Revenge of the Electric Car

Porsche Goes Hybrid

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:17:39 +0000

918 Spyder is Porsche’s First Ever Plug In Hybrid Electric Car

(via Inhabitat)

From the post:

Dubbed the 918 Spyder, this stealthy-looking ride is a parallel hybrid just like the Prius – well, except much, much sexier. It also supposedly gets 78 miles per gallon, has emissions of 70g CO2/km, can go 16 miles on electric charge alone, and does 0-60 in just 3.2 seconds. Oh and did we mention that it’s drop-dead gorgeous too?

Here’s the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

via Inhabitat:
918 Spyder is Porsche’s First Ever Plug In Hybrid Electric Car
by Yuka Yoneda, 03/02/10

Porsche recently blew everyone at the Geneva Auto Show out of the water with their freshly unveiled electric concept car – their first plug-in hybrid ever. Dubbed the 918 Spyder, this stealthy-looking ride is a parallel hybrid just like the Prius – well, except much, much sexier. It also supposedly gets 78 miles per gallon, has emissions of 70g CO2/km, can go 16 miles on electric charge alone, and does 0-60 in just 3.2 seconds. Oh and did we mention that it’s drop-dead gorgeous too?

The mid-engined two seater is powered by both a 500-horsepower V8 and two electric motors that produce an additional 218 horsepower. According to Porsche, the 918 Spyder also has four different modes of power delivery:

“A button on the steering wheel allows the driver to choose among four different running modes: The E-Drive mode is for running the car under electric power alone, with a range of up to 25 km or 16 miles. In the Hybrid mode, the 918 Spyder uses both the electric motors and the combustion engine as a function of driving conditions and requirements, offering a range from particularly fuel-efficient all the way to extra-powerful.”

While the 918 Spyder is still a concept, the fact that Porsche is considering releasing a plug-in hybrid is a pretty big deal. Plus, as Brian Merchant of Treehugger points out, the car company has never made a concept car that it didn’t later bring into production. We definitely think Porsche is bringing the sexy back into green with the 918 and hope to see it in the showrooms soon.

Tesla To Offer Auto Leases

P.G. Morgan — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 19:24:02 +0000

2010 Tesla Roadster

Tesla is hoping its new leasing strategy will help usher in a new round of early adopters into the mainstream.

Are You Plugged In?

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 18:19:56 +0000

The Wall Street Journal assesses your EV readiness.

Are You Plugged In?
By Mara Lemos Stein.

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704022804575041582416418368.html?mod=WSJ_latestheadlines

By MARA LEMOS STEIN

Some of the first plug-in electric passenger vehicles are slated to roll onto U.S. streets later this year. Are you ready? Test your knowledge with this Wall Street Journal quiz.

The Journal Report

See the complete Energy report.

1. For all the fanfare, sales of electric cars are currently negligible (outside of golf courses, that is). How many plug-in electric vehicles does President Barack Obama wish to see on U.S. roads by 2015?

A. Five million
B. Two million
C. One million
D. 250,000

Answer: C. The president is hoping to use incentives to get one million plug-in hybrid vehicles to consumers by 2015. Plug-in hybrids differ from hybrids on the road today in that they can go longer distances on battery power and can be recharged via electrical outlets.

2. Which electric-car developer counts former U. S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson as an investor?

A. Bright Automotive
B. Coda Automotive
C. Tesla Motors
D. Fisker Automotive

Answer: B. Coda popped onto the electric-vehicle stage in June 2009 as an offshoot of Miles Electric Vehicles, a maker of electric light trucks in China. In addition to Mr. Paulson, Coda’s founder Miles Rubin has attracted investments from other well-connected individuals, including Thomas “Mack” McLarty, former chief of staff for President Clinton.

3. Coda isn’t alone in attracting heavyweight investors to its ranks. Connect the investor to the electric-vehicle developer:

A. Fisker Automotive
B. BYD Co.
C. Tesla Motor
D. Bright Automotive

1. Reuben Munger
2. Sergey Brin and Larry Page
3. Al Gore
4. Warren Buffett

Answer: Al Gore is an investor in Fisker through venture-capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Warren Buffett is an investor in China’s BYD, which is making a compact fully electric vehicle to be sold in China later this year. Google Inc. co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page have invested in Tesla. And Reuben Munger, former managing partner at investment firm Baupost Group LLC, is a founder and chairman of Bright, which developed a fully electric delivery van called Idea.

4. Some of the most talked-about electric vehicles are slated to debut later this year and can travel at least 100 miles on a single charge (even if some of them run on an auxiliary gasoline engine when the battery runs low). Match the auto maker with its electric car:

A. Tesla Motors
B. Nissan
C. Fisker Automotive
D. General Motors

1. Karma
2. Volt
3. Roadster
4. Leaf

Answer: Tesla already is making the fully electric sports luxury Roadster; Nissan will manufacture the five-passenger all-electric Leaf from late 2010; Fisker will make the first deliveries of its luxury Karma later this year; and GM’s Chevrolet Volt is a four-passenger hatchback due at some dealerships later this year. These vehicles are expected to range in price from about $40,000 to more than $100,000. All will qualify for a $7,500 federal tax credit.

5. Then there are a slew of fully electric small vehicles that are pinning their hopes on eco-conscious city dwellers who may not want to spend much more than $25,000 on a new technology. Which has the longest range?

A: Think Global’s Think City
B: Wheego Electric Cars’ Whip
C: Reva Electric Car’s Revai
D: Myers Motors’ NmG

Answer: A. The Think City, a two-seater with optional back seats for children, can travel at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour and go as far as 100 miles per charge, but it is also the most expensive, at about $37,500 before a tax credit. The Whip is a two-seater that can travel at a top speed of 35 mph for 40 miles per charge; it sells for around $19,000. The top speed of the Revai, sold as the G-Wiz in the U.K., is 50 mph and its nominal range is 50 miles; it retails for about $12,000. Myers’s NmG—or no more gas—is a three-wheel, one-seat vehicle that can travel up to 75 mph and as far as 50 miles in its lithium-battery model. It costs about $30,000.

6. New vehicle technology comes with an alphabet soup of new abbreviations. Which one applies to the Chevy Volt, to be introduced later this year by GM?

A. PHEV
B. EREV
C. NEV
D. V2G

Answer: B. GM calls the Volt an extended-range electric vehicle, or EREV. It is powered by a battery pack that when fully charged has a range of up to 40 miles; it also has a small gas engine that turns a generator that charges the battery once it is depleted. It is different from a plug-in hybrid, or PHEV, which runs on both battery power and gasoline. NEV stands for neighborhood electric vehicle, which can travel at a top speed of 25 mph. V2G stands for “vehicle-to-grid,” a technology system being developed to enable electric cars to store power and sell it back to the grid.

7. The Society of Automotive Engineers International recently published guidelines to standardize the shape of the plug and sockets for safely powering up electric vehicles. What will it look like?

A. Smiley face
B. Hat and straight line
C. Five pins
D. Two fat fingers

Answer: C. The J1772 connector is a five-pin device heavier than the nozzle on a gas pump that enables charging at 120 or 240 volts.
— Ms. Lemos Stein is a reporter for Dow Jones Clean Technology Insight, a publication based in New York. She can be reached at mara.lemos-stein@dowjones.com

Tesla Tribute

Chelsea Sexton — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 18:02:06 +0000

Our Consulting Producer Chelsea Sexton has written a tribute to the three Tesla employees who lost their lives in Wednesday’s plane crash in Palo Alto:

We lost a few of our own yesterday; there’s just no other, more elegant way to say it. The electric vehicle community is a close knit one and too small to begin with. To all of us, Doug Bourn, Brian Finn and Andrew Ingram were colleagues. To the employees of Tesla Motors, they were family and friends.

Working for a start-up can be a challenge, and much has been made of Tesla’s ups and downs. But ever since this company has been little more than a few folks and a converted Lotus in a San Carlos garage, some of the most talented people in the industry have chosen to be there because they are dedicated to the mission and to each other. Many have sacrificed to do it, though I know that not only are they not thinking about that in this moment, most count themselves lucky to have gotten the chance. They have changed things.

The three men lost in the crash will be missed- they already are. However, Tesla’s future successes will not be accomplished in spite of this tragedy, but because smart, passionate people like Doug, Brian and Andrew chose to work there in the first place, and because those who remain press on.

Coming Soon – The Electric City

P.G. Morgan — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 23:30:42 +0000

Photo by Jim Wilson, New York Times

The New York Times looks at how EVs are going to shake up our cities.

Cities Prepare for Life With the Electric Car

From the article:

“The San Francisco building code will soon be revised to require that new structures be wired for car chargers. Across the street from City Hall, some drivers are already plugging converted hybrids into a row of charging stations.

In nearby Silicon Valley, companies are ordering workplace charging stations in the belief that their employees will be first in line when electric cars begin arriving in showrooms. And at the headquarters of Pacific Gas and Electric, utility executives are preparing “heat maps” of neighborhoods that they fear may overload the power grid in their exuberance for electric cars.”

Here’s the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/15/business/15electric.html?pagewanted=print

February 15, 2010
Cities Prepare for Life With the Electric Car
By TODD WOODY and CLIFFORD KRAUSS

SAN FRANCISCO — If electric cars have any future in the United States, this may be the city where they arrive first.

The San Francisco building code will soon be revised to require that new structures be wired for car chargers. Across the street from City Hall, some drivers are already plugging converted hybrids into a row of charging stations.

In nearby Silicon Valley, companies are ordering workplace charging stations in the belief that their employees will be first in line when electric cars begin arriving in showrooms. And at the headquarters of Pacific Gas and Electric, utility executives are preparing “heat maps” of neighborhoods that they fear may overload the power grid in their exuberance for electric cars.

“There is a huge momentum here,” said Andrew Tang, an executive at P.G.& E.

As automakers prepare to introduce the first mass-market electric cars late this year, it is increasingly evident that the cars will get their most serious tryout in just a handful of places. In cities like San Francisco, Portland, Ore., and San Diego, a combination of green consciousness and enthusiasm for new technology seems to be stirring public interest in the cars.

The first wave of electric car buying is expected to begin around December, when Nissan introduces the Leaf, a five-passenger electric car that will have a range of 100 miles on a fully charged battery and be priced for middle-class families.

Several thousand Leafs made in Japan will be delivered to metropolitan areas in California, Arizona, Washington state, Oregon and Tennessee. Around the same time, General Motors will introduce the Chevrolet Volt, a vehicle able to go 40 miles on electricity before its small gasoline engine kicks in.

“This is the game-changer for our industry,” said Carlos Ghosn, Nissan’s president and chief executive. He predicted that 10 percent of the cars sold would be electric vehicles by 2020.

Utilities are gearing up to cooperate with the automakers, a first for the two industries, and governments on the West Coast are focusing intently on the coming issues. Price and tax incentives need to be worked out. Locations must be found for charging stations. And local electrical grids may need reinforcement.

The California Public Utilities Commission, whose headquarters are in San Francisco, has brought together utilities, automakers and charging station companies in an urgent effort to write the new rules of the road.

Much of the attention on electric cars has been on the vehicles’ design, cost and performance. But success or failure could turn on more mundane matters, like the time it takes car buyers to navigate a municipal bureaucracy to have charging stations installed in their homes.

When the president of the California Public Utilities Commission, Michael R. Peevey, leased an electric Mini Cooper, he said, it took six weeks of visits by installers and inspectors before he could plug in his new car at home.

“It was really drawn out and frustrating and certainly is not workable on a mass basis,” Mr. Peevey said.

Such issues are being hashed out here first. The San Francisco area is home not only to a population of early technology adopters but to companies like Coulomb Technologies and Better Place that are developing the networks and software to allow utilities to manage how cars are charged.

Tesla Motors, a Silicon Valley company that makes electric cars, says it has already sold 150 of its $109,000 Roadsters in the Bay Area. One customer bought the sleek sports car on the spot after a test drive.

“We asked him how he heard of Tesla and why he bought the car,” said Rachel Konrad, a Tesla spokeswoman. “He said, ‘Well, three other guys on my block have them.’ ”

In Berkeley, a town known for its environmental sensibility, one out of five cars sold today is a hybrid Prius. If electric cars are adopted that broadly in the next few years, problems could ensue.

“If you just allow willy-nilly random charging, are we going to have neighborhood blackouts?” asked Mr. Tang, the utility executive. He said a single car could consume three times as much electricity as a typical San Francisco home.

Mr. Tang is working to make sure that does not happen by monitoring where electric cars are sold in Northern California. And later this year P.G.&E. will lead a “smart charging” pilot project, connecting 200 cars to special charging stations that let utilities control the electrical demand at a given moment.

Robert Hayden, the clean transportation adviser for San Francisco, said the city hopes to have 60 charging stations installed in public garages by year’s end, with a thousand more available across the Bay Area in 2011. And in Oregon, an advisory group is working on charging stations and related issues.

To avoid problems in areas with high car concentrations, utility executives said they would encourage people to charge their vehicles at night or to use smarter electric meters that help control demand.

“We are trying to be proactive about how to make sure that the transformers that serve these homes and neighborhoods are robust enough,” said Doug Kim, an executive at Southern California Edison, which serves Los Angeles.

Mr. Kim said the popularity of electric vehicles “will be a function of a lot of different things: the state of the economy, how many people can actually afford to buy the cars and the price of gasoline — how high does it have to be?”

Some transportation experts are skeptical that electric vehicles will catch on anywhere in the country, in large part because the batteries and the installation of home recharging units are expensive.

Dan Sperling, the director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis, estimated that a typical electric car battery would cost the automaker $12,000, and a 240-volt charging unit would cost a household at least $1,500.

Without huge subsidies, “the reality is, these electric vehicles are not going to sweep the industry and become a major share of the market for a very long time,” Mr. Sperling said.

Despite such skepticism, Washington is putting considerable money into the effort, including billions of dollars in loans to Ford, Nissan and Tesla Motors.

Under last year’s stimulus package, nearly $200 million will support Nissan’s introduction of the Leaf by permitting the installation of 13,000 charging stations around cities in Oregon, Washington, California, Arizona and Tennessee in the next year or so. (Nissan plans to build the Leaf in Tennessee eventually.)

If electric cars do take off, consumers and society could benefit. Battery-powered motors are more efficient than gasoline engines. They cost drivers on average only 2.5 cents a mile for fuel, less than a third of the cost for a highly efficient gasoline car, according to proponents.

The Energy Department says electric cars produce less of the emissions linked to climate change than traditional vehicles, though how much less depends on the source of power on the local electricity grid.

Before the first Nissan Leafs and Chevrolet Volts reach the show room, an electric car infrastructure is getting a test drive in the Bay Area, in a limited way.

Google, which is talking to automakers about using its PowerMeter energy management software, has already become something of an electric transportation hub. At Google’s Mountain View headquarters, a handful of employees drive to work in Tesla Roadsters, and more drive a fleet of modified Priuses that Google owns. The employees pull into carports that are covered with solar panels and plug their cars into the 100 available charging stations.

Nearby, in downtown San Jose, the city has reserved street parking for electric vehicles and installed charging stations. Nearby, at Adobe Systems’ headquarters, an executive showed off a dozen charging stations in the parking garage. Eighteen more will be installed this year.

“No one wants to be left behind,” said Richard Lowenthal, chief executive of Coulomb Technologies. “We’re preparing for an onslaught of demand.”

‘Revenge’ Hits Indiana

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 16:29:09 +0000

Director Chris Paine was in Indianapolis this week to film for ‘Revenge.’

More details in this TV report:

Filmmaker in Ind. for electric car doc

Here is the full text of the article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.wishtv.com/dpp/news/business/filmmaker-in-ind.-for-electric-car-doc

Filmmaker in Ind. for electric car doc

Updated: Friday, 12 Feb 2010, 6:51 AM EST
Published : Friday, 12 Feb 2010, 6:02 AM EST

* By: Debby Knox

Indiana is slated to be the leading state in the development of electric cars. Thursday evening, the man who may know more than just about anyone else about electric cars spoke to a group at the art museum.

The new Think car could be the future. It’s all electric and it may soon be manufactured in Indiana. At 1,500 pounds, a single charge will take it 112 miles.

Chris Paine made the 2006 documentary movie, Who Killed the Electric Car . He’s excited about the Think.

“It turns out that Indiana is a big center for the rebirth of the electric car. In fact, some of the engineers working in Indiana worked on General Motors EV1, which is the subject of our first film,” said Paine.

Paine is shooting a sequel to his 2006 movie. In fact, he was in Anderson Thursday taking pictures of an electric delivery van being designed by Bright Automotive.

Electric cars have zero emissions and charging is easy — it’s a matter of plugging it into the closest socket. And it makes absolutely no sound.

Paine believes Americans are hungry for alternatives. He likes the new Chevy Volt.

But is America ready for an electric car? Paine says yes.

