Electric car blog Danny’s Contentment has some great video material of the new Think electric car, as a couple of yellow examples made a flying visit to London this week. Presumably they were stopping off on their way to next week’s Geneva Motor Show, as they were on Norwegian plates and are apparently not in the UK any more. We wish we had Danny’s contacts and could have been there to have a poke too.

The Think is scheduled to go on sale in the UK towards the end of 2008 and according to Danny’s scoop will cost £14,000 to buy plus £100 per month to lease the batteries. The claimed figures include a maximum range of 125 miles and 65mph top speed, with an eight-hour full recharge. The lithium polymer batteries are happy to be topped up from a lesser discharge, of course.

While the Think looks a lot like other small city electric cars, there’s a big difference: it will be fully homologated as a car, not slipped onto the market under the lower quadricycle barrier. That means it has to pass 30mph crash tests, and boast airbags up front - essentials given the high top speed.

This, of course, means that it will be the first modern fully electric car on the UK market.

Volkswagen’s Polo BlueMotion is a bit of an odd fish: a current generation VW Polo has been kitted out with various bits and pieces to improve its fuel economy. The result is about 15 percent more miserly than equivalent 1.4TDI models, with the base-model BlueMotion 1 even achieving a Prius-trumping official CO2 emissions score of 99g/km.

Unfortunately the gains don’t come without pain. The aerodynamic add-ons front and rear are nice enough, but the gearbox has been fitted out with longer ratios in third, fourth and fifth and we have to say that, as a result, it’s not a pleasant thing to drive.

Changing up from second to third feels like half the engine must have fallen out and is bouncing down the road behind you. Third comes as a surprise because in the first two gears the three-cylinder turbo diesel feels eager in the extreme – positively rapid, with the usual ample torque of a compression-ignition engine providing plenty of urge to get you going. But as you get to third, you’d be forgiven for thinking you’d found fifth instead. Actually, slot from second to fifth by mistake and the engine will splutter so hard it might have choked on a breeze block.

The best way to get up to normal road speed is to hang on to second until you hit the (rather low 4,500rpm) red line. And then do the same with third and fourth. Don’t even think about fifth until you hit 60mph or a downhill stretch with the wind behind you.

Driven this way the Polo will at least escape the feeling that it’s about to start kangarooing in protest with every upshift. But of course this is not the way to get the car’s claimed 70mpg+ fuel economy.

In summary, it really shows that this is an existing car modified to be miserly, not one for which such extremes of economy come naturally. The Polo BlueMotion is crying out for a properly spaced 6-speed gearbox and until it gets one – most likely with the next model Polo – we’d advise opting for one of the conventional Polo 1.4 TDI variants. They’ll feel nicer to drive, will be very nearly as frugal, and will cost less to boot.

Writing in The Sunday Times today, actor Philip Glenister revealed how a 1983 Audi Quattro coupé wound up starring in Ashes to Ashes, the BBC drama set in 1981. DCI Gene Hunt’s new wheels are the result of a paucity of memory. “When we sat around discussing cars with the production crew and scriptwriters, trying to think of an iconic car that defined the early 1980s, the only thing we could come up with was a Mini Metro,” Glenister wrote. “I think it was me who suggested the Audi quattro. As a child I would spend hours watching rallying on Saturday mornings and it was always the quattro – usually in red and white or a rather strange orange colour – that would be tearing up the field ... Everyone agreed: the Audi quattro would be perfect.”

As Glenister admits, the Audi would have been well beyond the pocket of an honest copper. Fortunately, his character isn’t an honest copper: “Hunt probably would have nicked it,” he added.

We are surprised that Glenister and the other creative geniuses behind the show weren’t able to recall a few more 1980s cars than the Quattro and Metro. Still, at least they got the colour – bright non-metallic red – spot on. The only other option would have been all-over white.

We aren’t totally convinced that Hunt would drive a car that was quite so unashamedly German, either. He doesn’t seem like a Vorsprung durch Technic kind of guy.

For our money, Hunt should really be driving a Ford or a Vauxhall – brands that still gripped the hearts and wallets of the car-buying nation in 1981. We think Hunt would have gone for a B-series Opel Manta hatchback, conveniently released in 1981 – and not much more than plastic front and rear spoilers bolted onto a 1970s Vauxhall Cavalier Coupé. Or, if you preferred something a bit more, ahem, modern, there was the king of the XR3s – the Ford Escort RS1600i, also released into the wild in 1981.

Note, by the way, how dramatic sunset shots were absolutely compulsory for 1980s brochure shots.

Well, those are our two automotive icons of the early 1980s. What are yours?

