While electric cars are still in the minority in Australia, the unstoppable groundswell of change overseas is pointing to a very different outcome in the not too distant future, with giants like General Motors and Ford joining the electric car manufacturing line-up.
People will be able to chat with private owners of electric cars at the upcoming free Noosa Electric Vehicle Expo on Sunday 21 March, from 10am to 2pm at the Noosa Transit Centre car park, Lanyana Way, Noosa Junction. Coastline BMW are bringing the Mini electric hatch and BMW hybrid models, and there will be Tesla and Hyundai models to check out as well.
Noosa resident and Slow Food advocate Rod Lees is a passionate advocate for an electric car future. “Once you have driven one, you never want to go back.”
“I bought my Hyundai electric Kona over a year ago,” he told Noosa Today. “It is my first electric car so I just had to have the 01 EV number plate. I drive the car to Brisbane, around Brisbane and return every week, a trip of about 500 kilometres, which I can comfortably do on one charge, so certainly no problems with range anxiety. I get a lot of interest from members of the public, who always have heaps of questions for me. Electric transport is definitely a family thing. My wife has an electric road bike, my brother a Tesla Model 3 and his wife has an electric MG.
“I had been following what was happening with electric cars for years, and in fact still do. I can honestly say that there are zero emissions from charging the Kona, and it costs me zero, as I connect it up to my household solar system during the day and charge when the sun is shining. We expanded from a 6kW system to a 13kW system, and even with charging the car we are still getting a return from our feed-in tariff.”
Rod’s passion for zero emission vehicles is a good fit with his other passion. Rod and his wife Karyn are extensively involved in Noosa’s Slow Food movement, which encourages support for local producers through the Snail of Approval. On the evening of this interview, they were participating in an awards night for local producers at a locally sourced dinner curated by Matt Golinski. “Slow food is all about good, clean and fair food and we want to support our local producers,” said Rod.
For further information about the Noosa Electric Vehicle Expo visit noosaevexpo.com.au.
