Bolwell Denied Green Car Funds For Electric Sports Car Project

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Oct 14, 2009
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THE BOLWELL CAR COMPANY, makers of the mid-engined Bolwell Nagari sports car, has criticised the Federal Government for denying its request for a slice of the $500 million Green Car Innovation Fund.

Bolwell had been seeking access to the Fund to assist it with the engineering and production of an all-electric version of the Nagari.

Both Holden and Ford have benefited from the Green Car fund, the former receiving money for local production of the Cruze small car and the latter using its portion of the funds to develop the upcoming EcoBoost Falcon and diesel Territory.

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However both the Federal Government and the CSIRO have knocked back Bolwell's request for funding, leaving the independent boutique manufacturer to instead source cheaper components from South Korea to build its all-electric Nagari variant.

 

''I think it's easier for them to give one of the majors a heap of money and say 'build a hybrid' than actually help the smaller, more innovative engineering side of things,'' company co-founder Campbell Bolwell told The Age newspaper.

 

The $198,000 Nagari is currently designed around a carbon-fibre chassis and a Toyota-sourced 3.5 litre V6, which comes with 220kW as standard or 280kW when fitted with an optional supercharger.

It's unclear at this stage what power output and pricetag Bolwell will apply to its battery-electric Nagari.

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Comments

  • Jake02 [reply]
    5 months ago 0 points
    Is the normal one even on sale yet? Maybe thats why they were denied?
  • David [reply]
    5 months ago 0 points
    KRudd & his buddies don't like Australian companies, but they're very good at giving our money to the Americans, Chinese and Japanese..

    Maybe thier union supporters can get jobs over there ? -lol
  • Lindsay [reply]
    5 months ago 0 points
    With any luck this should encourage them not to bother selling that thing, it's absolutely fugly.

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