by Dan Blacharski

Whoever said that electrical engineers were a bunch of pocket protector wearing, Star Wars watching, RPG playing Dilberts? Kenyon Kluge, Director of Electrical Engineering at Zero Motorcycles, has raced motorcycles professionally, spends time surfing in Santa Cruz, and has never worn a pocket protector.

Kenyon jumped from a large IT company to a startup to combine his love of technology with his love of motorcycles, and now is the Director of Electrical Engineering at Zero Motorcycles, a Scotts Valley, California manufacturer of gas-free electric motorcycles.

Originally from: ITworld

by Lea Bogdan

Earlier this month I got an up-close and personal look at a high performance green ride from Zero Motorcycles. Showcased at a gathering of the Chicago Clean Energy Alliance (CCEA), the Zero S street bike was a crowd pleaser to this group of over 450 eco professionals from the windy city. We love that this bike is 100% electric powered, charges in under four hours, and is a top contender for performance and quality. Mike Mastrangelo, lifetime motorcycle enthusiast and also a distributor for Zero Motorcycles, was at the event and gave me the inside scoop about why he loved this bike so much that he went to work for the company.

Although Mastrangelo loves the green features of this pristine two-wheeler, the first thing he wanted to tell me about was how the bike feeds his need for speed. The bike gets up to 67mph, but as many would agree, this is perfect for an urban dweller. One charge will last up to 50 miles, but it can be conveniently plugged into any 110v or 220v outlet. Motorheads out there would probably like to know that the Zero S has fantastic handling with a 31 peak horsepower and 62.5 ft/lbs of torque, which is similar to a 250cc gas powered motorcycle.

Originally from: Inhabitat

An Isle of Man government decision to stage its own green TT event in 2010 could save the taxpayer up to £95,000, the House of Keys has been told.

Tourism Minister Martyn Quayle outlined the costs as he defended the decision to sever ties with 2009’s organiser TTXGP to create TT Zero.

He said the TT Zero budget was expected to be between £100,000 and £150,000 for the Department of Tourism.

A TTXGP race would have cost the department up to £195,000, he added.

Mr Quayle was responding to a question from Peel MHK Tim Crookall.

Originally from: BBC

Zero Motorcycles is aggressively pursuing the title of frontrunner in electric motorcycle technology. It beat its competitors to the punch by being the first with a multi-bike line up. It hosted the first international endurance competition for off-road all-electric vehicles, a 24-hour event held at the 408MX Motocross Track in San Jose, California, where 50 riders on 10 electric dirt bikes thrashed Zero’s electric MX bike unmercifully to prove the company’s electric bikes could endure the same abuse as its gas-powered counterparts. All 10 teams completed the race with the winning squad logging 1015 laps and an average best lap speed of 27.5 mph. Zero has also developed an international presence after opening a new European headquarters in Amsterdam and signing independent representatives in the UK, Germany, France, Austria, Italy and Spain.

Originally from: motorcycle-usa

Germany’s best kept secret, well not really, but it’s kinda important to us: the KTM Freeride electric motorcycle was scheduled to be unveiled later this year, but now, thanks to leaked photos, we get to see how the thing looks like. And it’s not bad, really. The motorcycle weighs in at a heft 200 pounds and produces just 30 HP. Price: just under $15,000.

Originally from: CarzBuzz