition.&amp;nbsp; If we can conserve electricity (partly by getting rid of the fish tank and by getting thermal solar to heat the spa), we can power an electric car from the system&amp;nbsp; - effectively reducing our footprint by another 10%.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Return on Investment&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Comparing the solar installation to a similarly priced money market investment reveals that the solar system generates about twice as much after-tax cash flow initially.&amp;nbsp; Given the rising costs of electricity, the system will actually generate five times as much after-tax cash flow toward the end of it's life (even considering the reduced efficiency of the system over time).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The cash saved by the solar system builds over time to offset its original cost in just eleven years.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; When considering the cost of money appropriately, the cash flow from the solar system generates a principle amount that catches an alternative investment of the system cost by the 14th year.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Over the 40 year life of the system, it will generate over $300,000 of after tax benefit more than a money market investment for the same time and amount (this is equivalent to about $100,000 in today's dollars).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You can see the attached excel spreadsheet for the raw calculations and assumptions used.&amp;nbsp; None of these calculations consider the increase in property value for having the system.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;By the way, even if I add unexpected costs of $500/year for service of some sort, the system still generates more cash than a money market, and it still breaks even with it before year 18.&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 17 Sep 2007 19:15:52 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Solar+Power+Rational</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Solar+Power+Rational</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Carbon Numbers</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Carbon Numbers&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;Multiply gallon of gas used by 19.6 to get pounds of CO2 emitted (&lt;a href="http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/factors.html"&gt;Reference&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;In California, multiply kWh of electricity by 0.61 to get pounds of CO2 emitted (&lt;a href="http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/e-factor.html"&gt;Reference&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Scooter versus Cars&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In the city, cars will average 15MPG (or less). So cars will emit 1.3 lbs of CO2 for every mile driven. Scooters take 0.100 kWh or less to go 1 mile. So a scooter in California will emit less than 0.061 lbs of CO2 for every mile driven.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;So a car emits over 20 times as much CO2 as an electric scooter for the same mileage driven!&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Sat, 15 Sep 2007 16:10:53 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Carbon+Numbers</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Carbon+Numbers</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Scooter Info</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Scooter Info&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;There are various electric vehicles called &amp;quot;Electric Scooters&amp;quot;. One is the &amp;quot;Mobility Scooter&amp;quot; which is basically an electric wheelchair. There is also the kids &amp;quot;Electric Scooter&amp;quot; which is a skateboard with a handle and an electric motor. Similarly there are &amp;quot;electric bikes&amp;quot; that are basically a bike with an electric motor. However, those are not the vehicles discussed here. Here we are interested in electric vehicles that are more like a moped or Vespa style scooter - that have a long seat and a platform to rest your feet.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h4&gt;Stated Performance&lt;/h4&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Manufacturers will give you numbers on how far and how fast their scooters will go, but these should not be used to compare scooters since they can be very different from each other (and from reality).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h4&gt;Speed&lt;/h4&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The main factor that will determine the top speed of a scooter is the size of the motor (in watts) and the voltage of the battery. Of course hills and wind and the size of the rider will also affect the top speed as well. However, on level ground with no wind and a 150 pound rider, here is the speed you can expect after 10 seconds of full acceleration:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;table cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1"&gt;
    &lt;tbody&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Watts&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Voltage&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Speed&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;600w&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;48v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;20 mph&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;1500&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;48v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;25 mph&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2200&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;60v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;30 mph&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;3000&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;60v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;35 mph&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
    &lt;/tbody&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h4&gt;Range&lt;/h4&gt;
