Electric Car

By Jere Hough Meteorologist / Feature Reporter

Published: Thu, January 08, 2009 - 5:20 pm Last Updated: Thu, January 08, 2009 - 5:58 pm

Short URL: http://wkrg.com/a/22464/

Jere Hough

What's Black and White but Green all over? A GEM Car...the Global Electric Motor Car. Definitely an eyecatching design, and on it's windshield, a sticker showing perfect 10s for Environmental Performance. It burns no fuel. It runs on batteries that you charge from your household current.

Ty Thompson with Terry Thompson Chevrolet in Daphne explains how it works. "Plug it in for about six hours, and you have about 40 miles worth of range...Top speed is about twenty-seven miles per hour."

Thompson says the GEM is an LSV, a Low Speed Vehicle, and it can only be used on roads where the posted speed limit is 35 mph or less, residential areas, for instance. Some local colleges and municipalities are already using them.

They come in many configurations, says Thompson, "You can get them two door, four door, a six passenger, with doors or without doors. You can have a heater, stereo system." But the air conditioning is actually two fans on the dashboard.

What do GEM Cars cost? "The price range is anywhere from about seven grand to fifteen thousand."
And on average it takes less than a dollar's worth of electricity to charge the car.

GEM cars are a division of Chrysler Corporation and have been built for the last ten years. Terry Thompson Chevrolet is Alabama's first and only GEM dealer.

"They're peppy, quiet, easy to drive. But the most fun of all," says Meteorologist Jere Hough, "is never having to pull into a gas station."