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CHAN:
Petrol prices have fallen sharply, but carmakers still have high hopes for the Japanese market for electric cars. They are adhering to tougher emissions standards and are eco-friendly to boot. Lets take a look at a car expo in Tokyo.

STORY:
At one Tokyo car expo some of the latest in electric cars are on display.

A wealth of hybrid vehicles are already on the road, but car industry executives say the race is still on to create a commercial vehicle which runs solely on electricity.

Tokyo-based Auto EV Japan unveiled the upgraded “Girasole Elettrica,” an electric car imported from Italy. They sold more than 120 of them in the Japanese market last year.

The car is now capable of running at a maximum speed of 65 km/h. Before the Japanese upgrade it ran at 45 km/h.

It costs about 100 yen, thats about a dollar, for a 7-hour, fully charged car to travel before running out of power.

[Kiyoshi Ito, Auto Ev Japan]:
With gas prices going up and down radically these days, an increasing number of people now appear to think they cannot really depend on fossil fuel and electric cars are the way to go — not just from an environmental point of view but from an economic point of view.

Another electric auto company, Tokai Denshi, showed off a sleek, futuristic sports car. Its an attempt to shake off the old image of function-driven electric cars.

[Shigeaki Kubota, Tokai Denshi]:
“People used to think electric cars are heavy and clumsy, but we wanted to revamp that image and make our customers realize that electric cars are actually cool.

Manufacturers say the cost performance of electric vehicles is almost 10 times better than ordinary fuel powered vehicles.

Man Bling