&lt;p&gt;When manufacturers figure how far their scooter can go on a charge, they often test it at 15-20mph on flat ground with no stops and a small rider. Others will try to determine a more real-world range with a normal number of stops and normal riding habits and medium sized rider. These methods will produce very different numbers for the maximum range, even for the same scooter!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;However, for a given riding style how far the scooter can go on one charge is really determined by how much power the batteries hold. This can be calculated by multiplying the voltage (v) and the amp-hours (ah) to get the watt-hours (Wh). A typical scooter uses about &lt;a href="http://blog.maxdunn.com/articles/2007/09/01/zapino-range"&gt;75Wh to go one mile&lt;/a&gt;.&amp;nbsp; So here is the range you can expect for different battery configurations:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;table width="500" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1"&gt;
    &lt;tbody&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Voltage&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Amp-Hours&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Watt-Hours&lt;br /&gt;
            &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Range&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;48v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;26Ah&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;1248Wh&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;17 miles&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;48v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;50Ah&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2400Wh&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;32 miles&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;60v&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;36Ah&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2200Wh&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;29 miles&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;60v (Lithium)&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;40Ah&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2400Wh&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;48 miles&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
    &lt;/tbody&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Note:&lt;/strong&gt; on the last entry, a lithium battery was included (the rest were sealed lead-acid). Lithium batteries provide about 50% more range for the same power and also weigh less than half as much, which will also increase the range. However, lithium batteries are still very expensive and not commonly used in scooters.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Blog Entries&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="EVNumbers"&gt;How much electricity it took to charge&lt;/a&gt; a scooter&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://blog.maxdunn.com/articles/2007/09/01/zapino-excursion"&gt;Nice 20 mile excursion&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://blog.maxdunn.com/articles/2007/09/12/grocery-shopping-on-the-zapino"&gt;Grocery shopping&lt;/a&gt; with a scooter&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Links&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.electric-bikes.com/motor/scooters.html"&gt;http://www.electric-bikes.com/motor/scooters.html&lt;/a&gt; (Milpitas)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Electric_Scooters"&gt;http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Electric_Scooters (Scooter Directory)&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.evfinder.com/twowheel.htm"&gt;http://www.evfinder.com/twowheel.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.mpoweruk.com/performance.htm"&gt;http://www.mpoweruk.com/performance.htm (Battery Performance)&lt;/a&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.mpoweruk.com/performance.htm"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
    &lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 14 Sep 2007 19:56:57 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Scooter+Info</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Scooter+Info</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>GreenEMotor</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;GreenEMotor&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/ecruiser160.htm" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;img border="2" align="right" alt="" style="padding: 5px; margin-left: 5px;" id="IMG_4" src="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/pics/ecruiser_sm.jpg" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt; &lt;a href="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/erunner160.htm" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;img border="2" align="right" alt="" style="padding: 5px; margin-left: 5px;" id="IMG_6" src="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/pics/e_runner_sm.jpg" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/home.php"&gt;GreenEMotor &lt;/a&gt;in Santa Clara, CA, offers a nice line of electric scooters. They have two different motor sizes: 1600 watt and 2200 watt and two different body styles: motorcycle and Vespa style. The 1600 watt comes with a 48v-26ah battery system, while the 2200 comes with a 60v-26ah battery system.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The scooters have all the usual accessories and also come with a unique high-power mode. At a stop, if you press the small red button on the right handlebar, then your acceleration off the line will be faster and it will use less power. In the high-power mode however, you can only go about 20 mph, so once you get going faster than 10 mph, you push the red lever under your right thumb to switch into the high-speed mode to&amp;nbsp; proceed to 30+ mph. We tested this feature and it really does make a difference in the acceleration off the line. However, the buttons are a little awkward to operate.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Another difference is that the back brake is a drum instead of a disk brake. With these scooters weighing almost 300 lbs plus the weight of the driver, you definitely want a good brake system to help you stop quickly. While we didn't have any problems stopping the GreenEMotor's scooters, we definitely are more comfortable with disk brakes in both front and back.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The specs they quote are probably a little on the high side, and the bikes are the most expensive in their class, but it is a nicely built bike.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/home.php"&gt;GreenEMotor&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
3527 Ryder St&lt;br /&gt;
Santa Clara, CA 95051&lt;br /&gt;
408-739-9466&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;table width="90%" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1"&gt;
