In the US, the MINI E pilot continues ended last year and the North American market is preparing to welcome the ActiveE this summer, a similar field trial that takes place in selected cities around the country.
But the MINI E pilot continues in Europe. BMW Group, along with Vattenfall Europe, has announced that the Mini E field trial in Berlin, Germany is entering phase two. In 2009, BMW has teamed up with its partner Vattenfall to release 50 of the cars to customers in Berlin as part of a project supported by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety.
The new fleet counts seventy MINI Es, with 30 going to private customers and 40 earmarked for fleet users. In order to support the ongoing field trial, a total of 50 plug-in vehicle charging stations have been installed in and around Berlin.
The MINI E Fleet trials began in 2009 in the USA (New York, Los Angeles and in the state of New Jersey), UK (Oxford / London) and Germany (Munich and Berlin). This fleet tests subsequently expanded into France (Paris), Japan (Tokyo) and China (Beijing and Shenzhen). In the first phase, the Mini Es in Berlin have racked up a reported 310,686 miles and three out of every four of the drivers advocate the exclusive use of renewable energy sources for charging up electric vehicles in the future. Initial results from the Berlin study after more than six months of usage show that the electric car’s limited range is proving – in the vast majority of cases – to be sufficient for the participants under everyday conditions.
[Source: Green Car Congress via Autoblog ]