The production version of Toyota’s three-seat iQ will be rolled out in front of punters at next month’s Geneva Motor Show. Actually the iQ is more of a 3+1. Just as 2+2 coupés tend to boast two proper seats plus two further seats for legless pixies, the iQ will offer three proper seats plus “room to spare to accommodate a child or carry luggage”, according to Toyota. In practice, carrying three full-size, fully limbed humans will require some juggling, with the front passenger seat sliding forward towards a scooped-out dash. How easy it will be to safely negotiate T-junctions with a passenger sitting a foot further forward than the driver remains to be explored.

Toyota also says that its new tiddler “signals a radical shift away from the belief that small cars, although kinder to the environment, are inherently basic and less safe”. Which means that Toyota is confident that the iQ will post a respectable NCAP result, but that it ain’t going to be cheap.

The new car will reportedly start rolling off production lines at the end of this year. We don’t yet know what will power it – we assume a small, three cylinder turbocharged petrol will sit under the snub nose driving the front wheels. Not much like it’s direct rival the Smart ForTwo, which of course has its three-cylinder engine and driven wheels at the other end.

We also wonder whether Toyota will be tempted to rival Mitsubishi’s rear-engined, four-seat “i”, and experiment with a zero-emissions, all-electric version.

Bad news today for UK electric car startups. As we predicted back in August 2007, London Mayor Ken Livingstone has pushed through changes to the London Congestion Charging scheme that will give a 100% discount to conventional petrol and diesel vehicles in tax bands A and B. The new £25 charge for “gas guzzlers” and 4x4s in band G may grab the headlines, but we’re more interested in the impact at the other end of the scale.

We can all now forget band A – which is where electric cars live alongside painfully slow Polo Bluemotions – band B is the place where the average London punter will now want to be when the changes come in, on 27 October 2008. They will be able to run free through the congestion zone while drivers of the majority of cars - in bands C to F - will still have to cough up £8 per day.

Band B allows CO2 emissions of up to 120g/km and includes a wide variety of quite normal cars – personal transport that can actually accelerate and protect you in a crash. The roster includes some quite delightful little motors. Put up with the clatter of a small diesel lump under the bonnet and you can go charge free in an Audi A3, BMW 118d, Citroen C1, C2 or C3, Fiat Panda, 500 or Grande Punto, Ford Fiesta, Fusion or Focus, Mini Cooper D, Peugeot 207 or 308, Renault Clio, Modus or Megane, Seat Ibiza, Skoda Fabia,Toyota Aygo, Vauxhall Corsa, or VW Polo.

And even if you despise DERV, you can still dodge Ken’s tax by choosing a suitably feeble petrol-engined Aygo, C1, Smart ForTwo, Mitsubishi i, Daihatsu, Hyundai, or Fiat 500.

And of course you can still choose a hybrid Honda Civic or Toyota Prius, which will qualify by virtue of their low CO2 rather than their alternative fuel status. Sadly for smug Lexus hybrid drivers, discounts for alternative-fuel vehicles outside of bands A and B are to be withdrawn (although even then the RX400h 4x4 manages to creep into band F and will pay only the standard £8 fee).

So a sad day for those brave entrepreneurs and pioneers pushing for progress in battery-powered plastic snails, like GoinGreen and the Nice Car Company. Reasons to buy their wares just took a big and potentially fatal dive. And a good day for blinkered, money-grabbing politicians. A good day of course for conventional car makers of economical city cars. And, it has to be said, a bad day for congestion in London. After all, a BMW 118d is not actually going to create any less congestion than an Aston Martin V8 Vantage, even if the Bimmer is in band B and the Aston in band G.

The other day we were rummaging among the trademark applications at the UK Intellectual Property Office – motivated mainly by the notion that BMW might have sought to register a name for its upcoming fourth brand and rumoured electric car.

Now, you might assume that BMW would be careful to keep a name under wraps before using it in anger, but you’d be wrong. Companies are caught in a dilemma: a registered trademark has a real financial value for a firm, but gaining one is a drawn-out process. They want to keep names quiet, but then what will they do if a rival beats them to the punch and registers the same name ahead of them?

The result is that sometimes the first place you’ll see a new name is in the Trademark Journal – a published list of applications that are still awaiting approval. They’re published so that intellectual property executives can keep abreast of developments among rivals and challenge applications if they think they might infringe their own rights. For example, if we were to try to register the brand “Blue Oval”, it’s fair to assume that Ford might want to have a word.

In practice, this means that pictures of Land Rover’s LRX hybrid 4x4 concept might have leaked in mid December, but the name LRX was on trademark books on 31 August 2007. Nobody would have known the significance of the name, it’s true, but the name was there all the same – in black and white.

Trawling back through the past 12 months of the Journal reveals one clear pattern. Citroen is hoping to register a whole heap of new brands. It seems safe to guess that either the motor shows are going to be packed with new Citroen concepts, or the French company is about to abandon its C1 to C6 plain-Jane labelling.

In recent months Citroen has sought to trademark: Chlorophyle; Cachet; Torpedo; Bazooka; Babylone; High Rider; Baraka; and Ultimum.