“I think America has been ready for an electric car for a long time, it’s just we’ve never had the ability to buy one,” he said.

Paine’s new movie, The Revenge of the Electric Car, will be released in 2011.

Trainspotting

Chelsea Sexton — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:27:26 +0000

©Nikki Kahn - The Washington Post

One morning just over a year ago, I was surprised to see the above photo taken from President Obama’s Washington, DC-bound train appear in a Washington Post collection from the inauguration. It was still a novelty to see anything pro-EV in a major publication, but what struck me at the time was that I had no idea who these people in Delaware were. Not long before, the plug-in movement was small enough that not only would we have known about something like this before it happened, we would have been the ones out there with the signs freezing our butts off.

A little googling revealed that the local Chrysler plant had recently closed, and these folks were hoping to see it re-opened and used to build a new generation of electric cars. I haven’t heard about them since (though the former Saturn plant in the area is slated for Fisker) but the image stuck with me. A simple group, a simple message- and a deep belief that the two were enough to change things. The story of my life, so to speak.

And we have; nearly every major automaker now has a plug-in car in the works. The first ones are scheduled to hit their initial market areas by the end of the year. But the flip side of that coin is how much work there is to be done in the same time frame; a walk through this season’s conference hallways reveals smiling faces on top of heavy shoulders and whispering among veterans about whether it’s all going to get done. Which is why I’m baffled that various stakeholders have started to “declare victory” and talk about what’s next.

We’re in an odd phase, trying to balance the tension of public excitement for what’s to come with the frustration that it’s not here just yet. In many ways, this is when the bulk of the work begins, much of it unseen and un-sexy: the final engineering shakeouts in extreme temperatures, the combing and refining of labyrinthian charger installation and DMV processes, dealer training, service manual writing, and so on. Having worked though a vehicular generation where we got through all of those things, had EVs on the road with seemingly more to come and still had it all go south, I know we’re not nearly in a secure enough spot to relax.

The worst thing we can do now is to get complacent- not because those involved aren’t serious, but because intention alone isn’t enough. And if what appears to be light at the end of the tunnel turns out to be the oncoming train, we’ll have no one to blame but ourselves.

But when we really do get it done? Oh, we’re throwing one hell of a party.

Tesla to stop Roadster production

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 20:14:14 +0000

Tesla's Model S

As Tesla files for its IPO, the company reveals that it will stop production of the Roadster — and will focus on the Model S.

More details after the jump:

Tesla to stop selling electric sports car next year

From the article:

“A reading of the fine print by Wired’s Autopia blog uncovers some disturbing product-planning news. To wit, the company’s only product, the first true freeway-capable, mass-produced electric car of the modern age, will go bye-bye next year.”

Here is the full text of the entire article in case the link goes bad:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2010/01/tesla-to-drop-stop-selling-electric-roadster-next-year/1

Tesla to stop selling electric sports car next year

Tesla Motors vehicle technician Chris Yap readying Tesla Roadsters at the development facility in San Carlos, Calif. The Tesla Roadster, a $99,000 electric sports car powered by laptop computer batteries, is 100 percent electric, can go from 0-60 mph in four seconds and the electric car gets an equivalent of 135 mpg compared to a gas powered vehicle. Production begins mid-March. The car itself is being made in England.

By Jack Gruber, USAT
It sounds like the initial public offering of electric-car maker Tesla is already being greeted with skepticism, but some of the fine print about its plans may give potential investors even greater cause for concern.

Tesla’s next electric car is the Model S, a sedan.

A reading of the fine print by Wired’s Autopia blog uncovers some disturbing product-planning news. To wit, the company’s only product, the first true freeway-capable, mass-produced electric car of the modern age, will go bye-bye next year.

From Autopia:

“We do not plan to sell our current generation Tesla Roadster after 2011 due to planned tooling changes at a supplier for the Tesla Roadster,” the company wrote in the filing. The Roadster is built by Lotus, so presumably Tesla is talking about changes at the British automaker’s factory in Hethel, England, but we can’t confirm that because Tesla spokesman Ricardo Reyes declined to comment.

That will leave the fledging automaker putting all its marbles on getting its electric sedan, the Model S, out the door in 2012. Tesla, of all companies, should know something about the delays and unexpected headaches that come with launching a product. The roadster went through an obstacle course of trouble before it came out. Thus, 2012 could become 2013 or 2014 — with no revenue coming in the door. Again, from Autopia:

“As a result, we anticipate that we may generate limited, if any, revenue from selling electric vehicles after 2011 until the launch of the planned Model S,” the company says in the SEC filing. That may not be a problem if S production starts on plan and goes off without a hitch, but if Tesla hits any snags, things could get ugly fast — a point it concedes in the filing.

“The launch of the Model S could be delayed for a number of reasons and any such delays may be significant and would extend the period in which we would generate limited, if any, revenues from sales of our electric vehicles.”

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Tesla obtained a $465 million loan from the Energy Department to build the Model S and is shopping for factory space in Southern California. The only ones happy about all of this: The 1,000 or so Tesla Roadster owners. Suddenly, their collectible is destined to become even more rare.

Coulomb Gets Charged Up

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 18:03:58 +0000

Coulomb Technologies are moving into EV charging.

More details — and a nice namecheck for ‘Revenge’
– after the jump:

Harris: Coulomb Technologies gets funding for electric car charging stations

“The director of the documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car?” is now filming the sequel, “Revenge of the Electric Car.” Just a hunch, but Tesla Motors could be cast as the dashing protagonist, while Better Place might be up for best supporting actor…

When Coulomb this week announced $14 million in second-round funding to advance its business model for electric vehicle (EV) charging stations, the Campbell startup gave more momentum to the EV revolution. The funding, led by Voyager Capital and Rho Ventures, follows Tesla’s disclosure that it will seek an initial public stock offering and Better Place’s announcement of a $350 million investment as it prepares to roll out its technology in Israel and Denmark.”

Here is the full text of the article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_14327646?nclick_check=1#

Harris: Coulomb Technologies gets funding for electric car charging stations

By Scott Duke Harris

sdharris@mercurynews.com
Posted: 02/03/2010 04:08:18 PM PST
Updated: 02/04/2010 05:36:05 AM PST

In downtown San Jose, Coulomb Technologies CEO Richard Lowenthal demonstrated how the… (Coulomb)

Green Energy

* Alternative energy, cleantech and related topics.

The director of the documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car?” is now filming the sequel, “Revenge of the Electric Car.” Just a hunch, but Tesla Motors could be cast as the dashing protagonist, while Better Place might be up for best supporting actor.

As for Coulomb Technologies, well, the Oscars might miss it altogether. Silicon Valley’s third entry in the race to electrify vehicular travel will never be as sexy as a Tesla Roadster, or seem as futuristic as Better Place’s battery-switching robots. Coulomb’s logo, apt but dull, reimagines a gas pump as a standard three-prong electrical socket. Its dream is to be a ubiquitous part of the scenery.

When Coulomb this week announced $14 million in second-round funding to advance its business model for electric vehicle (EV) charging stations, the Campbell startup gave more momentum to the EV revolution. The funding, led by Voyager Capital and Rho Ventures, follows Tesla’s disclosure that it will seek an initial public stock offering and Better Place’s announcement of a $350 million investment as it prepares to roll out its technology in Israel and Denmark.

Collectively, the startups are trying to resolve a Catch-22 resulting from the limited range of electric motors. How can plug-in cars proliferate without potent places to plug them in? Why build charging stations without a sufficient number of EVs? The startups are working on a variety of solutions.

Better Place, orchestrating its efforts with French carmaker Renault, will essentially rent out switchable batteries to extend range. Coulomb envisions a landscape transformed by cutting-edge charging stations — a kind of “smart grid” of Web-networked stations that will communicate with drivers about their availability.

In 2008, Coulomb installed its first ChargePoint Networked Charging Station in a downtown San Jose parking garage; its Web site now shows ChargePoints in at least 24 states. Voyager Capital managing director Daniel Ahn described Coulomb as “the early market leader in the race to provide EV charging infrastructure from both a software technology and market share standpoint.”

Coulomb’s engineers may be accustomed to working out of the limelight. “We’re networking guys,” explains founder and CEO Richard Lowenthal, who was a Cisco Systems executive in the late 1990s after it acquired StrataCom, where he had been vice president of research and development. Infrastructure is often taken for granted, while the glamour goes to consumer brands Apple, Google and Facebook — all of which, of course, would collapse without that unsung Internet networking infrastructure.

Lowenthal was one of those valley techies who enjoyed personal prosperity in the 1990s. He then turned his attention to community affairs, serving two terms on the Cupertino City Council and becoming involved in nonprofits. As a councilman, he sometimes drove an electric Toyota RAV4 that had been provided by Cupertino as part of a state program to promote the technology. (Perhaps you remember that EV charging station at Costco that was always vacant because there were so few electric vehicles around.)

When Lowenthal decided to return to business full time, he said, it was a test ride of a Tesla in 2007 that got him thinking about EV charging stations as a prime business opportunity. While Lowenthal ordered a Tesla, he has since opted for the Mini E, an all-electric Mini Cooper made by BMW.

For Coulomb, the question is whether there will be enough EVs for its ChargePoints. Lowenthal points to the upcoming rollout of Chevrolet’s Volt and Nissan’s Leaf. China’s BYD, now partly owned by Warren Buffett, also plans to bring electric cars to the U.S. Just about every major carmaker now has an EV in the works, with Tesla developing its Model S to take on Mercedes and Lexus in the luxury sedan market.

The revolution might lack the quick acceleration of the Tesla Roadster, Lowenthal suggests, but millions of EVs are coming — and Coulomb plans to recharge their motors.

Contact Scott Duke Harris at sdharris@mercurynews.com or 408-920-2704.

Tesla Announces IPO

P.G. Morgan — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 03:05:44 +0000

According to their SEC filing, California electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc. plans sell up to $100 million in an initial public offering.

Read more in the LA Times story:
Tesla Motors plans $100-million IPO

From the article:

“California electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc. plans sell up to $100 million in an initial public offering, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The move brings the innovative car company, which has long enticed car enthusiasts, one step closer to becoming a household name.

The price of shares or the timing of their availability is still unclear, but industry observers expect the much-anticipated offering to be well-received by investors.”

Here’s the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tesla1-2010feb01,0,6307372.story

Tesla Motors plans $100-million IPO
Shares in the electric car maker are expected to draw strong interest from investors. The stock price and timing of the initial public offering are unknown.

By Robert Faturechi

4:38 PM PST, January 31, 2010

California electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc. plans sell up to $100 million in an initial public offering, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The move brings the innovative car company, which has long enticed car enthusiasts, one step closer to becoming a household name.

The price of shares or the timing of their availability is still unclear, but industry observers expect the much-anticipated offering to be well-received by investors.

David Menlow, president of IPOfinancial.com, said that selling stock to the public would bring the company closer to becoming independently profitable.

“This could propel them into a more prominent position in the auto industry,” Menlow said. “The question is how they’re going to be able to rein in their costs.”

The IPO would be a first among electric car companies, which have shown life in recent years in response to high oil prices.

Tesla currently sells its signature all-electric Roadster sports car for $109,000 — a price tag that’s slimmed some after federal tax credits. Last year, Tesla unveiled the prototype for a more affordable sedan: the Model S, priced at under $60,000. The all-electric vehicle gets 160 to 300 miles on a single charge.

The car company’s high costs have been buffered by government cash, with Tesla recently winning approval for a $465-million loan from the federal government.

Menlow said he expected high investor interest but many would take a wait-and-see approach to how viable an investment in the car company would be.

“Making the jump from a concept to an IPO to a financially sound investment, there are many mountains to climb,” he said. “As we continue to get more information, it’s not going to be the sex appeal of the technology anymore, it’s going to be ‘are they going to be able to survive?’ ”

robert.faturechi@latimes.com

Better Place gets $350m from banks, investors

P.G. Morgan — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 19:02:36 +0000

Better Place has just announced a major new set of investors.
More details after the jump:

Electric car firm Better Place raises $350 mln

“Better Place, an infrastructure provider for electric cars founded by former SAP executive Shai Agassi, has raised $350 million in fresh equity as part of a second round of financing.

Better Place’s concept is for battery-swapping stations to complement a network of charge spots so that electric cars like partner Renault’s planned Zoe can extend their range without the need of an additional back-up engine that burns fossil fuel.”

Here is the full text of the article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE60O0DG20100125?type=marketsNews

Electric car firm Better Place raises $350 mln
Mon, Jan 25 2010

FRANKFURT, Jan 25 (Reuters) – Better Place, an infrastructure provider for electric cars founded by former SAP executive Shai Agassi, has raised $350 million in fresh equity as part of a second round of financing.

Better Place’s concept is for battery-swapping stations to complement a network of charge spots so that electric cars like partner Renault’s planned Zoe can extend their range without the need of an additional back-up engine that burns fossil fuel. [ID:nLD574217]

Nine investors participated, including HSBC , Morgan Stanley Investment Management and Lazard Asset Management, the company said in a statement on Monday.

“This is one of the largest investments made yet in the ‘clean tech’ sector. The value of Better Place is now estimated at $1.25 billion,” it said.

HSBC invested $125 million of its own funds in the company, giving it an equity stake of roughly 10 percent in Better Place.

“We are absolutely convinced that the paradigm change from cars with internal combustion engines to electric vehicles offers great possibilities for growth both in the auto industry as well as for utilities,” said Stuart Gulliver, HSBC executive director and head of its Global Banking and Markets business.

The company reaffirmed its original target to begin full commercial operations at the end of 2011, when industry partner Renault plans to offer the first car with a replaceable battery.

“Due to our technology our concept and the stable partnership with Renault, we have a lead over all other alternative energy mobility concepts of at least two years,” Shai Agassi said in the statement. (Reporting by Christiaan Hetzner; Editing by Greg Mahlich)

Enter the Russians

P.G. Morgan — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 00:02:41 +0000

Russia’s richest man, Mikhail Prokhorov, gets a nod of approval from Putin on his new electric car investments. Read more in the article:

Putin Backs Russia’s First Electric Car Project

By Gleb Bryanski and Gleb Stolyarov for Reuters.

From the article:

“Russia’s richest man, Mikhail Prokhorov won early backing from Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for his plan to start mass production of electric cars, Putin’s spokesman said on Tuesday.

Russia is seeking to modernize its commodity-based economy, which was hit hard by the global crisis when energy prices fell, and wants to achieve growth in technology sectors where it believes it may have some competitive advantage…

“Putin listened very attentively and wanted to see this project discussed in detail with all the ministries involved as soon as possible,” Peskov told reporters without elaborating on the details of the plan.

Industry professionals who had seen the early design of Prokhorov’s car told Reuters that the vehicle would be a Golf-class sedan with a body made from plastic. They said Prokhorov was ready to provide project financing for two years.

They said the target price for the car would be around 8,800 euros and it would be a pure electric vehicle as opposed to a hybrid, which runs on both a conventional engine and battery-powered electricity.”

Here’s the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.reuters.com/assets/print?aid=USLDE60I22620100119Putin backs

Russia’s first electric car project
Tue, Jan 19 2010

* Tycoon Prokhorov wins Putin’s backing for electric car

* Russia’s electric car could cost 8,800 euros – sources

By Gleb Bryanski and Gleb Stolyarov

MOSCOW, Jan 19 (Reuters) – Russia’s richest man, Mikhail Prokhorov won early backing from Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for his plan to start mass production of electric cars, Putin’s spokesman said on Tuesday.

Russia is seeking to modernize its commodity-based economy, which was hit hard by the global crisis when energy prices fell, and wants to achieve growth in technology sectors where it believes it may have some competitive advantage.

Prokhorov, a gold-to-basketball entrepreneur who sold some of his most lucrative assets just before the crisis, is sitting on a cash pile he is ready to invest. He has previously demonstrated strong interest in technology.

“Putin listened very attentively and wanted to see this project discussed in detail with all the ministries involved as soon as possible,” Peskov told reporters without elaborating on the details of the plan.

Industry professionals who had seen the early design of Prokhorov’s car told Reuters that the vehicle would be a Golf-class sedan with a body made from plastic. They said Prokhorov was ready to provide project financing for two years.

They said the target price for the car would be around 8,800 euros and it would be a pure electric vehicle as opposed to a hybrid, which runs on both a conventional engine and battery-powered electricity.

Prokhorov’s Onexim Group currently has no car production facilities. It was not immediately clear whether Prokhorov planned acquisitions or partnerships to complete the project or whether he had asked Putin for funding.

France’s Renault SA , which has a stake in Russia’s largest carmaker AvtoVAZ , and its Japanese partner Nissan Motor Co Ltd <7201.T> have been the most aggressive proponents of pure electric vehicles.

In August, the alliance unveiled a zero-emission, hatch-back vehicle called “Leaf;” it plans to start selling the first cars in the United States, Japan and Europe towards the end of 2010 at prices comparable to those of a gasoline-engine cars of the same size.

