Nickie Muir: Wheels oiled for electric car

Photo / Thinkstock

If you've been filling up at the gas station watching your car consume the equivalent of the week's grocery bill - and wishing you could spend the money on something else.

If you've driven into the local gas station, filled up your car, having just read in the National Geographic that the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is "not yet over" four years after the well was capped and felt the cognitive dissonance of being unwillingly part of the problem.

If you're worried about Statoil starting the process to drill large sections of the Northland coast and don't believe it will bring jobs but rather risk the tourist and fishing economy we do have ... then I have some good news for you.

Santa. I'm talking to you: an electric car - I really want one in my stocking next year.

To have a nearly 500km range and for it to cost me only $15 of clean sustainable 100 per cent NZ electricity.

To be able to afford an overseas family holiday every year with the savings. To never have to read the words "the anti-deep sea oil drilling protesters all drove cars to the march" again. To be part of creating new industries which might actually deliver the jobs and income without the environmental risks and to know that every time I charge up my electric car I'm part of the solution.

But don't take my word for it.

If you're in Paihia on New Year's Eve go and ask the guys who are driving one of the new Tesla model S electric cars and see how their road trip from Cape Reinga to Bluff is going. There's nothing even vaguely hippy about this car - it looks like something European and very fast - which is about as descriptive as I can get with cars.

From the political mess that oil has left in Nigeria, Iraq, Algeria, Syria, Russia and Venezuela (that's not an exhaustive list, I'm just getting bored), it would be a sane nation that would want to step back from co-dependent and often violent relationships engendered by oil and become a little more independent, economically confident and, well, better looking. Nice to cut the $8 billion oil import bill too - if we cut it to zero as Denmark plans to, it'd be like doubling the income from our dairy industry overnight without creating more waste.

The price, which has been the main obstacle, is finally getting within range of being able to pay for itself in less than four years in savings.

Even Nick Smith will drive in what is being billed as the "Epic Road Trip from Top to Tip" (Nick: Does John know?

This doesn't gel with the oil drilling deal but you're heading in the right direction. (We won't tell if you don't). Carl Barlev and Steve West, the owners of the brand new shiny red beasts - really are leading the charge on fast charge electric cars and you can follow their progress on their "Leading the Charge" Facebook page. They'd be happy to have a chat in a town near you.

If you're lucky they'll even take you for a spin.