Electric cars may be the best solution for weaning ourselves off of the gas-guzzling - and greenhouse gas-emitting - combustion engine. But for those sellingelectric vehicles, there is a lack of understanding over what customers want from, and what they will pay for, when it comes to plug-in automobiles.
Two studies from the University of Delaware (UD), have helped plug that gap, by looking at how consumers valued the features of electric vehicles - and how driving patterns would mesh with the limited range of the first generation of these cars.
The last 12 months have seen the electric car move from the 'green wish list' and onto the car showroom - with the Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt leading a jostling pack of electric car wannabes. But the numbers of e-cars hitting the dealer's forecourts is tiny, and the waiting lists excessive. It was in order to get a better picture of a road-map for the marketing of e-cars, that the researchers from UD surveyed car buyers, and their driving habits.
In the first study, published in Resource and Energy Economic, 3,000 people were asked how much extra they would pay for different features - such as driving range and better battery charging times. This information will be extremely useful for car manufacturers, looking at where to place their e-car offerings in the overall price spectrum.
They found that charging time was very important to drivers - with people prepared to pay, on average, an extra $2100 to knock charging down from 10 to 5 hours. Slash that further to 1 hour, and potential customers would fork out $3800 more. High value was also attached to driving range. If an electric car could only go 200 miles, and a gasoline-burning car 300 miles, buyers would expect the e-car to be $3,500 less, on average, to buy.
UD教授乔治·帕森斯（George Parsons）表示，这些数字对制造商来说将非常有趣。``此信息告诉汽车制造商，人们愿意为另一个距离支付什么。它为他们提供了有关使汽车在市场上具有竞争力所需的成本水平的指导。''
在运输研究中发现的第二项研究与第一个研究有关 - 它研究了驾驶员在日常旅行中如何使用汽油车。这个想法是要查看是否有一些驱动因素有限的电动车范围不是问题。有趣的是，作者Willett Kempton和Nathaniel Pearre发现，每天将近十分之一的驾驶员从未超过100英里 - 使其成为购买当今有限范围的E -Cars的理想候选人。
And another 32% went more than 100 miles only on 6 days per year. For these drivers, occasionally using another method of travel might not be a drag, to them considering owning an electric car. That offers hope that a large potential market is already in place - and so car makers could significantly ramp up sales. The authors concluded that ''It appears that even modest electric vehicles with today's limited battery range, if marketed correctly to segments with appropriate driving behavior, comprise a large enough market for substantial vehicle sales.''
