Where are the electric cars when you need them?

Last week, General Motors posted its 2007 financial results. The company lost a whopping US$38.7 billion. The world’s largest automaker - for now, Toyota is closing fast - has offered buyout packages for 72,000 of its staff. Still, all is not gloomy at GM. While overall revenues were down last year, the automotive division generated a record $178 billion in revenue, a $7-billion improvement over 2006.

But how much better would GM be doing if it had left the EVs on the road?

The EV1 (Electric Vehicle) became a cult hit in the mid '90s in California with their 80-mile range, their silence and their get-up-and-go (zero to 60 in under four seconds). They seemed to be the wave of the future and the solution to Los Angeles’s chronic smog problem. Consumers were willing to pay and numerous celebrities were proud to be seen driving around the city with the latest toy.

And then they were gone.

What happened to them is the subject of the excellent documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? Perhaps the biggest shock comes in the first two minutes, when it’s revealed that there was a short time, in the early development of automobiles, when there were more electric cars on the road than gasoline-powered vehicles. Technology has never been the issue to operate electric cars. Rather, the issue has been finding a battery capable of carrying a car hundreds of kilometres at highway speed in a single charge and then being able to quickly recharge the battery so the driver can keep going.

As the documentary explains, automakers unveiled electric vehicles in California 15 years ago to meet stringent guidelines that demanded an increasing amount of zero-emission vehicles be put on the state’s roadways over the next decade.

GM’s EV1 was an immediate hit with its sleek design and sharp handling. Even in L.A., with its outrageously long commutes between home and work, a battery would last long enough to get people home for the car to recharge overnight.

Perhaps it was too soon. Gas was still relatively cheap, climate change was not an everyday phrase and nobody imagined a barrel of oil would cost $100.

Car companies were unwilling to market electric vehicles, the oil and gas sector kicked up a fuss, consumers were doubtful they would work better than their faithful gas guzzlers and governments were reluctant to force the issue.

In the 1980s, Lee Iaccoca helped save Chrysler with the minivan. Could General Motors have put itself in a much better financial situation, saved tens of thousands of American jobs and led the industry by standing up for electric cars? Whether it’s automobiles or widgets, being a leader is where the money is made, particularly in the long term. However, GM decided in the late '90s to put its money behind a short-term windfall in the massive Hummer.

Oops.

The electric vehicle’s return is inevitable, as fuel prices continue to climb and battery storage capability continues to improve. The current hybrid vehicles on the road are merely the transition. In the meantime, some of the myths of electric cars will have to be cleared up. While they will depend on electricity generated in many cases by coal-powered plants, studies have shown they would still cut greenhouse gas production by as much as a third. They also don’t pollute while operating, unlike regular cars. Furthermore, a huge upgrade to the electrical grid would be unnecessary since most people would be charging their vehicles overnight, a low time for electricity demand. Unlike hydrogen-powered vehicles, they wouldn’t require service stations for refueling, just a home outlet.

GM insists it spent more than $1 billion trying to get electric vehicles off the ground. In light of last year’s financial numbers, and the fact GM hopes to be profitable again by 2010 or 2011, perhaps it’s time for an American automaker, out of desperation and fearing for its long-term survival in the marketplace, to make its boldest move ever.

But this time, stick to it.