Electric car enthusiasts say that current battery technology has advanced significantly from that of earlier models, making electric cars cost-efficient. Russia’s vast defense sector has some expertise in making batteries. (Writing by Gleb Bryanski, editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

Europe Goes Electric

P.G. Morgan — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 21:52:31 +0000

A new European-wide electric car initiative will be launched as part of the Spanish presidency of the EU next month.

Read more about it in the Irish Times article:

EU to introduce electric car initiative

From the article:

“Spanish rime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, whose country currently holds the EU presidency, said there was a need for a pan-European strategy to produce a viable electric car…

The European Commission is already working on its proposals for electric cars which the Commission President José Manuel Barroso described as a “very important” part of its green strategy.

Mr Zapatero told MEPS in the European Parliament that the car industry was already going huge change and there was a need for a co-ordinated response and a common strategy.

He said competitors such as China and Japan would have the advantage unless EU car manufacturers had the right incentives to invest in electric vehicles.”

EU to introduce electric car initiative

RONAN MCGREEVY in Strasbourg

Wed, Jan 20, 2010

A new initiative to launch a Europe-wide plan for an electric car will be launched as part of the Spanish presidency of the EU next month.

Spanish rime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, whose country currently holds the EU presidency, said there was a need for a pan-European strategy to produce a viable electric car.

Mr Zapatero said he had met some of Europe’s biggest car manufacturers in recent days who impressed upon him that the EU should take a lead in developing electric vehicles.

The outcome of the meeting will be unveiled in San Sebastian on February 8th.

The European Commission is already working on its proposals for electric cars which the Commission President José Manuel Barroso described as a “very important” part of its green strategy.

Mr Zapatero told MEPS in the European Parliament that the car industry was already going huge change and there was a need for a co-ordinated response and a common strategy.

He said competitors such as China and Japan would have the advantage unless EU car manufacturers had the right incentives to invest in electric vehicles.

“It was felt to be fundamental that there should be co-operation of efforts in developing the electric vehicles among all EU countries with the commission taking a lead in developing electric cars,” Mr Zapatero said.

He added that there was a need for a regulatory framework to provide financial support for electric vehicle manufactures, common standards and technologies without which it will be “difficult for Europe to take a lead in this area.”

Toyota digs for Lithium

P.G. Morgan — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 23:59:09 +0000

Toyota Tsusho Corp, a trading house and key Toyota supplier that Toyota owns 22 percent of, just announced that it would be jointly developing a new lithium project in Argentina with the Australian-listed Orocobre Ltd.

For more information read:

Toyota in Argentine Lithium Deal for Hybrid Car Push

By Eriko Amaha for Reuters.

From the Reuters post:

“A sister company to Toyota Motor Corp secured a lithium supply deal in Argentina on Wednesday that could help the world’s largest automaker keep its lead in gasoline-electric hybrid cars.

The deal sent shares in the lithium project’s owner and operator, Australian-listed Orocobre Ltd, soaring almost 50 percent to an all-time high.

Lithium, a highly reactive and versatile metal, is expected to be in increasing demand as carmakers choose costly but more efficient lithium-ion batteries to power hybrid and electric vehicles.

“When it comes to mass production of hybrids, the main hurdle has been a shortage of batteries,” said Yoshihiko Tabei, chief analyst at Kazaka Securities. “Toyota is taking a step on its own to secure the materials it needs to ensure stable production.” …

Subject to the finalization of the terms, Toyota Tsusho will acquire a 25 percent equity interest in the joint venture while Orocobre will continue to own the remaining 75 percent of the project and will operate the venture.”

Toyota in Argentine Lithium Deal for Hybrid Car Push

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wirestory?id=9608959&page=1

Toyota in Argentine Lithium Deal for Hybrid Car Push
By Eriko Amaha
Reuters

SYDNEY/TOKYO

A sister company to Toyota Motor Corp secured a lithium supply deal in Argentina on Wednesday that could help the world’s largest automaker keep its lead in gasoline-electric hybrid cars.

The deal sent shares in the lithium project’s owner and operator, Australian-listed Orocobre Ltd, soaring almost 50 percent to an all-time high.

Lithium, a highly reactive and versatile metal, is expected to be in increasing demand as carmakers choose costly but more efficient lithium-ion batteries to power hybrid and electric vehicles.

“When it comes to mass production of hybrids, the main hurdle has been a shortage of batteries,” said Yoshihiko Tabei, chief analyst at Kazaka Securities. “Toyota is taking a step on its own to secure the materials it needs to ensure stable production.”

Toyota Tsusho Corp, a trading house and key Toyota supplier 22 percent-owned by the automaker, said it would jointly develop a new lithium project in Argentina with Orocobre.

Orocobre shares jumped to a record peak of A$2.04 in its heaviest ever trading volume. The stock has risen almost 10-fold in the past 12 months, and closed up 32 percent at A$1.85.

Toyota Tsusho rose 6 percent, while Toyota Motor’s stock ended down 0.9 percent, roughly in line with other auto shares.

STEP CHANGE IN DEMAND

The Salar de Olaroz project in Argentina is estimated to cost around $80-$100 million, with the final figure to be determined after a feasibility study, Orocobre spokesman Paul Ryan said, adding the study should be complete by end-September.

“As environmentally friendly electric car demand continues to grow, Toyota Motor will have the opportunity to become a cornerstone offtake customer,” Orocobre said in a statement.

Toyota uses nickel-metal-hydride batteries for the current Prius hybrid but has decided on lithium-ion batteries for future plug-in models.

Concerns about carbon emissions and their impact on climate change plus high and volatile oil prices are increasing the popularity of hybrid and electric vehicles despite their higher costs.

Toyota aims to double its global output of gas-electric hybrid cars to 1 million units in 2011, as it fights to stay in the lead in the growing market for low-emission cars, the Nikkei business reported this month.

Orocobre went public in December 2007 and now has a current market capitalization of nearly A$150 million.

Managing Director Richard Seville said the lithium market had been growing at a compound annual growth rate of about 7 percent between 1997 and 2007, before the global financial crisis, thanks largely to demand from consumer electronics makers.

“That growth will continue, but on top of that we have the step change in demand with a new application which is in large format batteries for use in electrical vehicles,” Seville told Reuters.

Houston-based James Calaway, non-executive chairman, and his family members hold an 11 percent stake in Orocombre, while other board members own a further 15-20 percent, Seville said.

JAPAN SEEKS RARE METALS

Subject to the finalization of the terms, Toyota Tsusho will acquire a 25 percent equity interest in the joint venture while Orocobre will continue to own the remaining 75 percent of the project and will operate the venture.

The Japanese government-affiliated Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corp (JOGMEC) is looking to take a part of Toyota Tsuho’s 25 percent stake, as part of Japan’s efforts to secure stable sources of rare metals, government officials said.

“Rare metals are essential not just for the high-tech sector but for Japan’s manufacturing industry overall,” said Hiroshi Kuwayama, a deputy director at Japan’s Agency for Natural Resources and Energy.

“With other countries, such as China, investing in mines around the world, we want to be more aggressive to support the private sector in securing stable supplies.”

Boliva has around 50 percent of the world’s lithium reserves, but does not yet mine the metal, while Chile, China and Brazil also hold big reserves.

(Additional reporting by Mayumi Negishi in TOKYO and Leonora Walet in HONG KONG; Editing by Mark Bendeich and Lincoln Feast)

Letter from Copenhagen

Chris Paine — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 16:51:04 +0000

(December, 2009)

Late night on the streets of Copenhagen, and biting cold. It was a dark and snowy night. But what I really wanted was…a bicycle.

Two weeks in on a trip to Denmark and my perspective on weather and transportation had shifted. The fastest way across town was on a bike regardless of conditions. Sure, an electric car would be nice, but that would have been last Sunday, when the nearly 80 electric vehicles in a “CO2 Race” combed the streets of Copenhagen. They were long gone. So were the electric Teslas, Nissans, Renaults, Betterplace vehicles, and Danish cars of the “International Mayor’s EV Parade,” a couple days later.

At the moment all I wanted was a bike.

As the occasional beautiful Dane raced by me with a baby on board – yes even at freezing 2AM – I knew why everyone chose bicycles here. Bikes had their own express lanes, their own concrete lane barriers, their own street lights, their own place on subways, their own bus racks, their own hipster club parking spaces, their own prams, even their own kind of road-rage. Step into a bike lane as many an international innocent would on the way to Klimaforum and learn a new Danish swear word.

My real issue that night was an age old problem for all wheeled vehicles: a flat tire. And a flaw in their system: No AAA road service for bikes (ha! one point for cars). So I chained up my bike (and mini-trailer) and set out on foot with rolling camera case dreaming of my heated electric car at home in Los Angeles.

Contrary to some reports, the Copenhagen Climate Conference was a great success. Sure, national leaders failed to sign a meaningful agreement, even after painstaking work by so many national staffs, NGOs (like Global Observatory), and demonstrators. But how enforceable would these agreements be anyway when a political party in China or the US for that matter, refused to go along back home?

Even with a signed agreement, someone would be break it or find a workaround. “The present is theirs, the future is ours,” as Nicola Tesla said.

The important success at COP15 was this: millions of human beings were rallying around a central issue for our time: global warming and stemming the stark consequences of an industrialized Earth. The demise of coral reefs, the threat to our ocean food chain, the flooding of small countries, the health disasters already playing out so many places, the loss of our local and global forests. The list goes on. But at least the wake up call has been sounded and people are taking action.

Renault's Twizy ZE Concept Car

Tens of thousands of demonstrators rallied. “There is No Planet B” signs proclaimed. And even with hundreds of riot police (and dozens of dogs and tear gas), fresh back from Bagdad, to control them, the marches went on. And the international press did its job. It reported – even with global distractions like Tiger Woods in full swing. And hundreds of mayors and corporate leaders committed their futures to meaningful action.

Revenge of the Electric Car had no shortage of scenes to chase.

After parading in Evs from City Hall to Denmark’s oldest University, mayors from around the world had something to say. The Toronto Mayor jumped from an all electric Mitsubishi to a plug in hybrid Fitzker positively on fire for them both. Toronto would lead! Like Portland, like Paris, like Tel Aviv, like Tokyo, like Los Angeles, like Copenhagen, like Hawaii! (warmer there by the way).

And how about Renault, arguably the biggest car company at play in this arena. They demonstrated 4 different models of pure EVs coming in 2010-11 to Europe.

And their COO, Patrick Pelata, sounded like he’d been in the post-gasoline car business for years – (preparing batteries and business models alike) with Nissan/Renault CEO Carlos Ghosn.

Patrick Pelata, Renault COO

Artists and activists created projects over Herculean obstacles to inspire and educate. We captured Jakob’s Fulsang Mikkelsen’s “CO2 Race” as he rounded up nearly 100 alt vehicles to adoring crowds and fitted them up with GPS systems to parade around Copenhagen at night. The EVs projected live red coordinates on a giant globe above the central square to spell out CO2. Talk about performance art.

One of Mikkelsen’s goals – helping to vindicate a failed Danish attempt to manufacture electric cars in the 1970s. One of his successes, getting reinspired to take this show around the world. Vegas anyone?

And entrepreneurs were in ample supply too. Shai Agassi updated the world on Better Place’s plan to install fast-switch stations and quick chargers in Denmark, Israel, Tokyo, and the US. Delays aside, all systems were go with an order for 100,000 electric cars from Nissan already in place.

Chris Paine and Shai Agassi, Founder and CEO, Better Place

And we had a screening of “Who Killed the Electric Car” at a film festival where Al Gore greeted us and had a few things to say about the culture wars. But that’s another story…

As I walked back through the streets of Copenhagen, my mind kept drifting to all the Tesla’s that have been sold here. With a $40,000 tax on gas cars, and an exemption for electric vehicles, no wonder that some of northern Denmark’s wind farmers are driving Teslas in the field. Wouldn’t it be nice in one of them picked me up right now for a ride…

And so, walking home that night, I felt proud of the EV movement and the efforts of so many to make a difference.

Change is happening.

CHRIS

When Bob Met Elon … and Chris

P.G. Morgan — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 17:05:54 +0000

Chris Paine, Elon Musk, Bob Lutz

The Revenge team filmed a historic meeting in Detroit today — getting GM Vice President and Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk together on camera for the first time.

More details after the jump :

Detroit’s Electric Avenue: The Street of Dreams?

From the NY Times post:

“Mr. Paine, who produced the documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car?” arranged the historic meeting. He is reportedly in production on a sequel, “The Revenge of the Electric Car.” Mr. Lutz — whose company was accused in Mr. Paine’s original movie of being the prime suspect -– is now a strong proponent of E.V.’s and a prime mover behind the development of the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid. And Mr. Musk is helping to revive the fortunes of the electric car industry with his stewardship of Tesla Motors.

The meeting went off as scheduled and proved to be a congenial gathering for the three men. A small crowd of curious onlookers followed them on their short stroll.

Mr. Paine was joined by a video crew, presumably shooting footage for “Revenge.” And while he seemed to be trying to create tension between Mr. Musk and Mr. Lutz, they didn’t seem to be buying into it.

Mr. Paine asked Mr. Musk if he felt being in Detroit was akin to being “behind enemy lines.” Mr. Musk smiled and said, “No, I really don’t think of it that way.” Mr. Lutz spent most of his 30 minutes with Mr. Musk sharing almost inaudible comments about various electric vehicles and features that caught their respective eyes.”

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/12/detroits-electric-avenue-the-street-of-dreams/

January 12, 2010, 4:58 pm
Detroit’s Electric Avenue: The Street of Dreams?
By JERRY GARRETT

Filmmaker Chris Paine (left) follows Elon Musk of Tesla and Bob Lutz of General Motors at the 2010 Detroit auto show.Fabrizio Costantini for The New York Times The filmmaker Chris Paine, left, follows Elon Musk of Tesla and Bob Lutz of General Motors at the 2010 Detroit auto show.

DETROIT — Which would be a stranger sight: Humphrey Bogart, Marilyn Monroe and James Dean sharing a late snack at an all-night diner, or the filmmaker Chris Paine; Bob Lutz, the General Motors vice chairman; and Elon Musk, chief executive of Tesla Motors, taking a stroll down Electric Avenue at the Detroit auto show?

Either situation seems pretty far-fetched. Thanks to spoofs of Edward Hopper’s “Nighthawks” painting, the scene with the actors is a little easier to visualize. But the highly implausible Detroit situation actually happened Tuesday afternoon.

Mr. Paine, who produced the documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car?” arranged the historic meeting. He is reportedly in production on a sequel, “The Revenge of the Electric Car.” Mr. Lutz — whose company was accused in Mr. Paine’s original movie of being the prime suspect -– is now a strong proponent of E.V.’s and a prime mover behind the development of the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid. And Mr. Musk is helping to revive the fortunes of the electric car industry with his stewardship of Tesla Motors.

The meeting went off as scheduled and proved to be a congenial gathering for the three men. A small crowd of curious onlookers followed them on their short stroll.

Mr. Paine was joined by a video crew, presumably shooting footage for “Revenge.” And while he seemed to be trying to create tension between Mr. Musk and Mr. Lutz, they didn’t seem to be buying into it.

Mr. Paine asked Mr. Musk if he felt being in Detroit was akin to being “behind enemy lines.” Mr. Musk smiled and said, “No, I really don’t think of it that way.” Mr. Lutz spent most of his 30 minutes with Mr. Musk sharing almost inaudible comments about various electric vehicles and features that caught their respective eyes.

Mr. Lutz put in a plug for the “range-extending capability” of the Volt, which can travel about 40 miles on electric battery power alone and another 300 miles or so with a recharging assist from an onboard gasoline generator. Mr. Musk said he had looked into that capability for his Tesla E.V.’s, but discarded the idea as unnecessary.

“We’re in the E.V. business –- only,” he said.

Tesla Motors used the 2010 North American International Auto Show, its first, to make a multifaceted statement about the viability not only of the company, but of the electric car as well.

Three vehicles were on display in the Tesla booth at the Detroit auto show: a white Roadster Sport with chassis number 750 that was driven from California some 3,600 miles to the show; another white Roadster Sport, with chassis number 1,000, which signals a milestone in the number of electric cars manufactured and put into service since the company started delivering cars to customers in mid-2008; and the latest iteration of the 2012 Model S, the sedan that is scheduled to go into production within two years and be priced at $57,400.

Say Hello To The Cadillac Converj

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 15:41:36 +0000

Bob Lutz announces the next GM Electric Car program, post Volt.

It’s the Cadillac Converj.