Some of these proposed brands have obvious associations, but others are more obscure. Chlorophyle is simply the French world for chlorophyll, the green chemical that gives grass and leaves their colour - so an eco-friendly brand, clearly. Baraka, on the other hand, is a French slang word meaning lucky, as in “you jammy sod”.

Torpedo, meanwhile, is a brand from Citroen’s past: the company first offered Citroen Torpedo coupés in the 1920s. Torpedo would make a great name if Peugeot-Citroen decides to create a double-chevron edition of the upcoming Peugeot 308 RC Z. As would Bazooka for that matter.

Among the other interesting tidbits in the Journal is the word Phoenix, sought as an automotive trade name by Ford. “Ford Phoenix” does have a ring to it – assuming the company can indeed rise above the red ink that’s currently burning up its balance sheet.

Will the UK get an electric version of the insane Ariel Atom? We think it might. The Atom is of course the exoskeletal sportscar that’s ideal for summer Sunday blasts, track-day thrills and, er, travelling to the Arctic circle.

Bonkers as the standard Atom is, there’s a slightly more unhinged version running around in the US: the Wrightspeed X1 is an Atom chassis fitted with a pure electric drivetrain that is good for 0-60mph in three seconds. This neck-threatening pace arises from a 300hp AC Propulsion electric motor powered by a bundle of lithium-ion batteries. Regenerative braking helps to muster a claimed 100-mile range, while a full recharge takes about five hours.

Sadly the X1 is not an accurate taste of things to come Stateside. Wrightspeed is reportedly planning a more practical sportscar for sale to the public, based around a diesel-electric hybrid engine and boasting actual bodywork, but the X1 is apparently destined to remain a one-off.

Then again, it might not.

Now this is pure speculation on our part, but it surely cannot be coincidence that Somerset-based Ariel has applied for a trademark on the word “Elektron”. The name was revealed by the UK Intellectual Property Office in December 2007, in a list of proposed brands published so that other firms can be forewarned and, if necessary, lodge a protest if they have a similar trade name.

What could be a better name for an all-electric Atom than Elektron?

Mind you, all this quantum-level guesswork is subject to the uncertainty principle. It is just a theory, after all.

There has been lots of speculation over the last few days as to what brand BMW will use for its mooted new city car brand. Auto Express thinks Isetta will be resurrected, but we doubt that BMW will be keen. After all, in its home market the company’s old bubble car line is rather less fondly remembered than in the nostalgia-obsessed UK. A German nickname for the vulnerable Isetta was Sargwagen - “coffin car” - and it seems unlikely that BMW will want to tackle that uphill PR struggle in today’s safety-centred world.

The firm does indeed own rights to the Isetta name, but we think it’s a bit more likely that BMW will either come up with a new brand or reuse an old one with some residual cachet. A rummage through its current registered trademarks turns up some interesting possibilities. It still owns old British marques Riley and Triumph, plus model names like Stag, Sprite, Maxi, Dolomite and Spitfire (which would be a brave choice for a German car). It also has automotive rights to some unfamiliar brands: Alphabet, Ingenta and - perhaps conveniently - Evergreen.

But if we were a betting blog we’d lay money on a second life for the defunct Metro brand. It is, after all, absolutely perfect for a city car, and there is still some residual fondness for the earliest incarnations of the Austin Metro. It could happen...

Apparently BMW, purveyor of Teutonic tanks for pushy people, is thinking about selling an electric car. The company’s head of clean technology, Jochen Schmalholz, told Drive.com.au that a battery powered car is in the works but the nod has yet to be given for production. “At the moment we are not really convinced it will work for BMW,” he said.

The relevant word Schmalholz neglects to utter, in his interview with Drive at least, is Mini - BMW’s small-car brand. It seems likely that any battery powered car would have to be small and light to give a useful range and respectable acceleration, and therefore would be unlikely to resemble an X5. The quirky Mini brand would be perfect and, perhaps, even some sort of 21st Century Mini Moke would fit the bill.

In the unlikely event that BMW does decide to stick its own blue-and-white propeller on a G-Wiz rival, we hope that it looks more like the three-seat Z13 prototype unveiled in 1993 and less like the four-seat E1 electric concept exhibited in 1991. The Z13, powered by a bike engine from BMW’s Motorrad division, could clearly kick sand in the face of the E1, which closely resembles an E36 3-Series after a front and rear shunt. Any BMW these days would feature the sharp-suited creases of Chris Bangle’s machete-wielding design team, of course, and so would actually resemble neither concept. But we like the Z13 and we can dream.

One likely scenario is that BMW has been playing with PML Flightlink’s 2006 Mini Cooper, equipped with four PML Hi-Pa Drive in-wheel pancake motors. PML has been careful to state that BMW was not involved in the production of its zippy Mini, but that doesn’t mean that BMW is going to ignore the company’s efforts now that they're done.