The BMW i3 was revealed today in Auckland, their next generation electric hatchback as part of their plan for the future of sustainable personal mobility. Similar to organic foods, the i3 is not cheap, which did not come as a surprise, but at $83,500 its almost $30,000 more then the 118d and sits very much in line with some of the more performance based vehicles like the M135i. Its a lot of money, and considering the yearly cost of petrol or diesel will be between $1500 and $3000 on average, you would have to do quite a bit of driving to make up that difference. 
BMW claim that the i3 can be fully charged in three to six hours via a BMW i wall box home charger, it is yet to be explained if this unit is included in the price or an additional cost. Once charged the i3 will have a range of 150km on purely electric power. When equipped with the range extender, range can be doubled to a maximum of 340km.
“The BMW i3 will have a drive away price from $83,500, which includes three year scheduled servicing and a five year warranty as standard. We consider this to be a very competitive price for what is absolute leading edge technology,” said Ms Englert.
Depending on what options are available or options you must buy with the i3 will ultimately decide if this is a very competitive price for what is absolute leading edge technology or just a massive price hike to make the most of the latest trend, we will let you know more as soon as we hear it.
