Penultimate day of Active E “ownership”


Not technically the owner of “my” Active E, but, the past 2 years (less 1 day) I sure have made the car mine. When I started this adventure almost two years ago there were two other choices of EVs readily available brand new. The Nissan Leaf and the Chevolet Volt, neither one appealed to me and I was lucky enough to have been given the opportunity to lease the BMW Active E. The Tesla Roadster was too expensive, small, and unattainable. Even in the used markets.

Several months prior to taking delivery of my Active E, I was looking for a vehicle to replace my commuter car – a 2005 Honda Civic Hybrid that I bought for e sole purpose of driving the HOV lane by myself. The ARB and California legislature had expired the privilege for hybrid vehicles (yellow sticker eligible) and I was figuring out what vehicle to get. I was looking at the Volt and the Natural Gas Civic and ran across an article on USA today for the Active E and the result has been my accidentally environmental life.

So, I became an Electonaut when BMW dubbed me one. I’ve enjoyed every mile and look forward to the launch of the i3. Still unsure whether we will exercise our right to purchase one, but my dealership has made it easy to wait until it arrives to decide. They figure they can sell my vehicle if I decide against it and refuse the delivery. So, I still have a configuration on order. BMW continues to make it difficult to pull the trigger with the varying levels of disappointment that they place in the way of moving from the Active E to the i3. The latest silliness involves the lack of “Green Sticker” eligibility for the i3 with REX. It so happens that I have made my initial configurations with the idea that the Electronaut production will be fast tracked and I should receive my vehicle before all 40,000 stickers are handed out. Alas, my feeling on this plan has become more pessimistic.

I’ve enjoyed the many friends that I have made over the past two years of joining the rEVolution. Michael Thwaite’s wotnogas.com ranking site has made it quite fun to compare myself against others and I had tried as hard as possible to catch up to Tom Moloughney. The wind on that contest was knocked out when Tom suffered the loss of Active E #1 in August 2013. Luckily he was able to get a replacement Active E to eternally torment those of us who have tried to catch him.

Here I am matching Tom’s mileage for Active E #1 (stopped to honor his lost vehicle) then proceeded to drive again.
IMG_3651

I’m fairly sure that those that will be bridging their Active E lease until the i3 is delivered will pass my mileage. But for a while, I led the West Coast. If we calculate it for the two years of the lease, I hope to still have been the West Coast leader. I still have less than twenty four hours until I have to return the vehicle tomorrow.

Here’s a shot of my Active E hanging out in Santa Monica Lot 6. A mecca of EV charging in the West Side of Los Angeles County.
Santa Monica Lot 6

I’m not sure if I can still call myself an Electronaut after I return my vehicle to BMW tomorrow, but I’m definitely an Electronut. It’s kind of fitting that I’m meeting with the OC Tesla Group tomorrow with my wife for this meeting using both our Model S and Roadster for the meetup. Definitely still nuts about EVs.

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