Top 10 reasons to own an Electric Car

1. You drive less than 40 miles per day on average. For most of us car commuters, and this is about eighty percent of Americans, we drive less than forty miles each day. Electric vehicles and neighborhood electric vehicles (NEVs) in particular are perfectly suited to this type of driving. Quick stop and go and multiple trips in your day? Even better as sever lf the electric cars out there can recharge your batteries when you step on your brakes.
   

   
   

2. Say bye-bye to your gas station slash convenience store. Some of today's electric cars that have longer ranges do use a gas combustion engine and estimates are that for the average consumer, you're only filling up a few times each year. For you pure plug-in owners, it's knowing that you never have to go to the gas station again, that is unless you want to pick up your favorite roadie food (c'mon, you know what yours is - mine is Hershey's whoppers)

3. Your vehicle is running ninety-seven percent cleaner than gas-powered vehicles. While you may still be stuck in the same daily drive and all-too-familiar traffic, neighborhood electric vehicles (NEVs) and longer range electric cars produce zero emissions. Something we can all breath a lot better about. This fact seems to be especially attractive to city dwellers in smog intensive areas where sunlight and hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides combine to form air pollution.

4. Low to no maintenance requirements. Remember those days of filling up for gas at least weekly and planning your oil changes on the way to/from work? Those days are miles behind you when owning an electric car because both are a thing of the past. Just plug-in your car when you have reached the end of the charge range and you're ready to go.

5. Go night-night to get your beauty rest and let your electric car get some ‘eeee's. In far less time than it takes for most of us to get our beauty rest, your plug-in electric car is gaining all the energy it needs to transport you around each day. Most plug-in electric cars and plug-in hybrids require about 8 hours for a full charge, which means your battery is basically starting from zero. The average charge time is more likely to be somewhere between 2 and 6 hours, depending on the distances you let your electric car take you and how heavy a foot you have when driving.

6. You only need a few horses under your electric car hood to run like a rocket. Electric vehicles don't require all of that low gear shifting or horsepower to get going at a really quick pace. On average, there's fewer than 40 to 50 horses under the hood of an electric vehicle. Not to be underestimated because they run like the thoroughbreds at the Preakness and do so silently because there's basically only one mechanism driving you forward. This means you can sneak up on that Porsche 911 at the traffic light and have him reading your license plate in under a few seconds. See number seven for even more performance-related reasons to own an electric vehicle.

7. Better torque curve. Say what, what is that? Well, it basically means that you can spank the pants off of the average automobile from a stand-still position. Many of you may be familiar with Tesla Motor's Roadster. It can go 0 to 60 in 3.9 seconds, which is as fast many of the fastest gas-fueled cars on the road. While other more traditional electric cars are not as fast, they too compete head to head against similar class vehicles.

8. Electric vehicles are so good looking. Uh-um, well, this might not yet be a completely true statement in the modern day sense of beauty. There are several electric car manufacturers that have taken up the gauntlet of racy lines. However, the Toyota Prius is the best selling electric and gas hybrid car in the US to date and it is, well, it's ugly. Good news is that maybe our tastes in good car looks will change. I mean, Raphael wasn't painting skinny girls with ripped bodies a few hundred years ago and look at what we consider an attractive human body today. So things change…. But, better yet, there are lots of electric auto manufacturers that get this and they're working on electric vehicles that look as hot as the latest German engineered vehicles and we can all get our neighbors to convert to an NEV and electric car too.

9. The government actually pays you to drive electric. Congress has several hefty tax credits coming your way if you purchase an electric vehicle. You can get a tax credit up to $7,500 per new electric car if you purchase in 2009 through 2011. These are tax credits, so they are fully beneficial to you, unlike tax deductible benefits, which are not. Talk to your accountant about it, but it is a definite incentive that you need to consider with your next purchase. Commercial vehicle fleets that go to electric vehicles also benefit from similar government tax credit programs.

10. Reduce Dependency. One of the benefits of driving your electric car is that you are no longer susceptible to the wild gyrations in the price of oil, and thus, the price at your local pumps. As the electric grid becomes filled with more alternative energies - Congress has big increases in these planned for by 2020, you're part of the solution.

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