Oil price holds key for electric autos

FRANKFURT: Renault SA Chief Executive Officer Carlos Ghosn said the future of electric cars depends on a rebound in oil prices that may boost sales of the battery-powered vehicles he's spending 4 billion euros ($5.9 billion) to develop.

"If it's less than $70, we're going to have a problem," Ghosn said in an interview at the Frankfurt Motor Show. "If oil's at $200 the economic equation's very easy, and if it's more than $200, even easier."

Renault pledged to sell 100,000 electric cars by 2016 in Israel and Denmark, the first two countries to hire the Paris-based company's US partner Better Place to roll out nationwide networks of battery-charging and swapping stations.