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The i3 Shadow Sport Limited Edition is coming Thinking about getting a BMW i3? Do you like to own low-volume special edition cars? When it comes to cars, a special edition where only 50 copies are made guarantees the owner will be in pretty exclusive company. That's exactly what BMW is doing with a special version of the 2016 i3. BMW is calling it the "i3 Shadow Sport" and they are using social media for the public unveiling. Tomorrow (Monday, 11/16) at 8:00pm EST, you can tune into the live BMWUSA Periscope event  to find out the details on the i3 Shadow Sport. BMW's teaser of the new limited edition i3 Shadow Sport From the teaser picture it looks like the car has a moonroof, which has yet to be available in the US, and is the new color, Fluid Black. It has the 19" Cyclone wheels which only come with the top-of-the-line Tera World package, so it's likely loaded with all the options the car offers. So far, all BMW has said was "With only 50 available to...

A screen shot of the current i3 owners map A few posts ago BMW i3 owner Scott Lawrence Lawson was featured in our Born Electric series and gave up some insight into his reasons for going electric and how he's doing with his i3 after a few months of ownership. At the end of the post I mentioned that he created a BMW i3 owners map where i3 owners can register their location and see where other i3's reside. It's not a commercial site that is trying to collect your data or sell you anything, Scott only created it because he though it would be fun to see where other i3's live. This is how he explains it on the site where you sign up: I thought I'd give back to the growing i3 community by making a map of BMW i3 owners and owners to be. This is an opt-in map so if you want to be on it, fill out this form below. The more specific you are, the better the data will represent our community. Maybe you'll meet someone new who made the same great choice in mobility as you...

Hopefully more dealers will understand that their EV customers want an EV loaner when their car is in for service and add them to their loaner fleet. I've been lucky enough to own some nice cars in my life. Like most people, bringing my car in for service was never something I looked forward to. However one thing that I did like was when I got an interesting car as the service loaner. I remember one time when my Mercedes ML430 was being worked on I got a black E430 4matic and I liked it so much I almost told the dealer to keep my car and trade it for the loaner. Today, many dealers have only a small fleet of in-house loaners and use rental car agencies for the overflow of cars that they need. They do it to save money, and I'm sure it does, but they do miss out on the opportunity to show off the other cars that they sell. I still don't fully understand why a BMW dealer for instance would want to put their customer in a car from another brand while they are getting service, i...

My i3 is powered by electricity generated by my home solar array. EV+PV is really a fantastic combination and one that I believe will be fairly common in the near future.  So how can you possibly top that? How about by getting two i3s and powering both of them plus your entire household's energy use by your  solar array! That's exactly what the Norby's are attempting to do. I have frequently written on my blogs how one of the best part of being in BMW's e-mobility test program for the past five years has been meeting and interacting with many of the other people in the program. Together we learned how to live with the issues that test cars frequently have, we built up our own support network and we simultaneously realized how fantastic driving electric was. It was a really a great experience and one that was nothing short of life changing for many of us.  While I've literally made hundreds of acquaintances in the program, there are a few people who I've really ...

The very first public display of the new BMW i DC quick charger BMW stole the show today at the start of Plug-in 2014  in San Jose, California by not only announcing a new DC quick charger that will charge an i3 to 80% in 30 minutes, but also by saying the use of these chargers will be free for i3 users through the end of 2015.  This is a huge step forward for BMW i and the EV movement in general. I have consistently contended that the mass adoption of electric vehicles will hinge on the deployment of rapid charging. Even though the majority of charging will be at a slower rate and overnight, for EVs to really be taken seriously by the masses they need to be capable of refueling in less than an hour while making longer journeys. Tesla and Nissan have already demonstrated that they understand this and have made significant investments in DC quick charge infrastructure, and today's announcement from BMW is proof that BMW also realizes this and appears ready and willing to j...