First plug-in car heads down under next year

AUSTRALIA will have its first plug-in electric car by the end of next year. The baby Mitsubishi i MiEV has been confirmed for local sales, with a showroom target in the final months of 2009 and a starting price in the $30,000 range. The company plans to skip the hybrid phase of future car development and go straight to a plug-in, with a claimed top speed of 180km/h and a range of 200km. "Mitsubishi don't make hybrid cars. They make electric cars. And we will have one here as soon as we possibly can," says the managing director of Mitsubishi Motors Australia, Rob McEniry. "We will have the i-car initially. But it doesn't go into volume production until next year. "How many we get depends on the reaction by some of the key fleets in Australia, and governments. We would dearly like to have a number of them here in 2009." The... [read full story]