December 2, 2009, Updated September 13, 2012

With its jet turbine engines and lithium ion batteries, Israel’s ETV Motors is producing clean, quiet, efficient, inexpensive, and environmentally sound personal transport.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kR6SeLkQbmw

ETV Motors in Israel is working to replace piston engines in cars with cleaner, more efficient turbine engines and the company’s own long-lasting lithium batteries

Automakers agree that extended range hybrids are the way of the future, but so far all of them, including the Toyota Prius, rely on the old-fashioned piston engine to supplement the battery power.

ETV-Motors-Prious-Demo

ETV Motors claims their recently unveiled proof-of-concept vehicle can run for 50 miles on one charge.

The new ETV jet turbine engine generates its own electricity to recharge the battery pack and is different from the Prius and other hybrids because “it’s always electric power that powers the wheels, whereas with the Prius, sometimes it’s electric power, sometimes it’s the energy generated by the pistons,” says Arnold Roth, COO of ETV.

The jet turbine won’t be used to propel the car, but will generate electricity to periodically recharge the battery packs. The engineers at the Israeli company, from the former Soviet Union, were the fathers of the MIG and the Russian jet turbine industry.

With $12 million in investments, ETV Motors, based on the central coast of Israel in Herzliya, recently unveiled a proof-of-concept vehicle that the company claims can run for 50 miles on one charge, reportedly twice as far as other electric hybrid cars in development.

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