For more details, read the story:

Lutz: GM to make Cadillac Converj electric car

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.detnews.com/article/20100110/AUTO04/1100345/1361/Lutz–GM-to-make-Cadillac-Converj-electric-car

Lutz: GM to make Cadillac Converj electric car

January 10, 2010 http://detnews.com/article/20100110/AUTO04/1100345

Lutz: GM to make Cadillac Converj electric car

ALISA PRIDDLE
The Detroit News

Detroit — It’s official: the Cadillac Converj will be the second extended-range electric vehicle that General Motors Co. will sell after the Chevrolet Volt.

GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz made the announcement Sunday at a conference of the Society of Automotive Analysts on the eve of the North American International Auto Show.

The Converj was shown as a concept last year at the Detroit show, and The Detroit News has previously reported it received board approval for production.

Lutz said Sunday the car is starting development now and is at least a couple years from going on sale.

It will have a future generation of the Voltec system that uses a small gasoline engine to recharge the lithium ion batteries to extend the range of the electric vehicle from the 40 miles it can run on electricity alone.

Ford Starts EV Test Drives

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 21:07:08 +0000

Ford is starting EV trials in Germany.

For more details, follow the link …

Ford Plans to Start Electric-Car Tests in Germany Next Month

“Ford Motor Co. will start a two-year test program of electric Focus compact cars and Transit vans in Germany on Jan. 4 as the U.S. company prepares to introduce battery-powered models as early as next year.

The 25 vehicles will be driven under normal traffic conditions in Cologne, where Ford’s European division is based, said Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer, director of the Center for Automotive Research at Germany’s University of Duisburg-Essen, which is overseeing the 15 million-euro ($22 million) study.

The drivers will include researchers and customers selected by Ford, Dudenhoeffer said today in a telephone interview. Data from the models will be monitored on computers that can simulate testing of more than 10,000 vehicles, he said.”

Here is a the entire text of the article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=abb2Vr3qnaqQ

Ford Plans to Start Electric-Car Tests in Germany Next Month

By Chris Reiter

Dec. 28 (Bloomberg) — Ford Motor Co. will start a two-year test program of electric Focus compact cars and Transit vans in Germany on Jan. 4 as the U.S. company prepares to introduce battery-powered models as early as next year.

The 25 vehicles will be driven under normal traffic conditions in Cologne, where Ford’s European division is based, said Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer, director of the Center for Automotive Research at Germany’s University of Duisburg-Essen, which is overseeing the 15 million-euro ($22 million) study.

The drivers will include researchers and customers selected by Ford, Dudenhoeffer said today in a telephone interview. Data from the models will be monitored on computers that can simulate testing of more than 10,000 vehicles, he said.

Bernd Meier, a spokesman for Ford in Cologne, said the study is the automaker’s first in mainland Europe. The company is already trying out battery-powered vehicles in London, Meier said.

Ford, the first U.S. automaker to offer a hybrid model, said on Dec. 8 that it may spend $300 million to $500 million on factories in its home state of Michigan to build electric vehicles and batteries. The Dearborn-based company has a target of rolling out an electric-powered version of the Transit Connect commercial van next year, followed by an electric Focus in 2011.

Local utility RheinEnergie AG will supply vehicle-charging stations for the test, which is being financed by the German government’s economic-stimulus package, Dudenhoeffer said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Reiter in Berlin at creiter2@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: December 28, 2009 12:30 EST

EVs in England

P.G. Morgan — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 15:59:53 +0000

The EV revolution continues in England’s second city, Birmingham.

Nissan Leaf Hits Seattle

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 15:33:21 +0000

Listen to what happens when the Nissan Leaf roadshow reaches Seattle.

Nissan Plans Leaf with Complete Charging Infrastructure

by Denis Du Bois for Energy Priorities.

“In some cities, Leaf drivers won’t have to wait for the charging infrastructure to catch up. Mark Perry, Nissan North America’s Director of Product Planning, says Seattle is part of a DOE project to place 2,500 charging stations to the Puget Sound region this summer. Perry says there will be a public charging station within five miles of any spot in the Puget sound area.

But Nissan expects most owners to charge at home, overnight. The charger is built into the car, with a timer so you can control when it charges itself.”

Read the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://energypriorities.com/entries/2009/12/nissan_leaf_electric_car.php

Nissan Plans Leaf with Complete Charging Infrastructure

This report begins with the sound of an electric bus traveling through downtown Seattle. It’s a reminder that electric transportation isn’t new — a timely reminder, because Denis Du Bois is on his way to test drive a prototype of the Nissan all-electric car, the Leaf. (podcast)

by Denis Du Bois
December 13, 2009

At the test location, Nissan technician Dean Romaine orients me to the prototype car’s dashboard and controls.
Nissan Leaf Zero Emissions Tour photo on EnergyPriorities.com

The all-electric Nissan Leaf car prototype visited Seattle’s Qwest Field this week.
Nissan Leaf prototype electric car photo on EnergyPriorities.com

Kate Quigley, of the Nissan Leaf Road Crew, gives an on-camera interview at a media drive day.
Nissan Leaf photo on EnergyPriorities.com

The Leaf has no internal combustion engine, which makes it a zero-emissions car. (The electricity that charges it, however, is not necessarily emissions-free.) Nissan expects the Leaf to be the first affordable, all-electric car.

This prototype is the Leaf powertrain, batteries and regenerative braking system under the body of a Nissan Tida.

Initially it’s a lot like driving a Toyota Prius hybrid… until the straightaway, where Dean persuades me to floor it.

The acceleration is quick — and almost completely silent. The Leaf has 107 horsepower and tops out at 90 miles an hour — although I don’t come close to that.

You can’t buy this, or any production all-electric car, in the US today. Nissan will begin taking reservations for the Leaf in the spring of 2010.

It has all the creature comforts — air conditioning, cruise control, stereo, and a navigation system that shows the locations of the nearest public charging stations.

In some cities, Leaf drivers won’t have to wait for the charging infrastructure to catch up. Mark Perry, Nissan North America’s Director of Product Planning, says Seattle is part of a DOE project to place 2,500 charging stations to the Puget Sound region this summer. Perry says there will be a public charging station within five miles of any spot in the Puget sound area.

But Nissan expects most owners to charge at home, overnight. The charger is built into the car, with a timer so you can control when it charges itself.

The ideal car battery would have a long range, and minimal residual waste at the end of its useful life. Nissan is taking advantage of battery technology developed for consumer electronics.

The Leaf’s battery is a LiMn chemistry. Nissan expects it to have a ten year life. As Nissan improves its battery technology, car owners will be able to upgrade. At end of life, Perry says Nissan has planned to recycle the battery.

The Leaf itself contains quite a bit of recycled materials. The one thing it doesn’t have is a tailpipe. It is completely emissions-free — no carbon. And, in places like Seattle, where the energy utility gets its power from renewable energy, is carbon neutral, even the charging source is carbon neutral.

GM’s Volt Program = $700m

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 22:14:57 +0000

GM to invest $700m in Volt rechargeable electric car

By Richard Kessler for Recharge News

“GM is spending $336m to upgrade the Hamtramck plant; $202m for a new plant in Flint, north of Detroit, that will build 1.4 litre engine-generators; $43m for a plant in Brownstown Township outside Detroit that will manufacture battery packs; $37m for a camshaft and connecting rod plant in Bay City, north of Flint; and $27m for GM’s Tech Center in suburban Warren, a Detroit suburb, location of Volt’s battery laboratory.”

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.rechargenews.com/regions/north_america/article200963.ece

GM to invest $700m in Volt rechargeable electric car

General Motors will invest $336m in a Detroit-area assembly plant, bringing to $700m total investment in eight Michigan facilities to begin mass production of the rechargeable Chevrolet Volt electric car in late 2010.
Related Stories

GM is spending $336m to upgrade the Hamtramck plant; $202m for a new plant in Flint, north of Detroit, that will build 1.4 litre engine-generators; $43m for a plant in Brownstown Township outside Detroit that will manufacture battery packs; $37m for a camshaft and connecting rod plant in Bay City, north of Flint; and $27m for GM’s Tech Center in suburban Warren, a Detroit suburb, location of Volt’s battery laboratory.

“We expect the Detroit-Hamtramck plant will be the first facility in the U.S. owned by a major automaker to produce an electric car,” says Jon Lauckner, vice president of global product planning.

Michigan has approved $135.2m in tax incentives for those sites and others. The state has the highest US unemployment rate at 15.2%, largely a result of the depressed automobile industry that has resulted in thousands of layoffs in the past 18 months.

The Volt is an electric car designed to drive up to 40 miles on electricity without using gasoline or producing tailpipe emissions. When its lithium-ion battery is depleted of energy, an engine-generator seamlessly operates to extend the total driving range to about 300 miles before refueling or stopping to recharge the battery.
Richard A. Kessler

Published: Tuesday, December 8 2009

GM puts $336m into Volt plant

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 23:57:51 +0000

GM to invest $336 million in Volt plant

General Motors Co will invest $336 million in a Detroit-area plant to produce its heavily anticipated Chevrolet Volt electric car beginning next year, the No. 1 U.S. automaker said on Monday.

Nissan in China

Lisa Rein — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 18:46:03 +0000

The government of Guangzhou Municipality in China and Dongfeng Motor Co., Nissan Motor Co.’s Chinese venture partner, have formed a partnership to promote electric car transport in the city of Guangzhou.

The Renault-Nissan Alliance, which will start marketing electric cars in the U.S. and Japan next year, has signed more than 30 agreements with cities, counties, states and governments to promote zero-emission electric cars and establish the charging infrastructure for the batteries.

Renault-Nissan plans to offer an electric car for sale in China in 2011, Nissan said in a statement.

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.detnews.com/article/20091123/AUTO01/911230418/1148/Renault-Nissan-inks-electric-car-deal-for-China-city

Renault-Nissan inks electric car deal for China city

Last Updated: November 23. 2009 8:54PM
Renault-Nissan inks electric car deal for China city
The Detroit News

Guangzhou, China — The Renault-Nissan Alliance, the government of Guangzhou Municipality in China and Dongfeng Motor Co., Nissan Motor Co.’s Chinese venture partner, have formed a partnership to promote electric car transport in the city of Guangzhou.

Nissan and its partners will conduct a feasibility study of the infrastructure development and incentives required to make electric cars accessible to customers in Guangzhou, a large city formerly known as Canton.

The Renault-Nissan Alliance, which will start marketing electric cars in the U.S. and Japan next year, has signed more than 30 agreements with cities, counties, states and governments to promote zero-emission electric cars and establish the charging infrastructure for the batteries.

Renault-Nissan plans to offer an electric car for sale in China in 2011, Nissan said in a statement.

Nissan unveiled the Leaf electric car in August, and Renault SA displayed four battery-powered concept cars at the Frankfurt Motor Show in September for vehicles that will go into production within three years.

Tesla Prepping IPO

P.G. Morgan — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 17:44:14 +0000

Tesla Model S Photo: Caroline McCarthy/CNET

Rumors are circling that Tesla is preparing an IPO, although no one at Tesla is yet talking.

More details at:

Electric-car maker Tesla preparing IPO

“Tesla would mark the first public offering from a U.S. automaker since Henry Ford’s Ford Motor debuted its shares in 1956. The IPO represents a landmark in the resurgence of electric-car technology that most carmakers had dismissed as impractical until recently.

The company’s chairman Elon Musk said early last year that an IPO was a possibility in either late 2008 or 2009.”

Here is the full text of the article, in case the link goes bad:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10402752-54.html

Electric-car maker Tesla preparing IPO

by Reuters

U.S. electric-car maker Tesla Motors plans to go public soon, two sources familiar with the matter said, amid growing interest in green technology and battery-powered vehicles.

An IPO filing from the 6-year-old start-up, best known for its $109,000 all-electric Roadster, is expected any day, said one of the sources. The person did not give a specific time frame, although IPOs typically take several months.

Tesla spokesman Ricardo Reyes declined to comment on what he called “rumor or speculation.”

Tesla Model S

Tesla Model S
(Credit: Caroline McCarthy/CNET)

Tesla would mark the first public offering from a U.S. automaker since Henry Ford’s Ford Motor debuted its shares in 1956. The IPO represents a landmark in the resurgence of electric-car technology that most carmakers had dismissed as impractical until recently.

The company’s chairman Elon Musk said early last year that an IPO was a possibility in either late 2008 or 2009.

But the financial market turmoil following the collapse of Lehman Bros. in the latter half of 2008 virtually shut down the IPO market. The appetite for IPOs has picked up since mid-September this year with a robust pace of new filings.

Tesla’s IPO would follow the successful debut of lithium ion battery maker A123 Systems, whose shares rallied 50 percent on their first day of trading on September 25.

Analysts have said that the success of A123, the first green-technology IPO this year, would encourage more venture capital-backed green companies to go public.

Tesla will compete with established automakers like Ford, General Motors, and Nissan Motor, all of which are racing to launch electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles. Tesla, by contrast, is a small player with a high-end market and limited production.

A combination of factors has driven the recent interest in developing electric, or partially electric vehicles, including the Obama administration’s push to have 1 million rechargeable vehicles on U.S. roads by 2015 and low-cost Department of Energy loans for manufacturers.

Venture funds back green cars
The carmaker is developing a second, lower-cost model, an electric sedan known as the Model S, which will have a base price of $49,900.

Tesla said in September it delivered 700 Roadsters since February 2008. The Roadster, which is built on a Lotus frame, can go from 0 to 60 miles an hour in less than four seconds, making it faster than a Porsche 911 or a Ferrari Spider.

The electric-car start-up was offered $465 million in low-cost loans by the U.S. Department of Energy to help build the new Model S. Tesla said it will build the new car in California.

Tesla’s investors include Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

Other investors include Daimler; Abu Dhabi-based Aabar Investments, which owns a stake in Daimler; and venture capital funds Valor Equity Partners, Technology Partners, The Westly Group, and Compass Venture Partners.

Tesla said it had achieved overall corporate profitability in July with about $1 million of earnings on revenue of $20 million.

But like established automakers, survival in the hyper-competitive U.S. automotive market has not been easy for Tesla. The company had to face cost overruns and production delays for the Roadster.

Aptera delays 2e until 2010

P.G. Morgan — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 19:55:37 +0000

Big changes at Aptera … more details ( plus official press release ) after the jump:

Officially Official: Aptera production pushed back to 2010

By Domenick Yoney for Autobloggreen.

According to the company, fund raising efforts didn’t keep pace with vehicle development and so they’re taking measures to slow the burn, as it were. One of those unfortunate actions involved laying off an unspecified number of employees, though one of them, co-founder Steve Fambro, has said he will resume his role next year. Addressing the situation he said:

“Right now my advanced work is a lower priority for Aptera. We’ve got to be wholly focused on funding and getting the first 2e on the road. Paul’s leadership and (chief engineer) Tom Reichenbach’s talent have led to changes in the vehicle that are spot-on. They’ve made the vehicle safer, it’s better handling and more comfortable. Once we get through this stage, we’ll begin mass producing the 2e – the most aerodynamic and efficient vehicle in the world.”

Here is the full text of the blog post, and the Press Release from Aptera Motors:

http://green.autoblog.com/2009/11/18/officially-official-aptera-production-pushed-back-to-2010/

Officially Official: Aptera production pushed back to 2010

by Domenick Yoney (RSS feed) on Nov 18th 2009 at 11:50AM Breaking

If anybody is still wondering whether Aptera, despite the recent commotion, will deliver one of their flightless wonders by Christmas, they can officially cease speculating. They’re not, and the release date has now been pushed back to some undefined time in 2010. Hopefully, the delay won’t be a full year as it was the last time they announced delivery postponement. According to the company, fund raising efforts didn’t keep pace with vehicle development and so they’re taking measures to slow the burn, as it were. One of those unfortunate actions involved laying off an unspecified number of employees, though one of them, co-founder Steve Fambro, has said he will resume his role next year. Addressing the situation he said:

Right now my advanced work is a lower priority for Aptera. We’ve got to be wholly focused on funding and getting the first 2e on the road. Paul’s leadership and (chief engineer) Tom Reichenbach’s talent have led to changes in the vehicle that are spot-on. They’ve made the vehicle safer, it’s better handling and more comfortable. Once we get through this stage, we’ll begin mass producing the 2e – the most aerodynamic and efficient vehicle in the world.

Sounds reasonable to us, and it’s no doubt reassuring for patiently waiting customers to have official communication from the firm. However, one can’t help but wonder why they didn’t head this chaotic episode off at the pass by making this announcement in a more timely fashion. The emotional investment of nearly 4,000 reservation-holding fans might be just as important as seeking further financial investment. In any event, the official press release awaits after the break.

[Source: Aptera Motors]

PRESS RELEASE:

FIRST ALL-ELECTRIC APTERA 2e PUSHED BACK TO 2010

Co-founders Fambro and Anthony step aside from day-to-day operations

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

VISTA, Calif. (Nov. 18, 2009) — In September 2008, when fledgling vehicle manufacturer Aptera named Paul Wilbur president and CEO, the 27-year Detroit auto executive set forth a series of financial goals and product deadlines. “Aptera’s production and delivery will be tied directly to funding,” said Wilbur.

