MITSUBISHI IMIEV

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Mitsubishi i-MiEV Electric Dream: Critics exhausted

Jessica O'Brien, winner of the carsales.com.au 'Electric Dream' competition, updates us on what it's like living with Mitsubishi's plug-in i-MiEV city car

You gotta love haters. No matter what you create there will always be a few people ready to tell you it’s rubbish.

They’ll keep you on your toes and assist you in making sure that you have every angle covered. This is not such a bad thing. Afterall, any publicity good publicity.

But haters are good for one thing. They give you the chance to convert them into believers.

This brings me to EVs, and our case, the Mitsubishi i-MiEV.

The general public is only too ready to believe the hype; but they need to see the results and the savings before making a decision to commit. This requires effort.

Even before the i-MiEV hit the roads, there were skeptics. Although EVs have (technically speaking) been around longer than petrol cars, the current generation of electric vehicles is a marked change from the driving experience that we are all accustomed to.

Sometimes I think it is easy to forget the i-MiEV was engineered to do better: Better for resources, better for the environment and not to be understated, better for the back pocket.

Myself, I love a good debate between skeptics and believers. I think that there are very positive things to gain on both parts: skeptics can gain a new perspective and believers can reiterate their trust.

When I found out I was going to get to drive a car and write about it, I would have been satisfied with Fred Flintstones wheels, so to speak. Undoubtedly it would have gone faster than my fossil of an MX-6.

No one was going to have a tough time selling me on the EV because I did not have to pay for it. So over the weeks I have done my best to consider my experience in terms of a regular paying driver who would see the vehicle as an investment as oppose to a privilege.

Even with this careful mentality, my opinion is, that the i-MiEV more than fulfills its role as a suburban runabout and environmentally-friendly socket-rocket.

I think sometimes when people hear about technologies as innovative as the i-MiEV before they can expect them to fulfill their every expectation.

Upon failing to do the ironing, read minds and cure diseases, some people would immediately drive the i-MiEV to the proverbial junkyard. No, the i-MiEV won’t shift your furniture, but it’s not designed to. Comparing a petrol car to an i-MiEV is like comparing a home computer to an iPad. No one is going to keep all their documents on their iPad, but it sure comes in handy for lighter use.

As far as driving around the city goes, there is non-disputable evidence that the i-MiEV does it more peacefully, more cheaply and more cleanly than its petrol counterpart. Even with a price tag of neigh-on 50 grand (which is soon to drop), the amount saved on fuel and servicing makes is a worthy investment as a suburb dwellers car or family’s second car.

So for the EV skeptics online and beyond- the only thing I can recommend is to investigate further than reviews (as charmingly helpful as they are!).

There are many events coming up, such as RACV Green-zone (Federation Square 29 August) that can provide you with the opportunity to see, try and talk to professionals about the alternative options that may just improve your driving experience. If you’re still not happy, let Mitsubishi know why so they can keep making their EV’s better and better.

Criticism is useless unless the right people hear it. So get out there, give it a go, and see for yourself. You never know, it might just turn out to be your electric dream.