ZENN Motors and Mystery of The EEStor Ultracapacitor  

Gas 2.0 has an update on the rather pitiful tale of ZENN motors and ultracapacitor company EEStor - ZENN Motors and Mystery of EEStor Ultracapacitor Gets Deeper. More at TreeHugger.

The whole EEStor/ZENN saga is getting so ridiculous that I often find myself debating whether or not I should even cover it anymore. The (so far) mythical EESU energy storage unit that’s supposed to revolutionize personal mobility by providing instantaneous charge times in a lightweight “battery” that can take a car 700 miles on a charge has yet to see the light of day.

EEStor missed its deadline of introducing a working EESU to the world by the end of last year. When that happened I couldn’t even bring myself to write about it. It just seemed, well, pathetic.

Now ZENN Motors, the company with a huge stake in EEStor, has said they have “successfully” ceased actually building cars and laid off 15 people so that they can stop bleeding cash. All of their eggs are now in the EEStor basket.

ZENN Motors’ new plan revolves around the EESU actually working. Their self-stated goal is to be the sole provider of EESUs to manufacturers — akin to intel supplying chips for computers. But as time goes on and we hear nothing, not a peep, from EEStor, the chances of ZENN actually surviving this change seem slim.