With the hefty price of fuel and the Government rebate, many New Zealanders have bought into electric vehicles (EV).
But can you go one step further, and turn the vehicle you already have into an EV?
Rosemary Penwarden, a retired Dunedin woman, has proven that it's possible by converting a 1993 Honda City into an EV.
Penwarden, a former medical laboratory scientist, told Seven Sharp's Jendy Harper that the project took eight months and cost around $24,000 to complete.
Despite being able to buy an EV with the money spent on the project, Penwarden insisted that wasn't the point.
"I wanted to show that it could be done. I wanted to show that somebody like me could do it."
READ MORE: As fuel prices soar, so does popularity of electric vehicles
Penwarden hopes her success will push the Government to make it easier and cheaper for Kiwis to do the same.
"What I'd like to see is our Government looking seriously at this kind of thing."
James Hardisty, director of EV-lution, told Seven Sharp that the expensive part of making a vehicle electric is the paperwork.
"You've got to spend a heap more money on engineering to make it compliant."
Hardisty, who is currently working on making his 1983 Toyota Hilux ute fully electric, sees a bright future for this kind of EV conversion.
"It could be a big business for NZ to take all of these old vehicles and make them electric."
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