Electric Car Performance

Just as with gasoline cars, electric car performance varies wildly depending on the purpose the car was built for. Neighborhood Electric Vehicles are speed limited to 25mph and perform like a more comfortable golf cart. Don't expect to win many drag races in a GEM e4. NEVs are good for getting around a neighborhood or college campus and are built with the performance needs for this in mind.
The high performance package for the e4 is a 7.0 horsepower motor. No that decimal isn't a typo. Even doors are optional on many NEVs. If your purpose is simply to get around a small neighborhood or campus environment though, they are really an excellent choice since you don't need much power or cornering force to do that.

On the other end of the spectrum you have cars like the Tesla Roadster. This electric car is built with performance in mind. Modeled after the Lotus Elise, the Tesla Roadster is fast, expensive and handles well. Just as you'd expect from a real sports car. The Roadster is limited to a 125mph top speed but it can get there pretty quick. A 0-60 time of under 4 seconds is impressive in any car no matter what is powering it. It's also light-weight at under 3000 pounds. Road tests have stated that is does run into some handling problems because of the big 1000 lb lump of batteries in the center of the car but it still handles admirably and does it without any emissions.

The ZAP cars and trucks are built with a single front wheel which allows them to be classed as a motor cycle. This may cause some safety concerns for some but it allows these vehicles to travel on surface streets and highways with performance similar or worse than a gasoline engined car built for maximum fuel economy. Which in performance terms is "not much". Road tests have found that even on a level surface some of these cars can't reach their 40mph top speed and lose even more speed when climbing a hill and with the tricycle design you can forget about cornering. Go too fast around a bend on a trike and you'll be on the roof.

Like with internal combustion cars performance is often a result of price although you can get respectable performance in affordable gas cars, the only electrics with performance worth mentioning are very expensive.

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