lousy film. the guy is a true believer, he isn't really going to like the cold hard facts. the thing wasnt read in the 90s and still isn't ready today. the only viable electric car today seems to run for 80k, yes its a sports car but its easier to do anything when you have that much money to play with.
as for trying to make something dirty about gm crushing their ev's, well thats what happens. they crushed their entire fleet of turbine cars except for a few saved for display when those were proved unviable too. no big conspiracy, just the fact they wanted to avoid liability/tax/and support for parts/service for 10 years if they sold the thing.
the simple fact is the ev1 weighs as much as a prius and only carried two people. they say they could up it to 200+miles range with an upgrade? so what? a prius can go over 600 miles on a tank and take 5 minutes to refill and go on another 600. and it does that with the interior room of a camry too. i don't think the ev1 would have scaled very well, make it bigger and heavier and you add more batteries and it gets bad fast.
and well, gas was what? 1.50 in the 90's? gas is 2.50 now and suv sales have been going up again these last few months. even hummers.
and well the dismissive way he addresses the ev1's limited range by saying thats all most people need...well really. most people can get by and live in a 1 room apartment too, but they don't. they can take the bus but they dont. its silly, and even sillier to pretend people should buy two cars so they can support an ev1.
For most people that would work 90%+ of the time.
almost no trucks or suvs would be sold if that kind of thinking actually were reality. how many trucks do you see on the road with an actual load of gravel in the back, most of the time they are empty
anyways how much could this ev1 sell for while making a profit? at the time a geo metro was what? 10k? 50mpg. what would give you more bang per buck. you could probably use the money saved to buy solar panels for your house or something.