It's electric! Environment minister's BMW reduces carbon footprint, sets example

Thenewest electric car in Newfoundland and Labrador belongs to the new minister of Environment and Conservation, Perry Trimper.

• St. John's council votes against buying 2 electric cars

UnderTrimper'snew portfolio, he's alsoresponsible for climate change and energy efficiency.

To do his part to reduceemissions and demonstrate that electricvehicles can work in this province, he has purchased aBMW i3, the first oneto besold in Atlantic Canada.

He keeps it in St. John's, where he spends much of the year away from his district of LakeMelville.

According to BMW, thei3 is made of carbon fibre and weighs much lessthan most vehicles.Ithas a range of 160kilometres andtakes about four hours to recharge with a special 240-volt charger, or 12 to 14 hours with a regular householdelectricaloutlet.

TheCBC'sPeterCowanwent for a ride withTrimperto find out howthe vehicle performedand had several questions for him along the way.

"Welcome to the world of electricvehiclesit's just a matter of hitting the drive and away we go," saidTrimper.

Why did you decide to buy an electric car?

Embracing the role as minister of environment and conservation and also on climate change and energy efficiency, Ithought 'here's an opportunity to assist with the attitude shift with the momentum that's going on across the continent' ... and this vehicle when I operate itthere are zero emissions coming out of anywhere.

A normal car ... with their internal combustion engines, there's 3.8tonnesof greenhouse gas emissions coming out of each of those vehicles, each year.So by shifting to more and moreelectric vehicles, we're all doing our ownpart we're all making a contribution to this big national commitmentand international commitment we have on climate change.

What does a vehicle like this cost?

This is an expensive one, it's in excess of $50,000 dollars there's quite a range of vehicles available now. GreenRock EVS, the first dealer that we have in the province... sells usedEV'sand you can pick theseup in the vicinity of $15,000,$20,000 dollars and on up then there are really nice high end models like Tesla'sthat are getting into six figures, so there's thewide range.

The good news of course, while youpay a little bitmore foran electricvehicle, you save in its operations. For example, over a 100 kilometretrip, if you actually calculate the amount of electricity versus the gas and so on, it's about 20 per cent of the saving over 100 kilometres so I'm going to, over time, recoupmy initial investment.

The hotel that I'm staying in they have a charging station, they allow their clients to charge for free, and it's great for me because I don't have any moregas receipts to handin with a rental car. Idid want to get my own vehicle down here so I said, 'let's spend a little bit more money and we'll go electric'.

Doesn't the value proposition change a lot now with the price of gas being where it is and with the price of electricity set to increase substantially?

Look at howgas is also fluctuating. We were just at a point in recent memory, where gas was extremely expensive. Electricity is here to stay and the technology continues to go forward with great advancements and colder weather climates, greater ranges and nice vehicles like this one. So, Ithink that the arguments around the price of gas being at a low point right now is a short term situation versus the longer term vision as to where the country needs to go.

Why do you think the adoption rates are so low here in Newfoundland and Labrador, when you look at other provinces where they're selling thousands of these and this province where there's just a handful?

First of all you need infrastructure, so the ranges are being developed in each vehicle. This one, as I said, has a range, just on electrical charge,of 135 kilometres. So I need to make sure if I'm going130 kilometres that I have a station before I get to my last 5 [kilometres].

The good news is that ...we have 47 charging stations now across the island so electric vehicle owners are merrily driving back and forth across the island now using electricity only.We're getting started and the infrastructure is coming along.Because of the way our population is distributed of course it's most efficient here in St. John'swhere we actually have several stations around the city.

What's the car like to drive compared to a similarcar of this size?

The bigdifference in it is that I almost never have to hit the brake. The way the accelerator is designed is that as I even release on it, it's almost feels like your driving a tractor, like a hydro-static, I holdthe brake now as I'm parked but as I slow down ... the batteries are being charged with the friction that comes just from slowing down.

One of the big concerns from people is range and the issue of having to recharge it.Is it really practical in a province that is so spread out ... to have to stop along the way and it's not like a gas station ... you've got to sit there for maybe up to an hour in order to get enough charge to make it tothe next station?

I'm just thinking back to my time in Labrador and just thinkinghow I used to live in community that had no road accesswhen we could, we would travel with extra gas cans, sleeping bags, shovels in case we got into trouble so there was a lot more preparation that used to be associated with a trip across Labrador. Similarly with the electricvehicle market and what's going on in this province, the infrastructure is starting to come, it's giving people more and more confidence that they can do this.

There are sort of three kinds of charging stations.This vehicle can actually be plugged into a householdoutlet. It's going to take a lot longer to charge up. A normal one is 120 volts, we're going to a charging stationthat puts electricity into this system at240 volts [Level 2]and then finally your higher end charging stations[Level 1], they're at480 volts and at 480 volts you can charge up in about30 minutes.

As you go up, of coursein your levels, they're more expensive to install but nevertheless, with demand they will become economically viable. We don't have any of these Level 1charging stations yet in the province but we certainly have, as I said,almost 50 of these Level 2's. They're quite efficient, in a couple of hours I can have a full charge again.

A lot of other provinces for example, Ontario and recently British Columbiaoffer fairly substantialincentives in order to encourage people ... should Newfoundlandand Labrador be offering incentives for people to buy electric cars?

• B.C. Energy Minister Bill Bennett mulling more electric car incentives

We're certainly looking at a whole range of options. Our department for climate change and energy efficiency just put a report in November that documents the current status of electric vehicles in the province and looked at other jurisdictions and means of [incentives for]the public to move in this direction.

Financial consideration certainly is something that we'relooking at. We'regoing to bea little fiscally challenged. We've got this deficit to deal with but there are other ways to change attitudes and things thatwe can do policy-wisethat can make itmore attractive for people to go and do this.