Sleek, lightweight e-bike Gaining a Toehold for the E-Bike

Via NY Times January 16, 2010 TECHNOLOGY has eliminated many of life’s milder physical demands, like getting off the couch to change the channel, or going to the store to buy a book.

Sanyo has introduced its Eneloop Hybrid bike, priced at $2,300, in the United States. Pressing a handlebar button causes a 250-watt motor to gently kick in.

The latest exertion to be conquered: biking uphill.

Electric bicycles — a regular pedal-driven bike with a motor for steeper slopes and an optional extra boost — is an idea that has been around for more than a century. But while e-bikes have caught on in certain parts of the world, particularly China, where tens of millions are sold each year, they have never quite captured the imagination of auto-obsessed Americans.

That may be about to change. At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this month, Sanyo, the Japanese electronics maker and a major producer of car batteries, showed off a sleek, lightweight e-bike called the Eneloop Hybrid Bicycle.    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/17/business/17ping.html?ref=technology