    &lt;tbody&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Name&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Price&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Motor&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Batteries&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Power&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.greenemotor.com/htm/erunner160.php"&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;e-Runner 160&lt;br /&gt;
            &lt;/font&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;$2600&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;1600w&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;48v-40ah&lt;br /&gt;
            &lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;1.920 kWh&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;a href="http://greenemotor.com/htm/erunner220.php"&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;e-Runner 220&lt;br /&gt;
            &lt;/font&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;$3100&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;2200w&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;60v-40ah&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2.400 kWh&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;&lt;a href="http://greenemotor.com/htm/ecruiser160.php"&gt;e-Cruiser 160&lt;br /&gt;
            &lt;/a&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;$2800&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;1600w&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;48v-40ah&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;1.920 kWh&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font&gt;&lt;a href="http://greenemotor.com/htm/ecruiser220.php"&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;e-Cruiser 220&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;$3300&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;2200w&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;font size="2"&gt;60v-40ah&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2.400 kWh&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
    &lt;/tbody&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
</description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 14 Sep 2007 14:46:44 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/GreenEMotor</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/GreenEMotor</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Reforestation</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Reforestation&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Planting trees is another way to take CO2 out of the atmosphere, and several organizations sell carbon credits for planting trees. A rough calculation is that a tree will absorb about 50 pounds of CO2 for its lifetime of 40 years. (Then it gives it back, but that is another issue.) So to offset the 50,000 lbs of CO2 we produce each year, we would need to purchase 1,000 trees which would cost &lt;a href="http://www.co2credittrading.net/purchase.html"&gt;$3,000 through Green Horizons&lt;/a&gt; or $&lt;a href="http://www.carbonbankusa.com/donations.html"&gt;12,000 through Carbon Bank&lt;/a&gt;, The nice thing is that trees continue to grow, so this would in essence be a one-time purchase (or at least for 40-years).&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 14 Sep 2007 02:20:12 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Reforestation</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Reforestation</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Max Dunn</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Max Dunn&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Web: &lt;a href="http://www.maxdunn.com"&gt;http://www.maxdunn.com&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Blog: &lt;a href="http://blog.maxdunn.com"&gt;http://blog.maxdunn.com&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 12 Sep 2007 20:38:57 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Max+Dunn</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Max+Dunn</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Zap</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Zap&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Zapino&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img width="197" height="190" border="2" align="right" style="padding: 5px; margin-left: 5px;" src="http://media.marketwire.com/attachments/200705/TN-339739_zap_electric_scooter_zapino.jpg" alt="" /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;We have looked at a lot of scooters, and the red Zapino (pictured left) is the first one that my wife said, &amp;quot;I like the way that looks!&amp;quot; So of course, we had to buy it. Luckily for me, it is also has the most powerful features in its class featuring a 3000 watt motor, 60v-36ah batteries, beefy shocks and good dual hydraulic disk brakes. And it just feels good and solid to ride.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here is our first impression:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;We bought a Zapino yesterday and rode it around, and love it! It has a lot of power, can accelerate fast in traffic so you don't feel like someone is going to run you over, and in &amp;quot;fast&amp;quot; mode, can go up to 40mph. I went to the store yesterday with my 50 pound son on the back and it was very comfortable and quiet so we could talk easily. It also has dual hydraulic disk brakes, which is good because with 130 lbs of batteries and a total weight of almost 300 lbs plus the rider, there is a lot of mass to stop!&amp;quot;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I measured &lt;a href="EVNumbers"&gt;how much electricity it took to charge&lt;/a&gt; and found it was less than a penny a mile.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here is a &lt;a href="http://blog.maxdunn.com/articles/2007/09/01/zapino-excursion"&gt;blog about a nice little 20 mile excursion &lt;/a&gt;my wife and I took on the Zapino.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Here is some information about &lt;a href="http://blog.maxdunn.com/articles/2007/09/12/grocery-shopping-on-the-zapino"&gt;grocery shopping&lt;/a&gt; with the Zapino.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Specs&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;table width="90%" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1"&gt;
