When it came to converting a car to electric in New Zealand there weren’t a lot of options for Ulrich Schmid. Then he found a Citroen 2CV.
In 2002 I became aware that using oil (petrol/diesel) the way we were could not go on forever. I wanted to do something about it so I hunted around to buy an electric vehicle. I discovered that almost all car manufacturers made one or more model of electric car, including Toyota, Honda, GM, Ford, Chrysler, VW, Citroen, Renault, Fiat and Peugeot, just to name the most important ones. There was also the Twike, Hotzenblitz, Think and other small producers of electric vehicles.
I could not afford an electric vehicle back then and it was impossible to import a left-hand-drive vehicle into New Zealand without owning it overseas. I decided to produce biodiesel from used vegetable fat and oil as an interim solution and have been running all our cars and tractor on 100% biodiesel since 2004.
I visited my mother in Switzerland in 2005 which gave me the opportunity to go to London to look at the only right-hand-drive electric vehicle available at the time, a Citroen Berlingo Electrique. There was a garage which serviced these vehicles and I was very impressed by them. Unfortunately they had stopped making them a month before I arrived.
The following year I became aware that MES-DEA in Switzerland were converting Renault Twingos and Fiat Pandas to electric, however, these brand new cars were rather expensive. I found an earlier model for a better price, but the company would only sell them in Switzerland and Northern Italy; I would have to own it for three months in Europe before I could bring it to New Zealand. I applied for an exemption from this rule but it was declined on the grounds that it was more dangerous to drive a left-hand drive vehicle in New Zealand! My options were running out. To buy a converted Hyundai Getz from Australia was as expensive as buying a Renault Twingo from Switzerland.
Read the full article in ReNew 112This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 15th, 2010 at 12:00 am