Powered by non rechargeable primary cells, although it was capable of reaching four miles per hour, the limitations of battery technology at the time made it impractical.
This is essentially the opposite of a galvanic cell, known as an electrolytic cell, and it performs electrolysis, which uses electricity, electro-, to do the breaking apart, -lysis.
To see how reduction potentials work in half reactions and combine in an overall reaction, let's consider a galvanic cell where zinc is oxidized and copper ions are reduced.
Now, even though the idea of a battery-powered vehicle was to revolutionize people's lives for the better, primary cell batteries (that's the " use once and toss" kind) weren't the way to go for obvious reasons.