The BBC asks Will electric motorbike sales take off across Asia, and gives some interesting figures:
Asia accounts for more than half of all global motorbike sales, and in some countries it is unusual for a family to not own one.
Take Thailand, the nation with the highest per person use of motorcycles. There 87% of households own at least one motorbike. These are typically the scooter variety, whereby the rider sits with his or her feet directly in front.
Thailand is closely followed by Vietnam (86%), Indonesia (85%), and Malaysia (83%) for households with motorbikes. The figures then drop to 60% and 47% respectively, in giant markets China and India, but that still dwarfs the UK's 7%.
The vast majority of Asia's motorbikes currently run on petrol, but transport experts say that a big switch to electric versions is now gathering pace.
I like this innovation:
While the big Japanese motorbike manufacturers like Yamaha and Honda are now making electric models, the Asian market has been led by newer companies.
Taiwan's Gogoro is one such firm. In addition to a range of electric motorbikes, it has come up with a solution to the problem of a rider having to stand around while their bikes charge.
Instead of charging points, Gogoro's users in Taiwan simply need to drive to one of more than 2,200 battery stations, and swap their batteries for free. The outdoor stations run 24-hours a day, and are said to be able to withstand the typhoons and searing heat of Taiwanese summers.
Gogoro is now planning to make this battery-swapping hardware and technology available to partner companies across Asia. These include Hero in India, Gojek in Indonesia, and DCJ and Yadea in China. Gogoro is also working on a partnership with Yamaha.
Horace Luke, Gogoro's chief executive, says the company is trying to become the "Android" of the electric motorbike world, providing the invisible scaffolding for other brands He likens it to the mobile phone system which encourages innovation by giving device makers more freedom to customise phones. In this spirit, Gogoro also intends to share its battery-management software, which helps to extend the life of the batteries.
Cool.
Off-road foldable e-scooters are the shot. Combined with fluroscent back-packs they can make 70% of commuting powerfully efficient in these poor countries, without the money to pay for tunnels, trams and trains right away.
ReplyDeleteWhere is the battery fetish coming from though? You cultists will wreck the environment digging everything up to look for lithium. We need a lot more storage to be militarily strong. But that kind of battery has to be the Donald Sadoway liquid metal stationary battery. For city transport we should be expanding the overhead trolley wires network.
ReplyDeleteIn Sydney we have the George Street trams. But if we are serious about things like this we should expand the overhead tram lines throughout the city. So much so that we can get containers off the port and have them travelling to the outer suburbs for sorting.
The worst thing about technology that the rather excellent and intelligent unabomber didn't point out was the terrible habit of seeking icing on the cake without the cake. The habit of not applying excellent old technology. Like canals, flat rail, tunnels, swales, ponds, check dams, terraces and so forth. Here we are thinking about terraforming Mars when we cannot seem to get it right on this planet.
Why oh why did we get rid of the tram wires? Just so you guys could get yourselves an incredibly damaging battery fetish.