Motorists wanted for ESB Great Electric Drive

The Nissan Leaf electric vehicle is one of the cars available on the trial

Fancy test driving an electric car for four months?

ESB is looking for 24 ecar ambassadors from all walks of life to do just that over the coming year as part of its Great Electric Drive programme.

This is the second year of the scheme and the ESB is looking for people of all age groups, lifestyles, occupations and commuting patterns to take part. It is also looking for organisations to get involved.

The cars on offer this year include the BMW i3, Mitsubishi iMiEV, Citroën C Zero, the Nissan Euro Leaf, Mitsubishi Outlander Plug-in Hybrid SUV, Renault Zoe, and the Renault Kangoo ZE van.

Cars can be charged via domestic electric supply or at on street ecar charge points.

Research carried out by ESB found that cost savings are important for drivers of electric cars, with 90 per cent of those polled citing it in their top three reasons for choosing an ecar.

It also found that 92 per cent of EV drivers travel in their car at least once a day and 60 per cent drive in excess of 300km per week.

Head of ESB ecars, Dermot McArdle said that electric cars offer ‘very significant savings’ to motorists.

He added: ‘An electric car costs less than two cents a kilometre to fuel and the average motorist could achieve running cost savings of almost €2,300 a year.’

Some 21 ambassadors took part in the first Great Electric Drive, with participants covering in the region of 105,000km of pure electric driving.

The average weekly distance covered was 300km with combined fuel cost saving of more than €13,500.

The closing date for applications for this year’s Great Electric Drive is March 4.

Visit the Great Electric Drive website or its Facebook page for further details or watch the video.