EVUK's Jim Carlucci to The DETR/Michael Meacher:-

Sir/Madam,
In a recent BBC Radio 5 phone-in(Nicky Campbell) on the subject of pollution/global-warming/The Hague etc. Michael Meacher made reference to the fact that compressed-air powered vehicles were being trialled in La Rochelle in France as part of that town's well-established electric vehicle rental project. Our question, of course, is simply this: if Mr. Meacher is genuinely impressed by this initiative, would he and his department therefore consider emulating/reproducing this example here in the UK?

I have contacted Stephen Marks of the Clean Vehicles/Fuels organisation Alter Europe http://www.alter-europe.org.uk outlining a basic proposition looking at the idea of a La Rochelle-type scheme here in the UK. I'd be grateful if you would read through my most recent email to Mr. Marks and let me know if Mr. Meacher would see any prospect of his department lending support and backing to such an enterprise in the next few months. Email to Stephen Marks of Alter Europe - your response/feedback sought:

Stephen -
- I did actually probably touch on everything which would be involved in getting this idea off the ground in this afternoon's telephone conversation. As I say, the "idea" was ultimately most of all prompted by Michael Meacher's comment last week during a radio phone-in about compressed air vehicles being introduced into the La Rochelle project. (Mr. Meacher had earlier been accused, understandably, by a caller of doing very little to encourage a switch to Zero Emission Alternative Vehicles....).

By sheer coincidence a close contact of ours, Eric Hawkins at Powertech-Solar had just succeeded in placing an order for one of these Guy Negre compressed air vehicles - the first UK import we believe - and this had also attracted much attention from his local newspaper in Dorset.

Also, as I mentioned today, the same global company Budget Rental that runs the Edinburgh Budget City car rental scheme(sadly, all petrol-powered vehicles of course) also has a very successful electric vehicle ("EV") rental service running in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, San Francisco, San Diego. The scheme is called "EV Rental EVerywhere" and is pretty successful -despite the fact that gas/petrol still costs just £1 a gallon over there.(Believe it or not, at a recent face-to-face meeting, I also recently pitched this idea at a slightly stunned Haji-Ianniou - aka "Stelios" - millionaire founder of Easyjey/Easyrental !)

The only other place in Europe where longer-range, new generation electric vehicles("EV's") can be rented by the public is Jersey in the Channel Islands. (The vehicles are electric Toyota RAV4's - otherwise only available in the US and Japan.) Tourists love them - the Jersey police have a couple in their fleet too and especially appreciate the low running/maintenance costs - as well as the low-noise or 'stealth' factor.

What's more, Guy Plante, manager of Europcar Rental in Jersey told us on a recent visit(see full Jersey report at http://www.evuk.co.uk ) that he'd love to rent out these electric Toyota RAV4's in London and elsewhere on the UK mainland - if only Toyota would agree to supply them. So! I have spoken at length now a few times to the Budget UK spokeperson Jeremy Snook - he, like 95% of the UK population, of course knew very little about ZEV's/EV's but seemed more than intrigued. He especially liked the fact that the 120 mile per charge compressed air vehicles cost a mere $10000 to buy and less than a penny a mile to drive(equivalent to 30 - 40 pence a gallon!). They can also be 'recharged' with compressed air in just 3 minutes.

He especially agrees that these vehicles would attract far more media attention than a petrol-car hire scheme - especially somewhere central like Oxford which has a good Clean City/Clearzone track record etc. Also, I suspect that there are many Oxford residents, academic or town, who'd welcome the chance to hire an "environmentally correct" vehicle occasionally without having the burden of all year car ownership. In other words you are opening up a whole new neglected customer sector that might otherwise have qualms about hiring petrol-powered vehicles. Of course, the long-range, lithium-ion Ford e-Ka would be another great vehicle - if only they could be persuaded(forced via legislation?) to mass-produce it. Could not Ian McAllister (Ford Chairman and co-chair of Government's Cleaner Vehicle Task Force) be persuaded to push the e-Ka beyond the concept-car stage?

My feeling is that - to really make this idea 'gel' - it will require the involvement of a recognised, official organisation like ALTER - and maybe, hopefully, Michael Meacher's department itself(... it was he who brought it up after all!!).

My immediate suggestion is that perhaps you could now make tentative, speculative telephone contact with Jeremy Snook, explaining the background and role of Alter-Europe and of course referring to his conversations with me of a week or two ago and perhaps mentioning the points which I have made to you thus far.

Our website EVUK http://www.EVUK.co.uk (unashamedly irreverent and outspoken...) has a pretty good SEARCH box on its Homepage: for example entering 'compressed' or 'Budget' will get you to some good links ).
Hope we can get something off the ground - with or without Mr. Meacher's help!

Note - if you have the stamina, take a look at UK Government's Cleaner Vehicle Task Force 'Final Report' at (as always the emphasis in this report is on 'clean-er', 'more fuel efficient' etc. not on 'zero emission' - indeed, the phrase 'zero emission vehicle' is never used at all in this lengthy, waffly, report. )

++ STOP PRESS++ (June 2001):

- French Revolution - Negre Air-Powered vehicles (120 miles per charge / 68.75mph*) are to go on sale around the world from the beginning of next year - 2002. After many contradictory and conflicting reports, Moteur Developpement International (email: cqfd.ad@mdi.lu ) have announced that Frenchman Guy Negre's compressed-air powered vehicles are at last to go into full-scale production at the start of 2002. The vehicles will appear in four different flavours - family car, van, small pick-up, and taxi and are to be manufactured and built in over 60 different countries worldwide (Think global, act local....).

These Zero Emission Vehicles can be 'recharged' in three and a half hours by means of the onboard plug-in compressor. However, the vehicles can also be recharged in just 3 minutes from an external 'industrial strength' external compressor compressor. Selling price: from £6,250(+ vat). Running costs: around a penny a mile...

Well - it'll certainly be interesting to see how long the world's "environmentally-concerned", pro-Kyoto, Bush-bashing media and politicians are able to ignore/downplay this automotive equivalent of the Storming of the Bastille - Vive La EV-olution!!

(* NOTE: MDI have now (July '01) confirmed this 68.75 mph top speed with us: the 60 mph figure given elsewhere in other reports and websites - e.g. http://www.zeropollution.com is - we are assured - erroneous!)

Leading German Sci Tech TV programme "Nano" - available free-to-air all over Europe via Astra Sat and repeated 5(!) times a day - has been the first TV company to `step up to the plate` and broadcast an excellent pre-launch report from MDI`s HQ in Nice - see transcript plus pics (...though they did get there two months after EVUK`s Moira G. visited - see her report....) Useful links:MDI

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