BMW Electric Cars: Will battery prices fall enough to make the car a success?

BusinessWeek has an interesting analysis on BMW’s Project i and the future of electric cars correlated with the high battery prices.

Here is an excerpt from the article:

“WILLING TO PAY”?

Skeptics counter that the future may be a long way off. Even if battery prices fall to a third of their current level, they’ll still cost $14,000 per car, Boston Consulting Group estimates. Such concerns have spurred caution in the industry. Rival Daimler is testing electric Smart cars in London, but the company has yet “to see proof that the relatively high numbers of people who say they are interested in these vehicles are willing to pay what it costs to make them,” says CEO Dieter Zetsche.

Others are optimistic. Consultant Bain & Co. figures battery costs could fall to $4,000 per vehicle by 2020, which means the showroom price of an electric could be as low as $20,000—about half what most manufacturers envision for their first electric models. At that level, Bain estimates, automakers could sell as many as 175,000 electrics a year in the U.S. alone. “We can bring these vehicles to market for a reasonable price,” Reithofer says.

Continue reading on BusinessWeek

2 Responses to “BMW Electric Cars: Will battery prices fall enough to make the car a success?”

jon H says:

May 1, 2009 at 5:36 pm

I hope they do for the price per mile cost of driving, but I will never embrace them the way I do gasoline engines, the exhaust note of a car is so much a part of it’s character and soul.

Gord says:

May 1, 2009 at 9:11 pm

The end of the internal combustion power.