{"id":403,"date":"2008-11-10T17:57:55","date_gmt":"2008-11-10T17:57:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/?p=403"},"modified":"2008-11-10T17:57:55","modified_gmt":"2008-11-10T17:57:55","slug":"i-miev-small-electric-van-to-come-to-uk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/archives\/403","title":{"rendered":"i Miev Small Electric Van to Come to UK?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mitsubishi’s i Miev city car has been a success in Japan but has proved slightly less popular in the UK – perhaps not helped by Mitsubishi’s decision to only import 300 of the blighters in 2007<\/a>, the car’s UK launch year.<\/p>\n

If you aren’t familiar with the i Miev (and I wasn’t), it’s a small thing that looks a bit like a 4-door Smart car. The current model has a 600cc turbo-charged petrol engine – just like a Smart car (sorry, I couldn’t find a copyright-free photo).<\/p>\n

\n

What makes it interesting to us van users are two things:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Mitsubishi are soon to launch a small van version<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. Mitsubishi are soon to launch an all-electric version<\/a>, designed for low-mileage urban use<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Sounds tasty, says you. Where can I get one?<\/p>\n

    Well, first of all, soon means 2010 for the electric launch and 2011 for the UK van import.<\/p>\n

    Then there’s the availability (assuming they take off). Mitsubishi UK are expecting to sell 2,000-3,000 of the all-electric model in the UK, according to Car Magazine<\/a>, but production volumes could be limited initially if battery production can’t keep up<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    If you’re still attracted – and for a modern, city-based business in need of a small van they will<\/em> make sense – then zero-emission heaven can be yours for around \u00a312,000 – about \u00a33,000 more than the current petrol model.<\/p>\n

    As I mentioned last week, the UK government is putting serious money on the table<\/a> to encourage the development of low-emission commercial vehicles, especially vans. The arrival of the i Miev van could be perfectly-timed for an upswing in demand.<\/p>\n

    We live in interesting times…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Mitsubishi’s forthcoming all-electric van version of their popular (in Japan) i Miev city car could be just the thing for the city van market in a couple of year’s time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[139],"tags":[219,474,475,473],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}