Car Manufacturers Shed Weight from Electric Vehicles to Improve Battery Life and Reduce Customer Anxiety -BBC
By Martine Paris
One of the biggest barriers to electric vehicles is the distance they can travel on a single charge, so some manufacturers are shed weight from their cars to squeeze more miles from their batteries.
It seems like a simple enough choice. The widespread use of electric vehicles could trigger a potential "positive tipping point" in the efforts to limit global warming. But many motorists are still choosing not to make the switch to this low-carbon technology. It is a decision that has meant while electric vehicle uptake has been rapid, it's been slower than some car manufacturers anticipated.
There are many reasons why consumers are not moving to electric vehicles as quickly as expected, including price, charging infrastructure and concerns about how far they can travel – so-called "range anxiety". Drivers want to be able to charge and go in the same time it takes to fill a tank with petrol or diesel, and they want the same mileage per charge of the battery, according to Achyut Jajoo, senior vice president and general manager of manufacturing and automotive at customer relations management software firm Salesforce, which recently surveyed 2,000 drivers on consumer preferences.
But with today's lithium-ion batteries, EVs can only go so far.
