A party-list lawmaker yesterday said the electronic tricycle, an environmental friendly alternative to the ever-present tricycle plying Metro Manila’s streets, is now gaining popularity as more local government units are beginning to evaluate their capabilities with pilot units.

Ang Kasangga Rep. Teodorico T. Haresco, whose advocacy is the micro entrepreneur, said he considered tricycle drivers as one of the largest micro entrepreneurial sectors in the country as he cited the cooperation of the Quezon City government and two Tricycle Operators and Drivers Associations in putting E-Tricycles units to field tests.

“It also represents a possible reinvention of the tricycle operator’s business model,” said Haresco, saying the acceptance of Quezon City of the E-Tricycles is part of its larger campaign to create a “green city.”

The first units of E-Tricycles, developed by Winace subsidiary Technostrat Corporation, were turned over to the Quezon City local government, represented by Mayor Herbert Bautista and Vice Mayor Joy Belmonte.

Featuring an updated design powered by an electrically powered, solar assisted engine that produces no emissions and no noise, e-trike, represents an eminently green evolution of the standard tricycle plying the country’s streets.

Driven by what Technocrat Chief Scientist Brian Stanley Jackson described as “an electrically powered, solar assisted engine,” the e-trike runs without gasoline or the noxious gasoline and used car oil mixture that two stroke owners prefer, to power regular tricycles.

“These vehicles are therefore carbon emissions-free,” said Jackson. “And because the engines are powered by batteries, they are quiet and therefore contribute zero noise pollution.”

Solar panels on the roof of the vehicle provide a constant charge to the engine’s batteries, increasing operating range.

Haresco said the e-trike’s engine is a non-combustion engine that is mostly independent of petroleum products. “This represents valuable savings for the tricycle operator, who in face of constantly rising oil and gas prices, is seeing his income get smaller every day,” said Haresco. “Aside from this, the e-trike’s capacity to carry up to six passengers comfortably and safely is a 100% increase in the carrying capacity of current tricycles, and will improve the operator’s revenues.”

“These savings, translating to perhaps P100 to P150 per day is valuable to the operator and his family,” the congressman said. “That’s a meal on the table, medicine for the sick, or even school supplies for the children. Every little bit helps.”

“With critical mass, like that achieved in India and China, this can reduce our dependence on imported oil,” he said.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) estimated that 1.5 million tricycles in the Philippines each consume an average of seven liters of gasoline per day.

A reduction in either number would do its part in reducing the country’s daily requirement, which is placed at about 48 million liters.

In QC, Haresco is convinced that these are “excellent alternatives” to replace the approximately 20,000 registered tricycles in Quezon City. “Perhaps after the unit trials are done, the QC government can embark on a replacement program for the dilapidated and dangerous units still operating.”