During the past 12 months, the company’s initial offering – the aerodynamic Aptera 2e, an all-electric, three-wheeled two-seater that gets the equivalent of 200-plus mpg – has evolved from concept to near reality. Companies including Google and IdeaLab have made significant investments in the southern California auto manufacturer, and numerous potential private and public backers are in the process of doing their due diligence. However, according to Wilbur, the vehicle development progress has been outpacing the rate of fundraising.

“We’re making significant progress every day with product refinements, the completion of engineering and design details, and securing meaningful strategic partnerships,” says Wilbur. “However, we now have to adjust our production schedule to align with financing realities. Properly managing the resources of the company means we’ll complete our first vehicles in 2010, not by the end of 2009 as previously projected.

“Aptera management is being a prudent steward of all resources to ensure future viability for the company and strong returns for its stakeholders. Therefore, we’ll begin volume production vehicles once our current series of private funding has closed or when we secure financing through the Department of Energy’s Advanced Technology Vehicle loan program, whichever comes first.”

The aerodynamically-inspired Aptera 2e goes from zero to 60 in under 10 seconds, tops out at 90 mph and has already received nearly 4,000 deposits, which are fully refundable and remain in an escrow account. The production vehicle includes enhanced safety features, a redesigned interior cabin that is airy and user-friendly, a monocoque, structural composite body as well as a telematics and infotainment system.

“I’m as disappointed as any of our depositors and loyal followers around the country that we’re delaying initial production,” says Wilbur. “There’s no one who’s more anxious than we are to put the 2e on the road.

“Because of this production delay, we’ve unfortunately been forced to lay off some hard working employees. It’s a strategy to streamline our spending to hone in on the items that advance our fundraising and completion of our first vehicle.

“Additionally as part of this plan, co-founder Chris Anthony is stepping aside from day-to-day activities to concentrate on his two other companies, Epic Boats and Flux Power.”

Aptera’s other co-founder, Steve Fambro, who started tinkering with the idea of building an aerodynamic vehicle five years ago, is taking a short leave of absence and will re-engage with the company in the new year.

“Right now my advanced work is a lower priority for Aptera,” said Fambro, the company’s Chief Technical Officer who directs all advanced concept development activities. “We’ve got to be wholly focused on funding and getting the first 2e on the road.

“Paul’s leadership and (chief engineer) Tom Reichenbach’s talent have led to changes in the vehicle that are spot-on. They’ve made the vehicle safer, it’s better handling and more comfortable. Once we get through this stage, we’ll begin mass producing the 2e – the most aerodynamic and efficient vehicle in the world.”

According to Wilbur, “Building and launching a new car company is the challenge of a lifetime – even in the best economic times. At Aptera, this is especially true because we didn’t start with an existing architecture for our vehicle. The 2e was designed from scratch, which is why we’re focused on properly, and painstakingly, creating a foundation that can succeed over time; it’s a chance for everybody working at Aptera to reshape the automotive world for the next generation.”

About Aptera
Aptera Motors (www.aptera.com) was founded in 2006 to develop and build the safest, most energy efficient commuter vehicles on the road. Utilizing streamlined aerodynamic design, lightweight composite structures and unique drive systems, Aptera (which means wingless flight) delivers vehicles that are attainable and efficient. The company operates two Southern California facilities in north San Diego County, where it designs, engineers and manufactures the vehicles and their composite systems to create an exceptionally strong, sleek body.

Cash for Volts?

P.G. Morgan — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:06:01 +0000

A coalition of car makers, battery suppliers and electricity providers has come together to ask for federal help for EVs.

More details at:

Group Seeks US Tax Credits To Spur Electric Car Use

by Judith Burns for Dow Jones.

“A coalition of auto makers, battery manufacturers, utility operators and shipping companies wants the U.S. to offer tax credits for buying all-electric plug-in vehicles as part of a $128 billion program to get seven million such cars on the road by 2018.

The “cash for volts” approach was touted Monday by the Electrification Coalition, a 13-member group that sees electric plug-ins as the answer to a host of problems, from dependence on foreign oil to tailpipe emissions that some believe is contributing to global climate change.

The group issued a lengthy report and a 30-second television commercial touting its plan, and its members outlined it at a presentation in Washington, D.C. All stressed that plug-in technology already exists and just needs a push on the financial front from Congress.”

Here’s the text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/djf500/200911161801DOWJONESDJONLINE000398_FORTUNE5.htm

UPDATE:Group Seeks US Tax Credits To Spur Electric Car Use

November 16, 2009: 06:01 PM ET

(Updated to attribute projection on “smart-grid” earnings to FERC Chairman.)

By Judith Burns

Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- Move over, cash for clunkers. A coalition of auto makers, battery manufacturers, utility operators and shipping companies wants the U.S. to offer tax credits for buying all-electric plug-in vehicles as part of a $128 billion program to get seven million such cars on the road by 2018.

The “cash for volts” approach was touted Monday by the Electrification Coalition, a 13-member group that sees electric plug-ins as the answer to a host of problems, from dependence on foreign oil to tailpipe emissions that some believe is contributing to global climate change.

The group issued a lengthy report and a 30-second television commercial touting its plan, and its members outlined it at a presentation in Washington, D.C. All stressed that plug-in technology already exists and just needs a push on the financial front from Congress.

“There’s no pie-in-the-sky here,” said FedEx Corp. (FDX) Chairman and Chief Executive Fred Smith, one of the coalition members.

However, “we’re talking about heavy investment” in cars, batteries and supporting technology, said Nissan Motor Co. (7201.TO) Chief Executive Carlos Ghosn, another coalition member, whose company’s all-electric vehicles will be sold in the U.S. starting next year.

Nissan is bullish on plug-ins, which Ghosn predicts will account for 10% of cars sold by 2020. By contrast, hybrid vehicles that mix traditional internal- combustion engines with electric power accounted for less than 3% of car sales in 2008, more than a decade after their introduction.

Instead of a national push for plug-ins, the coalition recommends starting with six to eight U.S. cities, chosen after a competition to act as a test site for electric vehicles, much as they might to host the Olympic Games. By 2013, it wants each city to have 50,000 to 100,000 electric car owners, or 700,000 nationwide, setting the stage for an expanded test that will add 20 to 25 cities, putting seven million plug-ins on the road by 2018.

The group wants residents in test cities who buy electric vehicles to qualify for generous tax credits that are significantly higher than the $7,500 maximum now available, and would like tax credits to fund 50% of the costs to upgrade utilities and 50% to 75% of the cost to build public charging facilities.

The group notes that Japan and the European Union already offer large financial incentives to spur electric vehicle purchases.

Some U.S. lawmakers are supportive of the idea.

“We can set the stage for it, with a wide range of tax credits,” said Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) who took part in the event. But, Dorgan said whether electric vehicles take off or flop will depend on consumers.

Despite a high upfront cost, operating an electric vehicle is cheap, costing 2.5 cents per mile traveled, compared with 12 cents per mile for a gas-powered car, advocates say. Since batteries that power electric vehicles might last longer than the car itself, they say financing will have to be adjusted to reflect that.

Electric cars already have a long-enough range for most Americans, who typically drive no more than 40 miles a day, coalition members noted. Vehicle owners would be able to fully charge them at night in their own garages, using an ordinary electric plug, and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Jon Wellinghoff suggested that they might earn up to $10 a day by having the vehicle hooked to a “smart” electric-power grid to help utility operators regulate supply and demand. Then, assuming such vehicles can be mass produced, “the math works,” said Smith.

Fast chargers, operating at 480 volts, available at public facilities, would allow drivers to charge vehicles on the go, removing the anxiety about the limited range of today’s battery-powered cars, coalition members added. The cost to put such facilities every 25 miles along interstate highways in California alone might cost $75 million, another hurdle the group hopes can be cleared with federal financial help.

-By Judith Burns, Dow Jones Newswires, 202-862-6692; Judith.Burns@dowjones.com

Chrysler Changes Its Mind About EVs

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 19:42:07 +0000

As the race to produce mass market EVs heats up, Chrysler has pulled out of the contest.

More details below:

Chrysler dismantles electric car plans under Fiat

by Kevin Krolicki, for Reuters.

“As late as August, Chrysler took $70 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop a test fleet of 220 hybrid pickup trucks and minivans, vehicles now scrapped in the sweeping turnaround plan for Chrysler announced this week by Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne.

Chrysler spokesman Nick Cappa said on Friday that an in-house team of electric car development engineers had been disbanded in favor of a more traditional organization…

Under mounting pressure to improve the fuel-efficiency of its line-up, Chrysler announced in September last year that it was developing three electric vehicles and would sell the first of the models by 2010.

In January at the Detroit Auto Show, Chrysler upped the ante on its electric car bet by pledging to have 500,000 battery-powered vehicles on the road by 2013, including sports cars and trucks.

But a presentation of Chrysler’s five-year strategy by Marchionne on Wednesday made no mention of Chrysler’s earlier electric car development plans.”

Here’s the text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-GreenBusiness/idUSTRE5A605N20091107

Chrysler dismantles electric car plans under Fiat

Fri Nov 6, 2009 9:49pm EST

By Kevin Krolicki

DETROIT (Reuters) – Chrysler has disbanded a team of engineers dedicated to rushing a range of electric vehicles to showrooms and dropped ambitious sales targets for battery-powered cars set as it was sliding toward bankruptcy and seeking government aid.

The move by Fiat SpA marks a major reversal for Chrysler, which had used its electric car program as part of the case for a $12.5 billion federal aid package.

As late as August, Chrysler took $70 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop a test fleet of 220 hybrid pickup trucks and minivans, vehicles now scrapped in the sweeping turnaround plan for Chrysler announced this week by Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne.

Chrysler spokesman Nick Cappa said on Friday that an in-house team of electric car development engineers had been disbanded in favor of a more traditional organization.

The automaker’s former owner, Cerberus Capital Management, had set up a special division called “Envi” — derived from Environment — to spearhead development of hybrid technology where Chrysler badly trailed competitors.

“Envi is absorbed into the normal vehicle development program,” Cappa told Reuters.

Under mounting pressure to improve the fuel-efficiency of its line-up, Chrysler announced in September last year that it was developing three electric vehicles and would sell the first of the models by 2010.

In January at the Detroit Auto Show, Chrysler upped the ante on its electric car bet by pledging to have 500,000 battery-powered vehicles on the road by 2013, including sports cars and trucks.

But a presentation of Chrysler’s five-year strategy by Marchionne on Wednesday made no mention of Chrysler’s earlier electric car development plans.

Under the Marchionne plan, former Envi chief Lou Rhodes will become the group line executive in charge of electric car development for both Fiat and Chrysler, Cappa said.

As of Friday, the Chrysler Group website still featured pictures and advertisements for the now-scuttled electric vehicles it had been developing.

That includes the Dodge Circuit, a two-seat, all-electric sports car that Chrysler engineers had rushed into prototype by using a Lotus platform.

At the time of the launch of Envi in late 2007, Chrysler executives had said the unit would operate with the speed of a venture capital-backed start-up that would compress the three-to-five-year development cycle typical for automakers.

Chrysler is the only one of the six top-selling automakers in the U.S. market without a hybrid offering.

Marchionne told reporters and analysts electric cars would only represent “one to two percent” of Chrysler’s sales by 2014, equivalent to less than 60,000 vehicles.

“Until the (battery) storage gets resolved, I think electric vehicles are going to struggle,” he said.

Fiat is considering bringing a battery-powered commercial van to the U.S. market but those plans have not been finalized, other Chrysler executives said.

The Obama administration, which has set a target of putting 1 million rechargeable cars on the road by 2015, gave Fiat a 20 percent stake in Chrysler in exchange for bringing vehicles and more fuel-efficient engines to Chrysler.

Marchionne has forecast that Chrysler will be at break-even on a net basis in 2011. The automaker has said it plans to more than double U.S. sales over the next five years and roll out a dozen new models based on Fiat platforms.

(Reporting by Kevin Krolicki; Editing by Gary Hill)

As the race to produce mass market EVs heats up, Chrysler has pulled out of the contest. More details below:

PBS looks into the Electric Future

Lisa Rein — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:51:35 +0000

Ahead of the Copenhagen summit, PBS look into the electric future in Denmark — and checks
in with Project Better Place.

Watch the show here.

Stan Ovshinsky’s New Project

Lisa Rein — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 20:39:49 +0000

Bob Stempel and Stan Ovshinsky

Stan Ovshinsky — one of the stars of ‘Who Killed the Electric Car ?’ – is out of retirement and working with former business partner (and ex-GM head) Bob Stempel to develop solar panels. More details in the Detroit Free Press article:

Panels may brighten job market

by Carol Cain.

In another bit of coincidence, Stempel headed GM’s EV1 electric car program in the early 1990s. The company dropped the program as demand for sport-utility vehicles took center stage.

After leaving GM, Stempel eventually connected with Ovshinsky at Energy Conversion Devices.

The duo worked there until Ovshinsky decided to retire two years ago.

That retirement was short-lived. Ovshinsky returned to what he loves — working to make the nation less reliant on foreign oil.

He started a new company, Ovshinsky Innovations LLC. He is working with Stempel again as a partner on the solar panels. They have a small staff and are testing the product in Oakland County.

Chris Paine in the ‘Daily Beast’

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 20:52:43 +0000

Chris gives his views on the EV revolution — and our new film — to The Daily Beast.
For the full interview, follow this link.

What can we expect to see in Revenge of the Electric Car?

We’re tracking the fortunes of GM with the Volt and Tesla, initially with their Roadster and now the Model S, and the electric Smart Car. And then we’re tracking a whole group of other manufacturers and related stories like Better Place in Israel and what the Chinese are up to. I think we’ll definitely see a few of the same people from the first film. I don’t know if Martin Sheen will narrate again—he was fantastic. Chelsea Sexton is now consulting for a venture-capital firm, VantagePoint, in Silicon Valley, but she’s still working with us on this film.

At Home with Bob Lutz

Jessie Deeter — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 18:37:02 +0000

We went to Detroit recently to see Bob Lutz. In these turbulent times, we wanted to know how the Vice Chair of GM was getting along.

We found Bob smoking a cigar on his Segway. Which was definitely my favorite visual of the trip. Lutz lives in a spread that can best be described as “bucolic,” in a quietly lovely suburb outside of Detroit. This was not the land of the $7,500 homes we’d been reading about. The Lutz farm boasts not one but two garages for his collector cars, a couple of barns for the horses, a collection of dogs and a pair of swans who had just hatched their cygnets (I wouldn’t have known what to call them, but Bob delighted in stumping our entire crew). It was a nice way to spend a morning.

Bob didn’t emote too much over the state of the car industry and Detroit as a whole, but, surprisingly, his wife did. And in a moment aside she told her husband how nice it was going to be to have him at home for a while ( this was during Bob’s brief “retirement”).

We then met our honorary crew member Chelsea Sexton out at GM’s car testing grounds. She was in town for a little business and a little fun—test driving the next Volt mule. If Chelsea’s ear-to-ear grin was anything to go by, the Volt seemed to be progressing fine. We then caught an “informal chat” between Chelsea and Tony Posawatz at GM’s tech center. Tony actually seemed more relaxed than the last time we’d seen him, possibly, one could speculate, because he was still employed.

We took Chelsea on a ride on the People Mover to get her reaction to the downsizing of the company she once belonged to and her test drive of the Volt. The beautiful art deco buildings, some in the process of falling down, provided a colorful backdrop for our up-and-coming-activist.

Since we only had two days in Detroit, we weren’t able to do much more sightseeing, but we did meet Bishop Ellis, who heads Greater Grace Temple and famously held a “bailout” service for the auto industry in his mega-church with SUVs at the altar. Although our crew are mostly heathens, I think that we were all moved by Ellis’s words.

After our interview at the church, we did a drive through neighborhoods in eight, seven and six-mile roads, finding more people sitting on their porches as we moved down the numbers. As bad as things are reported to be, the people we saw and talked to seemed to be generally in decent spirits, and though we found a “For Sale” sign on nearly every block, we didn’t find very many next door to each other. But my brief phone call with former New York Times reporter Charlie leDuff — who spoke of a Detroit where forgotten bodies were found in abandoned buildings — left me sure that the Detroit story was much bigger than we had the resources to cover.

There’s always next time.

Nissan’s Big Plans

Paul Scott — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 22:42:48 +0000

I’m probably going to seem a little Nissan-centric this month, what with their imminent big announcement August 2nd. But also because I, along with a few other Plug In America members, spent the better part of the past three days meeting with about ten of Nissan’s advanced planning team. They invited us to come to their Los Angeles facility and participate in a wide ranging series of discussions, marketing seminars, and even a drive over to Santa Monica to see what a normal day driving an EV was like. They were a delightful group, younger than all of us (except for Chelsea).

