General Motors produced the EV-1  in response to California's Zero Emission Vehicle mandate, which required ten percent of vehicles to emit zero tailpipe emissions by 2003.  GM gave the car performance similar to other small passenger cars and built it to meet all federal safety requirements.  Unlike Toyota's gasoline-fueled hybrid-electric Prius, the EV-1 was powered by household electricity stored in its batteries.  After a six-hour charge, the vehicle could drive up to 90 miles with a maximum speed of 80mph.

The EV-1 lessees (GM never sold the car outright.) formed fan clubs and built web sites devoted to their cars.  The vehicle proved that a pure electric car could compete head-to-head with gasoline vehicles for medium range travel.  The EV-1 story took a turn for the worse, though, when the Bush Administration took aim at California's ZEV mandate.  In 2002, the Justice Department prevailed in a court ruling prohibiting the state from regulating fuel efficiency of its own citizens' vehicles.  Within months, GM made moves to pull in the EV-1.  Ignoring pleas of its customers and offers to buy the vehicles outright, GM reclaimed the last of the cars in March and methodically crushed them into scrap.