That said, the Volt is actually a hybrid car using a small petrol engine to power the drive motor once the stored energy in the batteries has been used up, but offers a more useable electric-only range than parallel hybrid technology models typified by the Toyota Prius.

Out of some 12,800,000 new car registrations, that represents around 0.13%, not the kind of figure that will

make the motor industry rich, particularly given the investment required in designing vehicles with a new drivetrain. Not surprisingly, there is more to come. VW announced details of a concept electric light CV in November, the VW eT! This is designed to offer a glimpse further into the future, presenting an electrically propelled urban delivery vehicle that can, for instance, be driven by a “joystick” control from the passenger side, if needed. 

Envisaging use as a mail or parcel delivery vehicle, it has been designed to follow the driver along the road as he or she makes house-to-house deliveries on foot. It could also be summoned to the driver when commanded. There will doubtless be a number of technical issues requiring further development and perhaps a greater hurdle – worldwide legislative agreements surrounding the autonomous operation. 

At the Detroit Show (See Below), Nissan unveiled the e-NV200 Concept, based on the NV200 van. As Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn said at the Show, the concept is near production ready. In fact the model was promised when the NV200 was launched, so the electric variant is no surprise, neither is the fact that it will use the Nissan Leaf drivetrain.

The low take-up for electric cars is not a surprise. The limited range is an issue for anyone who does not have access to a car with an internal combustion engine for longer journeys. That’s what has given rise to the Chevrolet Volt/Opel Ampera range extender concept. The cost of electric vehicles also remains a factor and will do for some time until the cost of batteries starts to fall. For the short term at least, it will be small electric commercial vehicles covering daily mileages that do not conflict with available range where electric vehicles can be expected to make market inroads.

Given the high relative cost, it is most likely that these vehicles will be operated on a lease by a fleet.

As Chris Hayden, then Chairman and CEO of Ford Retail told me in April 2011 at the launch of the Transit Connect Electric in the UK: “We’re particularly attracted by commercials because of the limited range, where people have got pre-speciied journeys. This is going to be a much easier sell, as long as we can sit down and talk about the obvious high price.

“We’ve done quite a lot of work on that and we will be buying the first one ourselves to use in our parts business. We’ll have real-time experience of how this works.

“The £40,000 price tag can be quite daunting. Everyone is writing the vehicle off in terms of residual value, but they are only going to do 80-90 miles a day.

“If you look after them they’ll run for many years. We currently amortize vehicles over three years. Once you start amortizing them over a bigger period – the battery is guaranteed for five years – we’ll see where they stand in terms of their residual value. It will make for some very interesting conversations and it will make for conversations that will enable people to see a way of accessing the vehicle.”

And you can’t pile electric vehicles high and sell them cheap, so there’s a learning curve for dealers. The prize for manufacturers is massive reduction in driveline development and manufacturing cost. Like it or not, EVs are here to stay.