Full disclosure; While we gave them many hours of our time, they did treat us to one dinner.

Today was the last day, and for me, the most interesting. They had scheduled a tour of the Southern California Edison “Smart Garage” in Pomona with the dynamic Ed Kjaer as tour leader. Ed, you may remember, gave President Obama a tour of the same facility a couple of months ago, which may account for the strong support we’re seeing from Obama’s administration for plug-in cars.

SoCal Edison’s Electric Vehicle department is probably the most sophisticated of its kind anywhere, and Ed runs the place. Seeing him describe how plug-ins will be integrated into the newer grid, yet to come, is to fully comprehend what our future will be like. Quiet, clean and powerful cars running on renewable electricity.

It would be beneficial if “60 Minutes” were to produce a segment with Ed describing how this will work. We need to get this information out to everyone as quickly as possible.

The Nissan folks have to be commended for seeking our input, as we’re the only consumer group that has many years of experience with production highway capable EVs. Since their stated goal is to be the first major carmaker to mass market a fully electric car starting next year, they felt it was a good idea to ask us what it’s like to use these cars on a daily basis.

I thought most of the questions would center around the upcoming release of their first car, but these folks are the team that helps envision the cars built 5 years from now, so instead they were thinking of a wide variety of EVs, presumably to cover as wide a market as possible.

There seemed to be little of the reticence we’ve seen from Toyota and Honda for plug-ins. Instead, they were clear that what they were going to offer was going to go over big. We gave them what they were looking for, and what we’ve been wanting a large OEM to ask for. More meetings are planned at our houses so they can see how the solar PV integrates so well with the cars.

Two more weeks till we see their first EV.

Nissan’s Big Gamble

Paul Scott — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 23:38:24 +0000

We’ll finally get to see the new Nissan August 2nd. (That’s Tokyo time, it’ll still be the 1st here.) I assume they’ll have the name finalized by then, too.

I’m kind of excited to see this car, having tested the drivetrain in the Nissan Cube. The drivability was similar to my RAV, but quicker. Since the Cube is 200 lbs heavier than the final body of the EV, it should be a bit quicker still.

The best thing about the Nissan is the expected price range of $25K- $34K. This is before the $7,500 federal tax credit.

Some think Nissan is taking a gamble by rapidly moving into mass marketing of EVs, comparing the company’s approach to Toyota and Honda’s approach of “wait and see how the market materializes for EVs, then jump in.” I think it’s Toyota and Honda that are doing the gambling. They own the hybrid market and are doing quite well, thank you, so why adopt a whole new technology that’s untried on a large scale? The gamble is that Nissan could grab the EV market and dominate it until BYD (China) enters the U.S., in 2012.

Those who make the decisions to forgo battery EVs in favor of plug- in hybrids only ignore a sizable market. I can only assume they have not spent any appreciable time in a well made EV. The benefits overwhelm the perceived problem of range. Once several thousand people get the opportunity to buy the likes of Nissan’s well made EV, the demand from the early adopters’ friends and family will expand exponentially. Of this I am certain.

Of course, we need millions of plug-in hybrids, too, so more power to everyone contributing to that market. It’s interesting to speculate regarding the relative market share of the EV in relation to the PHEV. I’m guessing close to 50/50. It’ll be mostly driven by the cost of gas. That’s a given.

All I can think is that Carlos Ghosn, Nissan’s CEO, has driven an EV, maybe even the RAV itself, and this is why he’s positioning his company to be the leader in EVs. Perhaps he knows how good it feels to drive a quiet, powerful car that doesn’t pollute. One that only uses domestic energy. He knows that if given the choice, millions of people would choose that over a car that poisons the air and uses mostly foreign energy.

Nissan’s big bet: Mass market for EVs

Hans Greimel Automotive News July 6, 2009 – 12:01 am ET

YOKOHAMA, Japan — Nissan Motor Co. CEO Carlos Ghosn is spending big money to make electric vehicles in high volumes — and soon.

On Aug. 2, Ghosn will unveil the first of three electric models in three vehicle segments that he plans to sell by 2013. The vehicles will be made in the United States, Japan and Europe.

“We have a different strategy from other car manufacturers,” Ghosn says. “We are the only ones investing for mass marketing, which is a risk, yes. But we think it is a bet in the right direction.”

That bet takes shape at a new lithium ion battery plant and at an electric-vehicle assembly line that Nissan will build at its Smyrna, Tenn., manufacturing complex. A $1.6 billion low-interest loan from the U.S. government will cover some of the costs. Analysts question the payoff.

Nissan is not alone in going electric.

– In June, Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd., maker of Subaru cars, began leasing electric cars in Japan. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. follows later this month.

– Toyota Motor Corp. will sell a plug-in Toyota Prius after 2010, taking on the Chevrolet Volt, which goes on sale in November 2010.

– BMW AG’s Mini brand is testing a plug-in model in the United States.

– Tesla Motors Inc., owned 10 percent by Daimler AG, received a $465 million government loan to help bring its $57,400 Model S electric sedan to market.

‘Go for mass market’

But rivals see initial volume in the hundreds or thousands. Ghosn wants hundreds of thousands. “If you go for EV, you should go for mass market,” he says.

Analysts warn of hype. Battery-powered cars may be the wave of the future, but costs are high; the recharging infrastructure isn’t there, and hefty government subsidies are needed to make electric vehicles competitive.

Nissan sees the technology as its best chance to eclipse Toyota and Honda Motor Co., which beat Nissan in introducing hybrid vehicles.

“This is an opportunity to go into a whole new technology and own that space,” says Andy Palmer, head of Nissan’s electric-vehicle program. “Hybrid vehicles compete with the internal combustion engine. But EVs are a segment all their own.”

Nissan’s consumer research shows that “there are definitely more than 100,000 in the United States who want” their next car to be an electric, Palmer says.

Dealers excited

“We can’t get them soon enough,” says Bill Newton, owner of Newton Nissan in Gallatin, Tenn. “Customers have already been asking about the cars since the news broke about Nissan’s plans to build the car here in Tennessee.”

In California, Nissan of Elk Grove owner John Driebe thinks Nissan has identified a powerful new market segment. “A lot of Americans really want to stop using imported oil,” he says. “We’re excited about being able to market a car that will never use a drop of gasoline.”

Driebe’s market near Sacramento is home to about 80,000 California state employees, many of whom are worried about the state’s current budget crisis. Driebe sees commuting state employees as an ideal demographic group for the car.

“By the time the electric car comes on line in 2012, the economy in California will be in a better place,” says Driebe, the 2006 chairman of the Nissan Dealer Advisory Board. “Nissan is really committing to this idea, and I think they’re going to be proven right.”

The Tennessee factories will have capacity for 150,000 vehicles and 200,000 battery packs a year. Production begins in late 2012.

Nissan also will build electric vehicles at its Oppama assembly plant south of Tokyo, starting next fall with a capacity of 50,000. It also plans an electric-vehicle plant for Europe and is studying a plant for China.

The first Japan-built car goes on sale in the United States and Japan next year to fleet customers such as corporations and local governments. It will be a four-door hatchback seating five people — about the size of the Nissan Cube or Versa — with a range of 100 miles per charge. Pricing isn’t set.

Oil vs. electrons

Batteries are expensive. But Ghosn thinks rising oil prices will tilt the economics in favor of electrons. If crude oil rises above $80 a barrel, Nissan’s electric vehicles will be cheaper to own and operate than gasoline-powered cars, he says.

Crude trades for around $70 a barrel today. Analysts say that will rise as the global economy recovers.

Ghosn aims for Nissan’s electric cars, minus the battery, to cost as much as a standard car. Consumers will lease the battery at a cost that, including charging, will match what they would have paid for gasoline.

Chris Richter, an analyst with CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, says, “If they can make good on Ghosn’s promise of a price comparable to a normal car, I think people will lap these up.”

Nissan hasn’t said how much it is spending on its electric ambitions. The first of the three models costs as much to develop as three normal cars, a person familiar with the situation says. The total investment in battery and car assembly at Smyrna is expected to exceed Nissan’s $1.6 billion loan from Washington, he says.

The machinery needed to make 50,000 batteries a year costs more than $300 million, he said. Add in other costs, and the price tag just for battery plants in the United States, Japan and Europe — which together will make more than 300,000 battery packs a year — could total about $1.5 billion.

Analysts ask whether Nissan’s bid to take an early lead in electrics is worth the cost. Kurt Sanger, an auto analyst with Deutsche Securities Inc., says, “If the competition just sits back to see if it works and then uses its brand credibility to enter the market, there’s no need to be first.”

But Ghosn sees his bet as positioning Nissan for the future, not just beating rivals to market with a single model.

“It’s a complete new lineup. Big cars, small cars, vans, light commercial vehicles, entry-level cars,” Ghosn says. “It’s a complete new way of looking at our industry.”

Tesla, Ford and Nissan win big with DOE grants

Paul Scott — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 20:13:24 +0000

We’ve been waiting for several months to hear this good news. Three EV pioneers, Tesla, Nissan and Ford, are receiving loans from the Department of Energy’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing program. Totaling $8 billion, the funds will be used to manufacture efficient vehicles and electric drive components.

In Tesla’s case, they’ll receive a total of $465 million to set up their factory in Southern California for the production of their hot Model S. This car has generated a lot of interest given its superb styling, performance and efficiency. The price point of $57K makes it affordable for a large segment of the population. Part of the money will be used to set up a production line for their battery packs and electric drive trains to be sold to other manufacturers such as their new partner, Daimler.

Nissan will receive $1.6 billion to build EV and battery factories in Tennessee. Having experienced the drive train for their new EV, I am very pleased that this will enable them to ramp up quickly to 150,000 EVs annually. This car will appeal to a larger segment of the population given its price of around $30K.

Ford is the big surprise for me. They’re getting the lion’s share of the money at $5.9 billion. They’ll use it to increase the efficiency of several of their cars and trucks. I assume some will go toward building their new EV with the help of Canadian parts supplier, Magna.

This announcement assures that large numbers of electric vehicles will be available to U.S. customers starting late next year and growing rapidly soon after. Additionally, tens of thousands of jobs will be created.

There will more announcements to come. I’m betting that Bright Automotive in Indiana will be on the next list of recipients.

It’s Happening

Paul Scott — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 22:41:12 +0000

It’s happening.

New production electric cars are being delivered at a rate of 100 per month. Teslas mostly, but the first BMW MINI E was also delivered last week, and we’ll have about 500 more of them on the road within the month.

Back in 1999, when we were all a twitter about Y2K, there were about 5,000 production EVs on California roads with a few dozen more in both Arizona and Georgia. Then they were gone. All but a thousand or so survived the crusher and have been proving themselves for 6-10 years by driving millions of oil-free, noise-free miles.

As we watch the first thousand of the new breed of EVs enter, and by doing so, double our national fleet, we can take heart that this meager trickle of cars will grow into a flow of thousands of EVs within the next 24 months. Then, everyone on this list can get one. Yahoo!

Each EV will replace a gas burner, thereby reducing the pollution we all breathe and the demand for oil which will keep the costs down for all of us.

How long before the number of plug-in cars outnumbers the gas burners? I think it’ll happen some time around 2022, give or take. Of course, you can help your community get there earlier by getting in line early for yours …

Chu Declares Electric Transportation “Inevitable”

Paul Scott — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 22:39:03 +0000

I heard that Energy Secretary, Steven Chu, was giving the commencement address at CalTech recently, so I jumped in our solar-powered RAV and drove over to Pasadena to hear what he had to say.

Pasadena is a beautiful city, and the section of town where CalTech is located is old and very wealthy. Walking through the leafy campus, Jacarandas in full bloom, I admired the buildings that for decades housed some of the smartest students our country ever produced as well as a sizable number of foreign kids intent on getting the best education possible in their chosen fields of mathematics, science and engineering. My anticipation over Dr. Chu’s speech grew with each step.

He did not disappoint.

Those of us in the EV movement were overjoyed when Obama picked Dr. Chu to head the Energy Department. An actual Nobel-winning PhD in physics who has a deep understanding of our predicament regarding energy and climate change in charge of the Energy Department. A true breath of fresh air!

He broke the ice by defining the term, nerd, using the Wikipedia definition (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerd), since most in his audience proudly considered themselves as such. I think it’s actually on the form when you apply to CalTech.

Having dispensed with the obligatory humorous start, he got down to business by reminding the audience that, in the early 70’s, scientists solved the pressing need to grow more food in order to keep millions from starvation and expressed that our problems today are every bit as important if not more so. He implored the students to take seriously the need to act fast in solving these problems and to not allow those who prefer faith over reason to interfere with the task at hand.

As one would expect, he talked about energy mostly, but my ears pricked up when he said we needed to prepare for the “inevitable transition to electricity as the energy for our personal transportation.” While most may have missed the importance of this comment, it meant everything to me. Those at the top of the Obama administration understand the need to move from dirty fossil fuels to renewable electricity, and their efforts so far show they are serious.

Chu’s defunding, at the federal level, of the hydrogen fuel cell vehicle, means he knows we need to put our efforts toward solutions that are ready now, not toward some expensive, inefficient technology that requires us to continue buying our energy from oil companies.

As the speech ended, and I started to go, the strains of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 “Ode to Joy” flowed out of the loud speakers and I walked through the beautiful purple flowering Jacarandas, happier than I’ve been for a while. Maybe these scientists, engineers and mathematicians can indeed help us to ward off the worst of what will come.

And now…the Plug In Tanker

Paul Scott — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 00:14:58 +0000

The Alaskan Navigator, one of two British Petroleum oil tankers retrofitted to be electrically operated dockside. (Diandra Jay/Press-Telegram)

It’s been a long time coming, but we have finally achieved the first “cold ironing” of a tanker in the Port of Long Beach. Cold Ironing is the term for plugging a ship’s electrical system into the on-shore grid to supply power so that the ship’s giant diesel engine can be turned off while it’s docked. Normally, these engines crank out massive amounts of pollution, equal to “a day’s worth of driving by 187,000 cars,” according to estimates by the Port of Long Beach.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) initiated suits against the ports over seven years ago to make this happen, and it was a long difficult fight, but the NRDC’s attorneys persevered and eventually won. This event marks the first of what we hope will be the electrification of all the tanker and cargo ships while docked in the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. For too long, the people living downwind of the ports have suffered the ill effects of this pollution with heart and lung disease, cancers and asthma rates that are significantly higher than average.

An earlier post of mine highlighted the hybridization of the tugboats that guide these massive ships into berth, further extending the benefits of electrifying what had been exclusively internal combustion-powered vehicles. Every kilowatt hour used to replace the burning of petroleum helps us to clean our environment, saves us money and reduces the need to fight wars over oil.

Read about it in the La Times story: Port of Long Beach takes ‘giant step’ toward pollution reduction

Port of Long Beach takes ‘giant step’ toward pollution reduction Port officials unveil what is billed as the world’s first electrical shore-side power system for tankers, which are notorious fuel guzzlers and air polluters…

At a ceremony formally unveiling the port’s dockside power system, port Executive Director Dick Steinke described it as “another giant step” toward cleaning up the air.

The project cost $23.7 million and took three years to complete, port officials said. The port contributed about $17.5 million to the project and BP paid the rest.

Port of Long Beach takes ‘giant step’ toward pollution reduction

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-green-ports4-2009jun04,0,7934525.story
By Ronald D. White, La Times

June 4, 2009

Port of Long Beach takes ‘giant step’ toward pollution reduction Port officials unveil what is billed as the world’s first electrical shore-side power system for tankers, which are notorious fuel guzzlers and air polluters. Docked in Long Beach on Wednesday with a fresh load of oil from Valdez, the Alaskan Navigator didn’t look like much of a trailblazer.

The massive tanker sat silently, with a few thin cables draping down to some gray metal boxes. Missing was the incessant rumble of diesel engines, which on an average cargo ship would be running constantly to keep electrical systems going — burning quite a bit of diesel fuel and generating a significant amount of pollution. But the 941-foot Navigator, anchored at the BP oil terminal’s Pier T on the Long Beach port’s main channel, isn’t average. The vessel, owned by Alaska Tanker Co. of Portland, Ore., was plugged into what is billed as the world’s first shore-side electrical grid.

Only the Navigator’s sister ship, the Frontier, is similarly equipped. Oil tankers are notorious fuel guzzlers and air polluters because of the power that’s needed to pump vast amounts of crude out of a ship. It’s the rough energy equivalent of a day’s worth of driving by 187,000 cars, according to the Port of Long Beach.

At a ceremony formally unveiling the port’s dockside power system, port Executive Director Dick Steinke described it as “another giant step” toward cleaning up the air.

The project cost $23.7 million and took three years to complete, port officials said. The port contributed about $17.5 million to the project and BP paid the rest.

