For this assignment you are an investigative reporter for the Sunshine Moonbeam Times and you should write a 800-1000 word story on the coming new Electric Vehicles (EV). Your assignment is to present enough information to adequately inform the consumer about their choices and your writing style should be in the form of a news article and not a formal essay.

Your goal is to write a balanced consumer article with an opinion spin at the end. You need to cut through the marketing and PR crap, and get to the actually science of EV's to better inform your readers.

For this article you should research 3 specific EV models and compare them. You should *NOT* include the Tesla models in this article as they are too expensive for most consumers.

Make sure you include the following technical information on each model:

• Free Range
• The approximate mass of the vehicle (may be difficult to find - look at an image of the vehicle and guess based on comparison to there vehicles - remember, you are an intrepid reporter.
• The mass of the battery pack
• Charging times and efficiencies
• Battery Lifetimes

Then you are to do a little math by calculating the cost of operation over a five year period  assuming 10,000 miles driven per year in combination with the MSRP and utility electricity rates (assume 10 cents per KWH).

Then you are to compare those numbers with a fuel efficient gasoline car that averages 35 MPG.   (relevant conversions are given below).

Finally you should summarize your story by qualitatively assessing the "Green Index" of this technology - that is are these new types of vehicles a cost-effective alternative for consumers that desire a greener form of transportation?

Brief Primer on EVs.

1. You will see numbers ranging from 33 to 37 KWH energy equivalent to a gallon of gasoline. The variation is related to whether you do the calculation by mass or by volume since the volume of gallon of gas is temperature dependent.

2. Just average and use 35 KWH per gallon.

3. Calculating a price comparison then works like the following:
a) If my gasoline powered vehicle gets 35 mpg then I can go 350 miles on 10 gallons

b) assume a price of gas - say $3.00 per gallon

c) total 350 mile trip cost is then $30.00

d) 10 gallons is the equivalent of 350 KWH

e) assume 10 cents per KWH as the price of electricity

f) total electricity price is the 35$ (so it costs more in this example)

g) Now factor in charging efficiency - which is about 85% so the the electricity cost is really 35/.85 = $41.20

Clearly the economics are determined by
a) the mpg of your gasoline car
b) the price of gasoline
c) the price of electricity