The CAFE legislation, which is creating many a headache for Rick Wagoner, is pushing BMW to think about a possible electric car. The chimera of hydrogen has been shelved and it seems that Munich is betting on the natural development of a hybrid - that is to be blunt, an electric car, at least for the US market.

We’re not talking pipe dream proposals, but news that has all the signs of being official from the moment when Norbert Reithofer, from BMW, discussed it in an interview with auto, motor und sport. According to him the first BMW electric will be a small citycar, that in one blow would throw into retirement all the studies conducted on hydrogen: too many obstacles for capillary distribution to the carburator that means any future is remote.

The step between hybrid and fuel cell, at least for BMW, will be electric but there remains a fundamental thing yet to be understood: will the Germans go it alone or will there be a partner to accompany them in the adventure? At the moment the latter appears more realistic and the believers indicate another possible colossal in the market could be the travelling companion. The incident was creating a cleft between American giants, two arch-rivals always united in the face of the common enemy, but not this time: the negotiations between BMW and Daimler over the project of beating toxic emissions and creating a no-emission vehicle unravelled and both will now go their own way.

And if BMW can’t find a partner by the end of 2008, it will make a solo effort, according to Reithofer. Recently talk was heard about a new brand that would be tasked with the production of the company’s “little ones”: at this point the possibility has re-emerged and it’s not absurd to imagine that a little electric could inaugurate the new brand.

(1 votes | Average: 1 / 5)

0 comments