Roger Brown, regional vice president of BP, said the emissions reductions amounted to 50% even when factoring in pollution created by power plants in generating the electricity.

ron.white@latimes.com

Chelsea Test Drives The Volt

Chelsea Sexton — Wed, 27 May 2009 16:29:49 +0000

Chelsea Sexton with GM's Tony Posawatz

Our Consulting Producer Chelsea Sexton got to test drive the GM Volt recently.

Here’s her verdict :

From the first Volt unveiling over two years ago, I’ve wanted to drive one. At some point last year, Tony Posawatz’s first words upon seeing me ceased to be “Hey, chels”, and became “I know, I know”. Given the history, I’ve all but made a nuisance of myself for this company, seeking evidence of their sincerity about doing another plug-in car- “fool me once, shame on you, but fool me twice” and all of that. I eventually came to believe they mean it, but I haven’t been sure that they really “get it” when it comes to what people love about electric cars- worrisome when they’re staking the future of the company on another one. That they still trash the EV1 to make the case for the Volt doesn’t help- beyond the fact that they are different cars meant for very different markets. While the EV1 wasn’t flawless, it became the benchmark of what GM was capable of in both engineering and consumer passion. As a result, they’re now known for building a car people are willing to get arrested for- no small act to follow. And at a time when the company is fighting just to survive, I wouldn’t be the only one wondering if the Volt would be nickel-and-dimed to a shadow of its potential.

So when I got a surprise call a few Fridays ago inviting me to fly to Detroit for a test drive, I hopped a red-eye and was there- with “Revenge of the Electric Car” film crew in tow, of course. If the Volt drive wasn’t enough, the Milford Proving Grounds is like Disneyland to a girl like me (though my description of it being filled with gearhead porn made my hosts blush a little!) After a quick tour of the property, we arrived at the section of course that had been closed for us. Standing in the middle of nothing but alternating stripes of grass and road, was a white Chevy Cruze emblazoned with large blue “Volt” graphics, like the smallest kid standing on his toes for the class picture.

Next to the car was Frank Weber, looking more proud and hopeful than I’ve ever seen. Self-described with the statement “I am German, I am an engineer- I do not feel”, Frank has always seemed pessimistic to me against the aspirational backdrop of the Volt team- but even he couldn’t completely disguise his thrill at finally having something functional to show after two years of talking. I’d had enough of the talking, myself- so with little fanfare, I was pointed toward the track and let loose. After the first few of many laps, Jim, “the Voltkeeper” who tended the car all day from a technical standpoint, asked if might stop smiling anytime soon. I think Frank just wondered if all EV people drive that fast…

I drove the Volt off and on all day long (stopping not because the car needed to, but because we were also interviewing GM folks in-between driving segments). It is more refined than many production cars I’ve driven, a fact that ironically breeds impatience- it’s hard not to drive it and think, “oh, this is fine, let’s just get on with production already”. It’s also the quietest full-performance plug-in I’ve seen so far- they must’ve beaten every bit of motor whine out of that car, because it sounds more docile than it is. It’s incredibly smooth, and very solid-feeling, even on the intentionally rough proving ground roads. Because it’s still a mule, Frank assured me that the car is only at about 80% of the final version’s performance capability, and that the extra bit of low-end torque I came away wanting would be there. While the acceleration is quite good (0-60 in 9 seconds), I was admittedly spoiled by the “off the line” performance of GM’s last EV, and the Volt doesn’t quite have the initial surge I was expecting as its progeny.

In fairness, the Volt can’t rightfully be compared to the EV1 (I myself have badgered GM not to do it) but I am aware that it and the other EVs of the 1990s are the frame of reference for many folks. I will say simply that this is not that. It is not a hand built car, so lacks all of the quirks, noises, and yes- individuality- that implies. Undoubtedly, some will be disappointed by that fact- but GM is clearly betting that the masses will be thrilled by it. Most folks love what they can do with the iPhone but don’t give a rip about what’s actually inside. It’s the functionality and flexibility that allows personalization and is most appealing; I suspect a similar line of thinking is informing the Volt.

I also failed to talk the guys into letting me drive the Volt in range-extended mode- I’d really been hoping to put to rest all the conjecture that because no one’s been allowed to drive it that way, there must be something wrong with it. Alas, Frank was typically insistent that it just wasn’t ready. I persisted, assuring him I’m familiar with pre-production systems, but he remained stoic, until I finally pinned him- “what is so wrong with this car that you won’t let anyone drive it with the engine on?” He paused, and admitted almost sheepishly, “well, when the engine comes on, you can hear it.” I kept waiting for more, but that was it-the big mystery… you can hear the engine. I started to note how that would be, oh, I don’t know, standard for an internal combustion engine in any car and that some people prefer it that way, but I was chastened by my own admiration for the position he took. While there’s absolutely a point where you have to stop engineering and start building, Frank’s statement is indicative of the attention to detail being paid to the Volt.

That said, some of the other folks working with the other mules found out we were there and “happened” to drive by a few times, in range extended mode- the thing is already Prius quiet. And because the generator operates within certain distinct “power bands” depending on the driver’s right foot (more power requested, higher the band- if the request is at the lower end of any band, the extra energy is fed back into the batteries) any detectable sound should directly correlate with attendant ambient and road noise. Can’t speak firsthand on the power of the generator- it is on spec certainly enough to keep up with all but the heaviest loads, but time-and my next test drive- will tell.

After I’d looped myself dizzy and exhausted the car, we went over to the Tech Center to interview Tony Posawatz about the latest status of the program and how it’s been affected by GM’s current economic situation. The Volt is Tony’s baby (I actually watched his eyes well up when the production concept rolled out on the platform at the 100-yr anniversary), so I expected him to be upbeat, and he was- they’ve been hiring for the Volt program, and are otherwise keeping noses down and trying not to worry about the political noise- they have a car to build. And as if to prove it, he pointed to a digital clock on the wall in plain view to the core team- it counts down to the minute the amount of time til the next milestone: the day they start building the first 80 “actual” Volts. Just in case someone takes his eyes off the ball. The date is now just a few days away, and everyone knows it. These will still be prototypes, but they’ll be in the right body and one step closer to production. My inner MacGuyver is already plotting an “extended test-drive”…It’s professional duty and all- someone’s gotta test that low-end torque.

Driving the Volt was a mix of experiences- it was a fun day, and it’s great to see spots of hope in Detroit from folks who are excited to be working on “something cool again” (their words). And let’s face it, it was also a relief- there were certainly some years there when I wasn’t sure they’d ever get even this far on a plug-in car again. But in the end, building the car won’t be their biggest challenge- it never has been. Whether they can get behind it effectively as it hits showrooms remains to be seen. And I remain repeatedly frustrated at watching them struggle to tell their own story, or when they allow, say, Bob Lutz to go on national television. I think they’re learning, but I wonder often if the wisdom will come fast enough- and at what cost.

I still don’t know that they entirely understand the nuances of passion people have for electric cars- but I do think that they understand just what’s at stake for this one. It is the end of the poker game for GM, and they’re all in.

Tom Hanks, The New Yorker — and Electric Cars

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 12 May 2009 19:39:01 +0000

Tom Hanks in his Toyota RAV4-EV

We were delighted to see Tom Hanks’s letter in this week’s ‘New Yorker’ — singing the praises of electric vehicles and name checking ‘Who Killed the Electric Car ?’

Read the full letter here :

RE: THE ROAD AHEAD

A letter in response to Peter J. Boyer’s article (April 27, 2009)

MAY 18, 2009

Peter J. Boyer, in his otherwise spot-on piece about the car industry, assumes that I once leased G.M.’s sadly fated EV1 electric car and, like other drivers of that twin-seat rocket of a vehicle, watched the emission-free car be wrested from my garage, towed away, and busted up into pieces of metal, glass, and rubber smaller than razor blades (“The Road Ahead,” April 27th).

Luckily, I did not. The source of Boyer’s slight inaccuracy may have been the documentary film “Who Killed the Electric Car?,” which used a clip of a visit I made to the “Late Show with David Letterman,” during which I claimed to be saving America one electric car at a time. However, by the time I began shopping for an all-electric car, in 2003, the EV1 had already been yanked from showrooms as if the car had never existed. Instead, I found what was purported to be the very last electric car available for sale in the state of California—a Toyota EV. It had four doors, a rear hatch, room for my family, including a dog in the back, power windows, A/C, a great sound system, and the fastest, most effective windshield defroster known to mankind. When the car companies collectively, and, to some, diabolically, decided to take these cars back, the electric vehicles disappeared.

But not mine. I have the pink slip. I own that car, and it is still driven every day, albeit by one of my crack staff of employees. My electric car recently crossed fifty thousand miles on the odometer with its original battery but without so much as a splash of gasoline.

Tom Hanks Los Angeles, Calif.

[Source: The New Yorker]

The Power of Electric

Stefano Paris — Mon, 11 May 2009 20:05:44 +0000

Cast and Crew: Stefano, Alexandra, and Gary

When Google asked for submissions of a 90 second video on the benefits of plug in cars to show at a 2008 Washington DC Brookings-Google Electric Car conference, Alexandra Paul and Stefano Paris decided to rise to the challenge! With Stefano’s friend Gary Winterboer, they shot this video at a local gas station using Alexandra’s RAV4-EV and Stefano’s EVO. Tom Hanks, who owns 2 electric cars, stopped by the gas station to buy a drink, recognized Alexandra from their Dragnet days, and watched some of the filming. The video was chosen to open up the plug in conference which was described in an October 2008 Washington Post article as follows:

Just four months ago, a conference here on electric cars drew four times as many people as expected. District fire marshals ordered some of the crowd to leave, and the atmosphere was more like that of a rock concert than an energy conference. A brief film depicted an electric car owner driving off with a beautiful woman to the strains of “The Power of Love” while her original companion struggles to pay for gasoline. The audience cheered.

This May 31st marks the 1 year anniversary of the fun “Power of Electric” videoshoot.

The Power of Electric

2008.06.11 Day 1 Plug-In Conference 1-2pm

[Sources]
- Alexandra Paul’s “Power of Electric”
- Stefano Paris’s “Power of Electric” video-photoshoot archive
- Stefano’s archive of the 2008 Brookings-Google Plug-In Conference Webcast
- Watch “Power of Electric” open the Plug-In Conference (1st Webcast hour video)

A Bright Day in DC

P.G. Morgan — Mon, 11 May 2009 07:40:48 +0000

YOU KNOW THE times are a changin’ when you see Republican senators like Richard Lugar turning out for the launch of an electric vehicle. We interviewed Senator Lugar in DC recently — as we caught the Capitol Hill debut of Bright Automotive’s Idea — a plug-in hybrid electric delivery vehicle.

Senator Lugar was also cheering for his home team – Bright are from Anderson, Indiana. They claim the Idea will save a 250 vehicle fleet company more than $500,000 a year in reduced fuel costs. That’s because the Idea will operate in all-electric mode for the first 30 miles before switching to hybrid mode for a full range of 400 miles. For a typical drive of 50 miles, that means the truck will consume just half a gallon of gasoline — equivalent to 100mpg fuel efficiency. Neat.

Bright know what they’re talking about — the company grew out of a project at the Colorado-based Rocky Mountain Institute and is partnered with forward-thinking organizations like Google, Alcoa and the Turner Foundation. What’s more, Bright’s CEO John Waters helped to develop the battery pack system for GM’s EV1.

We filmed John as he briefed Congressmen and women on the Bright Idea. Heather Zichal, Deputy Assistant to the President on Energy, said a few supportive words before John and his team walked over to the Senate for a repeat performance.

As the second Bright photo call ended, we were astonished to find a row of electric vehicles — Tesla, GM, Chrysler — parked outside the Senate office buildings. It was a pre-Earth Day preview. Senator Tom Harkin took a Tesla for a test drive. GM’s Tony Posawatz was there plugging the Volt. Hard to imagine that happening even a year ago.

Behind all the hoopla however, there was a serious purpose to Bright’s trip. They’ve applied for $450m of government money — from the DOE’s Advanced Tech Fund — so they can make 50,000 of their 100mpg vehicles by 2012. The DC charm offensive was all part of the plan — as were the public shows of support from Frito Lay and Duke Energy Corp.

So … fingers crossed for Bright. We’ll be tracking their progress over the next 18 months for ‘Revenge.’

MINI E Makes LA Debut

Paul Scott — Wed, 06 May 2009 23:45:08 +0000

BMW’s just held an event for the lessees of their MINI E at the Science Center, next to the University of Southern California, a really stellar venue when you consider the product they were showing.

I arrived at the same time as Stefano Paris, Plug In America’s documentarian, and as we walked from the parking lot, we went past an SR71 Blackbird on display to get to the party. This sleek, titanium marvel can travel at mach 3.2, orders of magnitude faster than the 95 mph MINI E. A truly awesome feat of engineering. It got us in the mood to see some equally exciting engineering, this time a combination of AC Propulsion’s drive system packed into the tight confines of the German engineered MINI.

There were lots of folks I knew in attendance, all of them excited that delivery was finally close. There have been delays, something we advocates of plug-ins have grown to expect. But these were happy folks. There was no mistaking it.

I got to meet Nathalie Bauters, the communications director for the MINI E program in the U.S., and she assured me the delay was only due to getting final UL approval for the plug they are using for charging. The cars have been waiting in a parking lot in Oxnard for weeks. BMW wants to make sure that all of their customers have an approved and permitted charging station installed in their garage before delivery. This is exactly what happened when we got our Toyota RAV EV six years ago. No charger, no car.

So, it appears most, if not all of the cars will be delivered in June. These MINIs, combined with the 400-500 Tesla Roadsters that will be on the road by end of June, effectively doubles the number of production highway capable EVs in the U.S. The Teslas will continue delivering at a rate of 100 per month while the MINI E customers will be the only ones in the country with these cars until the year long test phase is over and BMW cranks up the production of more.

The difference with how Nissan is approaching the EV is interesting. While BMW is taking a careful look at how its customers will be driving the cars and how they charge them, trying to see if there are any issues to deal with before committing to large numbers of EVs, Nissan is racing to get thousands on the road as fast as possible. They seem very comfortable that their car is going to be bulletproof right out of the gate. I heard today that they expect to have 5,000 Nissan EVs for sale by the end of 2010. It is expected they will expand production quickly to the tens of thousands in 2011.

We are privileged to have front row seats to observe this quickly evolving transportation technology. When you look back 20 years from now, when virtually every vehicle sold has a plug on it, you’ll remember these pioneer companies as being well ahead of the curve. Tesla will be a common brand, with several well received models in all price ranges, and there will be a few proud owners of the original Apteras zipping along the freeways among all manner of new plug-in cars, trucks and even SUVs. The gas burners of today will be mostly gone, replaced with cleaner and quieter cars.

The 200 people at tonight’s party will soon take their place among the pioneers who helped bring this future about. You could really feel their excitement.

My good friend, Jeff U’ren, who came loaded with questions for the BMW folks and came away satisfied with the answers. The one question about whether the lessees can take the $7,500 tax credit is still to be determined. More on that later…

Elon — and Model S — on Letterman

Chris Paine — Fri, 01 May 2009 21:56:21 +0000

Tesla CEO Elon Musk appeared on the David Letterman show on Wednesday. Dave and Elon talk about the Roadster, the Model S and the future of electric cars.

Watch out for the name check for ‘Who Killed the Electric Car?’ around 3 minutes in …

Wally Rippel drives the MINI E

Paul Scott — Fri, 01 May 2009 20:59:14 +0000

[slidepress gallery='paulscott-minie']

AC Propulsion, the San Dimas, CA, company that birthed the modern-day EV with its AC-150 drive train, was tapped by BMW last year to provide drivetrains for an initial run of 500 Minis. Dubbed the “MINI E,” these fully-electric cars are just weeks from being deployed on the streets of Southern Californai, New York, and New Jersey.

I’d been promised a test drive, so when Wally Rippel (you’ll remember Wally from “Who Killed the Electric Car?”) called and invited me out, I jumped at the chance.

Wally was involved in the design of the Impact/EV1 while at Aerovironment, along with Alec Brooks and the incomparable Allan Cocconi (the “AC” of AC Propulsion). Wally worked for a while helping Tesla Motors launch their Roadster, and is now back at AC Propulsion working on the newest iteration of the AC-150. Rumor has it that this next one will be quite a bit more powerful than the first.

Wally drove me to a local restaurant for lunch, so I could get familiar with the interior of the car without having to watch for traffic. The MINI E is a well designed car with all the amenities one would expect of a new car these days. I was more impressed than most, probably because I’m still driving that old RAV that was never much of a luxury vehicle to begin with, and, 6 years in, it still hasn’t gotten any more comfortable. (my wife Zan, I might add, adores the car and has no complaints.)