    &lt;tbody&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Name&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Price&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Motor&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Batteries&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Power&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.zapworld.com/electric-vehicles/electric-scooters/zapino-electric-scooter"&gt;Zapino&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;$3000&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;3000w&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;60v-38ah&lt;/td&gt;
            &lt;td&gt;2280Wh&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
    &lt;/tbody&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Dealers&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;h4&gt;California&lt;/h4&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.greenrides.com/"&gt;GreenRides&lt;/a&gt; - Campbell, CA&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 12 Sep 2007 20:35:34 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Zap</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Zap</link>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Links</title>
      <description>&lt;h1&gt;Links&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Electric Cars&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.eaaev.org/eaaevsforsale.html"&gt;http://www.eaaev.org/eaaevsforsale.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.hybridtechnologies.com  "&gt;http://www.hybridtechnologies.com&lt;/a&gt;&amp;nbsp; ($40k electric SmartCar; $50k electric MiniCooper)&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.evfinder.com/classifieds.htm"&gt;EV Finder Classifieds&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://motors.shop.ebay.com/Cars-Trucks___W0QQFuelType9dab9364ZElectric2d5193dQQ_ckwZelectricQQ_sopZ3"&gt;EBay Electric Cars&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Electric Conversions&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;a href="http://leftcoastelectric.com/index.php "&gt;http://leftcoastelectric.com/index.php &lt;/a&gt;($20k+ Service to convert Mita, but not much info)&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;a href="http://www.canev.com/KitsComp/GeoKit/Geo-Kit.html"&gt; http://www.canev.com/KitsComp/GeoKit/Geo-Kit.html&lt;/a&gt; (Kit, $8k, not Miata)&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;a href="http://www.electroauto.com/catalog/catalog.shtml"&gt; http://www.electroauto.com/catalog/catalog.shtml&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;a href="http://www.e-volks.com/"&gt; http://www.e-volks.com/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;(From &lt;a href="http://laweekly.blogs.com/judith_lewis/2006/04/who_resurrected.html"&gt;http://laweekly.blogs.com/judith_lewis/2006/04/who_resurrected.html&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Electric Bikes&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I looked at electric bikes online here:&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp; http://www.electricvehiclesnw.com/&lt;br /&gt;
They have lots of information, but all their bikes seem to cost a lot more &amp;ndash; closer to $2k for something strong enough to push me up a hill.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; I was initially put off by reading that these bike motors were more for assist, and you&amp;rsquo;d really need to pedal along to help &amp;ndash; which defeats the purpose a bit to me cause I might get sweaty then anyway.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; But it sounds like your experience was very nice, so&amp;nbsp; I may want to test one myself too.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Electric Motorcycles&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/07/enertia_electric_motorcycle.php#s1"&gt;Electric Motorcycle&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Electric Scooters&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
One other thing I came across was this:&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp; http://www.neoscooters.com/proddetail.asp?prod=expresso_electric_scooter&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; &lt;br /&gt;
I&amp;rsquo;m not sure why one would want an electric scooter vs. an electric bike, but this thing has pretty good stats -&amp;nbsp; For only a little more money, it has a range of 30 miles and top speed of 17mph.&amp;nbsp; It&amp;rsquo;s probably much heavier than the electric bike, but it might have a more comfortable ride, plus it has storage containers built in.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Or, for lots less, theres this:&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp; http://www.neoscooters.com/proddetail.asp?prod=X%2DTreme%5FX%2D560&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Gas Scooters&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; http://www.staton-inc.com/Details.asp?ProductID=3014&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; &lt;br /&gt;
It supposedly gets over 200 miles per gallon &amp;ndash; with it&amp;rsquo;s 1/5 gallon tank will go 40 miles on 60 cents of fuel.&amp;nbsp; It goes upto 30mph, which is scary fast.&amp;nbsp; It is a four stroke engine, so it is reasonably quiet, but not enough to ride with others like you mention for the electric.&amp;nbsp; I&amp;rsquo;m going to continue to try to sell it because I think I might prefer a small motorcycle &amp;ndash; which get upto 100 mph, and can drive fast enough to keep up with traffic, which I&amp;rsquo;d argue is safer than riding on the shoulder.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; (ideally I&amp;rsquo;d like the electic motorcycle you pointed out, but I hope to spend 1/10 as much money for a solution).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Real World Electricity Usages&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In the information for the sale of a Chevy Geo that was converted to electric by Solectria (using an AC motor) they quoted this:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;font face="Arial"&gt;The  		vehicle has 13,080 miles on it, with 8,619 kWh&amp;rsquo;s on the charger.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;font face="Arial"&gt;This means that this vehicle consumed about 660 Wh per mile total. Since this includes the inefficiencies with the charging process, it coresponds well to the oft-quoted figure of 400 Wh per mile.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.snew.org/Surplus_Vehicle_Sale.htm"&gt;http://www.snew.org/Surplus_Vehicle_Sale.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 09 Sep 2007 05:11:07 Z</pubDate>
      <guid>http://evforeveryone.org/Links</guid>
      <link>http://evforeveryone.org/Links</link>
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