Renault Reveals All Electric Cars
Renault is to announce plans to produce a commercial electric car at a similar price as “normal” cars, within the next two years, reports The Independent.
The chief executive of Renault-Nissan said they want to be a global leader in all electric, zero emission cars. As the Frankfurt motor show Renault is to announce the development of four types of electric cars which will be capable of going around 100 miles before needing to have their batteries recharged.
The four models will be firstly a family car based on the Laguna and called the Fluence. Secondly there will be a version of the Clio and thirdly an electric version of the Kangoo van. Finally there will be a two-seater city car for short city journeys.
Renault thinks it’s solved the recharging problems which have always been the problem with the development and introduction of electric cars. But Renault has negotiated with thirty cities or and countries over the creation of recharging networks. It’s also in talks with 30 others.
This would mean there would three different ways of recharging after 100 miles. Firstly, drivers could swap their batteries at a special “battery” service station. Secondly, they could use fast-recharge points which may take 30 minutes to recharge or thirdly they could recharge batteries from an electric socket which would take around 8 hours.
Rather than own the lithium battery drivers will rent the battery for around 100 euros a month. This price would cover the cost of electricity and battery rental and would be less than the amount of petrol used a month.
However until batteries have a longer life electric cars will be more popular with urban drivers and Renault is aware of this.