Neighborhood electric vehicles – NEVs for short – are a category of low-speed vehicle that first gained significant attention during the early years of California’s Zero Emission Vehicle mandate. Approved by the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) for street use on roads with posted speed limits of 35 mph or less, these low-speed electric vehicles are positioned as meeting the needs of residents in planned communities, in downtowns and urban areas, on college and business campuses, and in other commercial and social settings. While federally approved, states and municipalities may also govern the use of NEVs with their own specific requirements. Interest in NEVs was high during the early ZEV years as several auto manufacturers hoped that lower-cost low-speed electric vehicles would help them meet the requirements of the state’s ZEV mandate at a manageable cost. That strategy didn’t come to pass, though NEVs continue to this day as they serve specific markets. Over two decades ago, Green Car Journal reported on the benefits of NEVs quantified by a pilot program in Southern California, where GEM electric vehicles – a brand then owned by DaimlerChrysler's Global Electric Motorcars and now by Waev Inc. – were used in place of residents’ conventional internal combustion vehicles over a two month period. To share this early insight on NEVs and their potential value in emissions reduction , we present this article just as it appeared in Green Car Journal’s December 2002 issue.
NEVs Reduce Emissions and Energy Use
Excerpted from December 2002 Issue: Do neighborhood electric vehicles really save on emissions and energy use? That question has been the focus of an innovative pilot project that recently came to a close in the Southern California city of Chula Vista, near San Diego.
Here, 28 GEMs were placed with families at Heritage Village in Otay Ranch, one of the largest master-planned communities in the country. Otay Ranch incorporates a focus that integrates pedestrian and transit design with alternative modes of transportation. Neighborhood electric vehicles are a part of this focus.
Neighborhood Electric Vehicle Program
The program was conducted by the nonprofit educational and research organization Green Car Institute, Mobility Lab, the City of Chula Vista, and DaimlerChrysler business unit Global Electric Motorcars. Its aim was to study how residents of master-planned communities travel within their neighborhoods, and whether short trips usually taken in automobiles could be replaced with zero-emission NEVs.
Over the course of 60 days, participants drove their GEMs daily and kept track of how they used these vehicles for work and play. Of particular interest in the data collection was how these vehicles offset the use of other modes of transportation.
NEVs Used in Place of ICE Vehicles
And the results? Given a choice of travel modes for short trips, participants chose a NEV over their private cars 89 percent of the time. Study results also showed that NEV travel replaced walking 8 percent of the time and bicycling 3 percent of the time. Not surprisingly, participants in the study reported that while NEV travel was attractive for many purposes, no one was willing to replace their family sedan with one. Rather, the NEV was viewed as an added option when traveling short distances for routine trips.
“We’re very interested in these study results,” says Rick Kasper, president of Global Electric Motorcars, “because they document what we’ve seen during GEM's five years in the marketplace: that the NEV is a legitimate transportation tool, not just a novelty.” Kasper says the study results are important because they quantify the value of the GEM as a viable transportation and land use tool that can help shape the way cities and communities grow, by increasing individual mobility while decreasing traffic congestion and air pollution.
Business and Leisure Activities
“The GEM vehicle can and does represent a practical travel option,” Kasper adds, “particularly when people take short trips of necessity, such as going to the store, picking up or dropping off kids at school, and going to work.”
The Otay Ranch study shows that of the trips taken in NEVs, some 49 percent were for purposes defined as “business” or “delivery,” meaning trips of necessity. Some 34 percent of the trips taken were classified as “leisure,” while 17 percent were designated “other.” Of the 28 families who participated in the test program, more than half plan to buy and regularly drive their test vehicles, a move that will further raise awareness of the GEM’s fun and functionality among the 7,000 households currently at Otay Ranch.
Use Cases for NEVs
The Otay Ranch NEV program reinforces the development's goal of providing an environmentally sensitive and sustainable urban design, reducing traffic congestion and vehicle emissions, and showing the NEV’s practical use in a modern planned community. A key aim of the project was also to help the City of Chula Vista and the developers of Otay Ranch plan the community’s transportation infrastructure from the “inside out,” that is, from the user’s perspective, as opposed to the standard perspective coming from professional planners or traffic engineers.
Data generated from the Otay Ranch program, and the demonstration programs that are slated to follow it, will allow better understanding of the potential for neighborhood electric vehicles in American communities. This is especially important now when the market for NEVs is being questioned in some quarters and championed in others. Well-documented data will help answer the question.
GCJ editors note that use of neighborhood electric vehicles, which emit zero localized emissions, could have a dramatic effect on cold-start emissions in areas when large numbers of these vehicles are driven, in situations where low-speed vehicles are a good fit. Programs like this one in Chula Vista show on a small scale what could possibly be accomplished on a large scale, should communities embrace NEVs as an integral part of the transportation mix.