The Car of the Future Can Do Without its Driver

General Motors and its Chinese partner SAIC will showcase the "Electric Networked-Vehicle" launched Wednesday in their joint pavilion at the Shanghai Expo, which opens May 1 and runs for six months.

The EN-V, pronounced "envy," is GM's latest effort to burnish its credentials as a future-focused, environmentally friendly company and shed its image as the bastion of the gas guzzling Hummer, reports AP. The automaker is in the process of winding down Hummer after a deal collapsed to sell it to a Chinese heavy equipment maker.

The two-wheel, two-seater EN-V is not just about making vehicles small, lightweight and emission-free, the company says.
"What we're talking about here is completely redoing the automobile," says Michael Albano, director of product and technology communications at General Motors International Operations — its global headquarters for international business in Shanghai.

With the trunk-less EN-V, GM has jettisoned the traditional "three box" system and gasoline-fueled engine in place of a pure-electric minivehicle meant strictly for city driving. Five fit in the parking space needed for one conventional vehicle, says Kevin Wale, president and managing director for GM China Group.

"GM's vision with SAIC is petroleum-free, emission-free, accident-free and congestion-free," said Wale. "We think we can do that by combining the benefits of electricity and connectivity."

The 1.5 meter by 1.5 meter (about 5 foot by 5 foot) EN-V appears to build on GM's earlier work with Segway Inc. in developing the PUMA, or Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility, vehicle. It will use the same types of battery cells as the Segway and the same battery supplier, Valence Technology Inc., said Christopher Borroni-Bird, GM's director of advanced technology vehicle concepts.

With the EN-V, GM proposes to reconstruct the automobile's "DNA."

The EN-V's maximum speed of only 40 kilometers per hour (24 mph) — even now city roads average only 20 kilometers per hour (12 mph) and often less — and other high-tech features reduce the need for heavy, high-stress steel, bumpers, air bags and crumple zones, says Albano.

Apart from its diminutive size and light weight — 400 kilograms (880 pounds) including the passengers — the vehicle would offer drivers the option of "autonomous driving:" letting the car drive itself via an elaborate system of GPS systems, digital maps, roadway and vehicle sensors, cameras and other devices.

According to autocar.co.uk, the EN-V can be ‘fully autonomous’: it could drive you 10 miles to work, drive itself home again to charge, and be back to collect you at 6 pm. Thanks to its ‘vehicle-to-network’ connectivity, you could even work while it drove you home.