Electric battery common fuels such as gasoline. In automobiles, this is somewhat offset by the higher efficiency of electric motors in converting chemical energy to mechanical work, compared to combustion engines. The usage of "battery" to describe a group of electrical devices dates to Benjamin Franklin, who in 1748 described multiple Leyden jars by analogy to a battery of cannon (Benjamin Franklin borrowed the term "battery" from the military, which refers to weapons functioning together). Italian physicist Alessandro Volta built and described the first electrochemical battery, the voltaic pile, in 1800. This was a stack of copper and zinc plates, separated by
Battery electric vehicle CNG bus, and produces 44 percent less carbon than CNG. For most of the 20th century, the majority of the world's battery electric road vehicles were British milk floats. The 21st century saw the massive development of BYD electric trucks. In March 2012, Smith Electric Vehicles announced the release of the Newton Step-Van, an all-electric, zero-emission vehicle built on the versatile Newton platform that features a walk-in body produced by Indiana-based Utilimaster. BYD supplies DHL with electric distribution fleet of commercial BYD T3. A battery-powered electric car is an automobile which is propelled by electric motors. Although electric cars often