Ford THINK and Other Electric Cars

I'm from Detroit. I've seen the short-sighted hubris of the Big Three never solving their automotive energy problem after an over 30 year clarion warning that started with the infamous gas lines during the Jimmy Carter Administration. I've seen The Big Three's current arrogance asking for a bailout now while cutting back on their R&D departments -- departments that should be beefed up as if this country were entering another war of WWII scale or larger.

My heart continues to break for the city of Detroit and its long suffering people.

GM and the EV-1 electric car

Much has been written and a noteworthy documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?" had been made about GM's EV-1 debacle of the nineties, where the company built a line of electric cars and leased them out to a handful of people (some celebrities) in California. A few years later, GM recalled them all and physically crushed each EV-1 car out of existence.

Ford THINK electric car

Comparatively little, however, has been written about Ford THINK, its line of electric vehicles abandoned in 2002 despite a California government mandate requiring car makers to produce 100,000 electric and other energy-efficient vehicles per year starting with the 2003 model year. Note that, in the same year, GM lawyers successfully blocked the California law.

Ford's THINK electric car line began when Ford Motor Company acquired Norwegian car maker Pivo in 1999, the company split it into two divisions: THINK Mobility, a line of battery-powered cars; and THINK Technologies, a research division for developing fuel cell technology.

Ford THINK City

THINK City was launched as the first street-legal model of Ford's THINK electric car line. Its top-end was 55 mph and its electric charge range was 50 miles. While THINK City wasn't designed for the long haul, it served as a workable citywide shuttle and as a viable economic model for electric vehicle future development.

After Ford shut down their THINK Mobility line in 2002, executives discussed recalling and crushing all car models like GM and the EV-1. However, thanks to political pressure from Greenpeace and other environmental organizations, Ford changed its mind and shipped THINK Mobility models back to Norway, selling them through Norwegian Ford dealers.

In 2003, Ford sold their battery-powered vehicle division to KamKorp, a Swiss manufacturer.

THINK City today

In 2008, leading California venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins and RockPort Capital entered a partnership with THINK Industries, creating THINK North America and promising to relaunch the THINK City line of electric vehicles. The North American division will be headquartered in Menlo Park, California near Stanford University, and their THINK City line has been said to launch in 2010.