Electric Bamboo Car Runs 30 Miles per Charge

Electric and eco-friendly cars are surely the main goals of several carmakers around the world, with large brands now focusing on developing fuel-efficient vehicles with very low emissions. However, when talking about an electric and eco-friendly car we usually refer to a model sharing the same design as a regular car but equipped with battery-powered engines and providing reduced emissions. Kyoto University has a different perspective over how electric cars should look or, at least, this is what you understand when looking at “BamGoo”.

Basically, BamGoo is an electric car unveiled on November 2, 2008, with a total weight of 60 kilograms and 100 percent ecologically-friendly. But more importantly, it can run as much as 30 miles (approximately 50 kilometers) per single charge which is quite impressive for an electric car.

And in case you're wondering what's with that low weight, you should probably know that developers managed to reduce the total weight by using local bamboo ware for designing the car body. That's really impressive but think that safety features are almost ignore in this model, with no crumple zones or airbags that may protect the passengers in case of impact.

“Single-seat bamboo-made electrical car "BamGoo" is displayed in Kyoto city, western Japan, Sunday, Nov. 2, 2008,” Daylife wrote in a report published today.

Electric and eco-friendly cars have become a must have for most carmakers, with the global economic crisis pushing customers to more fuel efficient cars, detrimental to models focused on large displacement engines and high performance. North American companies are among the most affected carmakers.