A NORTHUMBERLAND car company is taking part in the biggest trial of electric vehicles in Europe.
AVID Vehicles, based at the Admiral Business Park, in Cramlington, is working with academics from Newcastle University on research which aims to assist the development of the green technology.
Almost 50 cars are now being tracked, analysed and logged by academics from the school of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, including cars from AVID.
Nick Gianfreda, of AVID vehicles, said: “People have a lot of misconceptions about electric cars, about them being slow and with poor acceleration, but that is not the case.
“They can get decent top speeds and they are cheap to run too.”
Phil Blythe, professor of transport at Newcastle University, said: “Here in the North East we are the only trial where there is a significant electric vehicle charging infrastructure in place so we can actually measure the real behaviour of drivers – where they are charging their cars, how they are using them, etc.”
6th April 2011