I've been seeing more and more press on electric motorcycles in recent months, all being touted as being "green". I just don't see anything green about them.

I just saw two items today, one was a press release on the Enertia Bike, and other was a blog post about a Japanese-built "EV-X7" from Axle Group.

I have nothing against electric motorcycles, and welcome the technology. But in order to charge the batteries on these things, you have to plug them into the power grid. And the power-grid is still supplied by electricity created from the burning of coal and diesel.

So whether smog comes out of a tail pipe, or from a power plant, the burning of organic matter doesn't stop. It might be a different story if we could build more nuclear power plants.

Pictured above is the "Enertia Bike", built by an Oregon-based company called Brammo. It'll cost you between $12,000 to $15,000, depending on how long you want to wait for delivery. But it tops out at above 50mph, and goes no farther than 40 miles. It takes 3 hours to charge up.

With that small range, and that length of time to recharge, what is the net smog-savings from electricity consumption versus riding a 250cc commuter bike? If you wanted a really "green" two-wheeled commuter vehicle, how about Honda Metropolitan scooter? It'll take you farther, and it's smog footprint is extremely nominal compared to three hours of battery charging. And it costs only $1,900.

Or look at this way, how much smog was put into the air for you to do enough work to earn $15,000 versus $1,900? That Enertia Bike is not that green is it?

Granted, the progress of technology takes small baby steps, and we need to build an Enertia Bike before we can get to something practical and sensible, but so far, the only thing "green" about electric motorcycles is the money they're burning.

Labels: Electric Motorcycles