TASTE FOR HYBRID

Most budding mec-hanics get to hone their craft on gas and diesel engines. They get to learn the rudiments of how these engines work and just what makes them purr.

Many only dream of the opportunity to work on a hybrid vehicle. For the students at the Laventille Technology Continu-ing Education Centre, the chance rode in last Friday, when Suzuki’s Life style Motors presented them with a Suzuki Electric Vehicle (EV)-Sport. Currently, the Suzuki EV-Sport can only travel 120 miles before the battery must be recharged.

The hybrid car is an electronic concept car that runs on an EV-1 Gen-III electric powertrain.

It will become part of the students’ training and will be used as a tool to assist them in understanding the rapid changes that have occurred in the world of automotive technology. They will also be required to examine the car in detail, carefully dissect it, reassemble it and then construct an exact duplicate of it from parts they will also make themselves.

After the ceremony , students looked on in awe at the vehicle.

In his address, Junior Tertiary Education Minister Satish Ramroop, said trainees will go beyond the theory of hybrid.

"Our trainees will receive hands-on training and technological experience in areas that were once only theoretical or textbook-based," he said and commended Lifestyle Motors for supporting this current automobile trend — the electric car." The Suzuki vehicle is also open for use to all the institutions under the Ministry, including Metal Industries Company (MIC), San Fernando Techni-cal Institute, John Donaldson Institute and the University of TT (UTT).

Ramroop also took the opportunity to explain the significance of the donation and placed it in the context of the need for more energy-efficient and environmentally-friendly vehicles.

He said, "The world is becoming worried ab-out energy supplies and prices. Environmental impacts have risen sharply on the public agenda. Large global concerns about climate change, resulting from in-creasing emissions of greenhouse gasses, have become the subject of international negotiations and protocols."

He said that having this vehicle, which cannot be licenced and is only for educational use, is a blessing in an era in which the practical application of the principles of sustainable development will be crucial to the economic, social and environmental well-being of TT.

People must realise that electric-powered transportation will have a role to play in the future, he said.

FACT BOX —

Electric Vehicles (EVs) are not a new development. In fact, they are currently a growing trend. The history of these cars dates back to the 1830’s.

By 1900, there were more EVs on the road than gasoline-powered cars. In the century that followed, the internal combustion engine came to dominate the transportation industry, and electric vehicles were, for the most part, just a matter of scientific curiosity.