Amsterdam Electric Cars Jigsaw Puzzle

Fossil fuels will eventually run out, and whilst we are using them they damage our environment through global warming and other problems caused by air pollution. Electric cars could therefore be the future answer to our transportation needs.

The cars pictured in our jigsaw puzzle are Smart Fortwo Electic Drive (ED) cars made by Daimler. They are part of a fleet of 300 Smart Fortwo EDs which form a car sharing scheme in Amsterday run by a Daimler sheme called car2go. The scheme allows drivers to simply walk up to a car, show their car2go membership car to a card reader, then hop in and drive off for as long or short a time as they like. Members pay only for the number of minutes they use the car, which actually works out to quite a reasonable rate. Each minute costs 0.29 euros, an hour costs 12.90 euros and a day costs 39 euros. For "stopovers" there is a reduced parking rate of 0.09 euros per minute, which works out to be 5.40 euros per hour. These rates include all the electric requred for powering the car, parking, road tax, insurance and maintenance costs.

Amsterdam is the first European city where the Car2go electric car sceme has been launched.