When it was my turn to drive, the first thing I noticed was the lack of a creep mode. This is what Toyota built in to the RAV to simulate a gas car. When you let off the brake, any gas car with an automatic transmission will slowly roll forward without stepping on the accelerator. You expect this movement, and when it’s not there, it feels like something is wrong. Wally said they’d probably add it in the future, since it’s an easy software upgrade.

After pulling out onto the street, I gave it a punch to see how Tesla-like it was. The BMW engineers limit the voltage going to the motor, so it’s not a rocket like the Tesla Roadster, but it does have very strong acceleration. The soft whine of the motor is reminiscent of the EV1, and quite pleasing to the ear. It’s sort of like what you’d expect an EV to sound like, but don’t worry, it’s barely audible, so you won’t be waking the neighbors.

I really wanted to see what it would do, so we jumped on the freeway, and I let her rip. This is where the similarity to the Roadster is most apparent. The car practically jumps forward, and the strong acceleration doesn’t let up like internal combustion cars do as they reach their peak torque RPM and begin hungering for another gear. The MINI E just keeps pulling like crazy all the way to its top speed of 95 mph.

At one point, I was doing about 70 and punched it. Even at that speed, the car felt like it was taking off from a dead stop. Torque at high speeds is fun, and gives you the feeling you can get out of any situation, even in such a small package.

One of the coolest aspects of any AC Propulsion car is the regenerative braking. The way it’s designed, all you drive with is your right foot. As you let off the accelerator, the regen smoothly takes hold and slows you down. You almost never have to touch the brakes. My only complaint is the lack of a coast mode. My RAV has the ability to “freewheel,” or coast, with no regen, and I’ve learned to use this for hypermiling – getting the most efficiency possible when driving in traffic. Supposedly, you can feather the accelerator to a coasting position, but I was not able to feel it, so maybe it takes a little practice. I think a button on the steering wheel that lets you coast when pushed would be a good addition to future models.

I’m jealous of those who were able to get in line early for these MINI Es. Even though they’ll only have them for a year before BMW takes them back for study, it’ll be a terrific year.

I heard another rumor that BMW is working on the next batch of these little rockets already. The more the merrier, I say.

Tesla Model S Launch

P.G. Morgan — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:11:36 +0000

The ‘Revenge’ team was out in strength recently to film the launch of Tesla’s Model S in Los Angeles.

Check out the photos below to see the Model S — and our team in action.

Andrew’s High School Electric Hyundai

Andrew Grin — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 22:11:31 +0000

Say hello again to one of our guest bloggers, Andrew Grin.

I just got my electric car back from the shop (for some minor work) and I decided to shoot some video because of the beautiful spring weather.

Fully Electric Hyundai Tucson from Island Grin on Vimeo.

Driving Nissan’s Trial EV

Paul Scott — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 05:01:29 +0000

Photo by Antuan Goodwin, from the CNET Article: Test-driving the Nissan EV-02 electric car

I got invited to go to Dodger Stadium this afternoon to test drive the Nissan EV. This wasn’t the final car, but the finished drivetrain in a Nissan Cube. I was assured it would be very close to the actual feel of the car though, and given the similarity of the Cube in weight to the final EV (the Cube was about 200 lbs heavier I was told), the ride should be comparable.

No mistaking it, this is a test car.

I was very impressed with the ride. The acceleration was significantly better than my RAV, no doubt due to the Li-Ion battery pack weighing about 400-500 lbs less than the Toyota’s NiMH pack. That’s 4 adults worth of mass, and as anyone who drives EVs will tell you, weight is something to be avoided. This is the same with gas cars, too, but so much energy is wasted with internal combustion that most people don’t care about the loss from extra weight.

They had a test run of about half a mile set up in the vast parking lot around the stadium, enough so that I could punch it a few times to test the acceleration, but I didn’t get to take it up to anything near the top speed. For performance, I’d give it a strong B+. I suspect the sedan body will enable a lower center of gravity, and if it’s 200 lbs lighter, it’ll have even more punch.

Mark Perry presented an informative powerpoint on the car, mostly general information, and not too much that I didn’t already get from the breakfast meeting of a month ago. However, the price range was news. They are expecting this car to sell for $25K-$33K before tax incentives. This makes the Nissan EV very affordable for most people. The federal tax credit is $7,500, and here in California, we’ll probably get another $5,000 off state taxes. Even at the high end of the price range, this means the car will sell for about $20K, much less if you start from the low end of the range.

Several other states are considering additional tax credits : Texas, Florida, Oregon and Washington, to name a few.

The first cars will be available next fall, about the time of the Chevy Volt debut. They intend for the majority of the Nissans to go to fleets initially, but they are certain some will be sold to private buyers in certain markets (Tennessee, Sonoma County, CA, the Bay Area, San Diego, LA and Oregon). The choice of these locations has to do with their roll out of a charging infrastructure.

I was told there is a good chance the actual car will be available to see fairly soon. Stay tuned…

MINI E arrives in US

P.G. Morgan — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 20:08:18 +0000

The first batch of MINI Es has arrived in the US.

A sharp-eyed ‘Revenge’ fan sent us these exclusive pictures from a holding facility in Central California, where the cars are being prepped for delivery.

BMW have promised 500 cars for the US market – and judging by what we saw, most of them are already here and ready for roll out.

Watch this space for delivery news.

Obama gives $2.4bn Jump Start To Battery Makers

Lisa Rein — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 10:41:52 +0000

President Obama is making good on his promise to spearhead the EV revolution. During a visit to Southern California Edison’s Pomona EV test facility, he launched a $2.4 billion competitive grant program for US battery makers.

It’s all part of the Obama administration’s plan get to 1 million plug in hybrids on the road by 2015.

Obama At A Town Hall Meeting in Los Angeles, California - March 19, 2009. Photos: Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times

Here’s a quote from the LA Times article By Maeve Reston:

Obama unveils $2.4-billion grant program to aid electric cars

“Even as our economy has been transformed by new forms of technology, our electric grid looks largely the same as it did half a century ago,” Obama said. “So we have a choice to make. We can remain one of the world’s leading importers of foreign oil, or we can make the investments that would allow us to become the world’s leading exporter of renewable energy.” The president renewed his commitment to doubling the country’s supply of renewable energy over the next few years — including spending $11 billion upgrading the nation’s power grid to ease the delivery of renewable energy across the country, and $15 million to help develop green technologies such as solar and wind power, and new coal technologies. As a receptive audience of engineers and workers cheered his plans, Obama pledged to put a million plug-in hybrid vehicles on the road by 2015, and highlighted his offer of up to $7,500 in tax credits for Americans who purchase electric vehicles. The new $2.4-billion grant program, which would be part of his recovery program, would ask companies to compete for federal money to increase the manufacturing of batteries and parts used in the electric cars.

Later that evening, Obama answered questions during a Town Hall Meeting that took place at Miguel Contreras Learning Center, in Los Angeles, California, where he warned us about the energy dinosaurs that would be opposing the new plan:

“…if we are going to make a serious investment in clean energy, well, that requires that we phase out dirty energy. And that requires that we stop subsidizing certain things and instead subsidize other things. Somebody is not going to be happy about that because they’ve been getting the subsidies, so they will start running ads on television saying this is a terrible energy plan.”

Read the full LA Times article and the complete Town Hall Transcript.

Gearing up for the MINI E

Stefano Paris — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 16:00:53 +0000

Stefano Paris at the November 19th, 2008 Los Angeles Auto Show unveiling of the MINI E.

200amp main electrical utility panel.

If you’ve been following the BMW MINI E program unveiled officially on November 19th, 2008 at the Los Angeles Auto Show you’ll know the process for being selected as a potential MINI E driver is a multistep one. The window to apply for a lease of a MINI E was from November 19th to December 24th, 2008, via an hour long online questionnaire.

In January 2009, I was excited to learn I was selected to be one of the potential 250 lessees of the MINI E being deployed in Southern California this year. Achieving selection status was just one of the first steps to MINI E driving sweetness. In the past couple of months I’ve been passing other qualifications. One of these items on the MINI E deployment checklist regards the residence where one is to park and charge the MINI E. MINI wants to insure their MINI Es will be parked in an enclosed garage and that the residence’s electrical system is up to the task of charging the car.

Clipper Creek EV Charge Station.

Last week I was notified by Clean Fuel Connection (the company contracted by MINI to deploy the MINI E specific Clipper Creek charge stations) that they would be conducting an initial site inspection of my garage and electrical service to insure I could support a MINI E. On Wednesday, March 11th, 2009, at 1:30pm I met with a very friendly Paul Jette of Sunpower Electrical, the electrical contractor assigned to do the actual charge station install. He inspected and took some photos of my 200Amp main electrical utility panel, and the garage space where the Clipper Creek MINI E charge station will be installed. A couple of years ago I had upgraded my electrical distribution system when I self-installed a 4kW Photovoltaic system with the knowledge that plug-in EVs would soon be in my driving future. My electrical cleanup resulted in a very neat and sparsely populated main panel, as I offloaded all individual circuits to a couple of subpanels. A majority of residences’ main electrical utility panel is their only panel, and many times it is completely stuffed with breakers and wiring, with no room for additional expansion. This is a result many times of the initial builder trying to save a few $$ and installing a less expensive panel. Generally, the cost of the electrical panel is “in the noise” (negligible), where the the majority of the cost of any electrical work is in the labor.

Milbank kWhr meter and 60amp feeder Murray circuit breaker.

Paul and I discussed the Clipper Creek charge station during his visit. It is to be protected by a 60amp feed breaker installed at the main panel. Paul confirmed the location I had already selected for mounting of the charge station to be ideal. I learned I was Paul’s 3rd MINI E initial site visit that day. These were his very first visits in the MINI E deployment program.

While MINI is picking up the tab for any and all electrical work required to install the Clipper Creek charge station, being an engineer I have the desire to install a kilowatt-hour meter ahead of the charge station to log EV charging kW/hrs. This self-imposed requirement means the charge station install by MINI at my house will be one of their simplest, as they just need to connect the charge station a few feet directly to the pre-installed and wired Milbank kilowatt-hour meter box I’ll already have in place. I’m looking forward to a callback from Clean Fuel Connection once they are ready to send out the Clipper Creek charge station for installation.

Stefano Paris sports an EV grin for the MINI E at the November 19th, 2008 Los Angeles Auto Show.

On a related MINI E note, if you haven’t already seen Jay Leno’s entertaining and very enthusiastic review of the MINI E that debuted earlier this week, definitely check out all the MINI E fun by watching his video below. The MINI E is powered by a beautiful, powerful, and efficient electric drive system manufactured by AC Propulsion of San Dimas, CA. AC Propulsion is the gold standard of electric drive in the EV industry. ACP has been in business for two decades and has been the force in leap frogging electric drive system technology into the modern EVs we know and love, like the pioneering GM EV1, AC Propulsion tzero, AC Propulsion eBox, the new 2009 MINI Es, and the gorgeous Tesla Roadster (a great evolution of licensed AC Propulsion electric drive technology).

Jay Leno’s Garage – 2009 MINI E

Under the hood of the MINI E.

MINI E powered by AC Propulsion!

[Source: Stefano Paris, Jay Leno's Garage]

Florida’s EV Tax Break

Stefano Paris — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 19:23:07 +0000

Florida House Majority Leader Adam Hasner

Josh Hafenbrack posts this informative entry covering the status of Hasner’s Florida State electric car tax break on the SunSentinel.com.

Florida State Representative (and House Majority Leader) Adam Hasner (R) has just introduced the bill HB 879 – Financial Incentives for Electric Vehicles.

From Josh’s article:

As the House Energy and Utilities Committee gave its stamp of approval to the measure, Hasner is planning a showing of “Who Killed the Electric Car?” to legislators tonight at the Tallahassee IMAX theatre. During the fall campaign, Hasner drove a leased 2002 all-electric Toyota RAV-4 throughout his south Palm Beach-Broward county district — when gas was at its $4-a-gallon peak. “I drove by the gas station with a smile every single day, because I was using an electric car that didn’t use any gas,” he said.

Bring on the EV Trucks

Lisa Rein — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 22:08:54 +0000

More electric trucks! I love that this market is blooming.

Fleet vehicles are perfect for EVs, since the routes are very predictable and tend to be within 100 miles per day. It’s easy to spec out a battery pack with enough kWh for a given size of truck to hit 60-80-100 miles, whatever the given fleet buyer needs. The longer the range, the more expensive, so you get only what you need.

Along with Tedd Abramson’s Zero Truck in San Diego and Smith Trucks in London, we now have EVI (I keep wanting to write that as EV1:~). The more the merrier, the market for these is going to explode soon with Obama’s stimulation plan, and its tax of $7,500 to $15,000 for electric trucks.

Many of the companies that have fleets of trucks have buildings that are perfect for solar. Add a solar PV system big enough to offset the building’s energy needs and charge the trucks, too, and you’ve just eliminated a whole lot of pollution, kept a lot of money from going out of the country and to the oil companies, and added value to your building. Sounds good to me.

As someone who rides a bike and a motorcycle in traffic, any time you can remove an internal combustion engine from spewing crap out its tailpipe and in your face, it’s a good thing. Trucks especially.

Paul

Fisker Automotive Karma ad airs on KTLA

Stefano Paris — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 17:30:36 +0000

Last Thursday, I flipped on the KTLA 5 news around 10:30pm, while grabbing a late dinner, and caught a Fisker Automotive Karma ad…on TV! I was caught completely and pleasantly by surprise seeing this great ad, as I don’t think we’ve yet seen any other EV/PHEV specific ads from any of the smaller start-ups.

Justifying the cost of TV ads could be difficult, but has the positive effect of alerting the general population – most of which are not closely following the EV movement – to realize EVs/PHEVs are happening.

I was able to find the Fisker Automotive Karma ad that ran during the KTLA pre-show
broadcast of the Academy Awards (2009.02.22), archived on YouTube for those that have not yet seen it:

Nissan Promises EV for 2010

Paul Scott — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 00:09:00 +0000

Nissan is a first tier OEM building a pure EV in the U.S. – for sale to regular folks.

They’re going to hit the market next fall, but will target Tennessee (where they will be made) and Oregon and Sonoma County, initially. (Carlos Ghosn must like the wine up that way or something.)

Regardless, once the $7,500 tax credit is accounted for, and the much lower maintenance costs, these should be about the same as buying a gas car, only the fuel will be less than a dollar a gallon equivalent. And your money stays domestic.

Buying one of these will cost about half what the Tesla Model S will cost and you can get it a full year earlier. It won’t be as cool as the Tesla, but most of us could afford one today.

Paul

Check out the article:
Nissan to launch electric car in Tennessee

By Mike Pare for the Chattanooga Times Free Press

Here’s a snippet from the article:

A top Nissan official in the U.S. said Monday that Tennessee is one of the first locations where it will sell its new all-electric car after it arrives in late 2010.

Also, the company eventually would like to make the car and its batteries in Smyrna, Tenn., and the Chattanooga area is in line for electric refueling infrastructure for the new vehicle, said Mark Perry, director of product planning and strategy for Nissan North America.

“Tennessee will be a launch market,” said Mr. Perry, additionally mentioning Oregon and Sonoma County, Calif.

The car will seat five and be in the size range of a Sentra or Versa, he told the Chattanooga Engineers Club.

“It will have 100 miles of pure battery range,” Mr. Perry said. He said Toyota’s 2010 Prius hybrid electric gets about 10 miles range on pure battery, while the planned Chevy Volt will get 40.

Mr. Perry said the Nissan, running on a lithium ion battery pack, won’t be a test model.

“We’re ready to go mass production and mass sales,” he said.

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:
http://timesfreepress.com/news/2009/feb/17/nissan-launch-electric- car-tennessee

A top Nissan official in the U.S. said Monday that Tennessee is one of the first locations where it will sell its new all-electric car after it arrives in late 2010.

Also, the company eventually would like to make the car and its batteries in Smyrna, Tenn., and the Chattanooga area is in line for electric refueling infrastructure for the new vehicle, said Mark Perry, director of product planning and strategy for Nissan North America.

“Tennessee will be a launch market,” said Mr. Perry, additionally mentioning Oregon and Sonoma County, Calif.

The car will seat five and be in the size range of a Sentra or Versa, he told the Chattanooga Engineers Club.

“It will have 100 miles of pure battery range,” Mr. Perry said. He said Toyota’s 2010 Prius hybrid electric gets about 10 miles range on pure battery, while the planned Chevy Volt will get 40.

Mr. Perry said the Nissan, running on a lithium ion battery pack, won’t be a test model.

“We’re ready to go mass production and mass sales,” he said.

The Nissan official said that while the cost for a conventional vehicle of similar size may range from $28,000 to $30,000, the federal government is offering a tax credit of up to $7,500 on the electric. There also will be other steps to lower the buyer’s initial costs.

He said maintenance costs will be about $1,350 lower annually for the pure electric vehicle than a conventional car.

“The pay back is immediate,” Mr. Perry said. He estimated the cost to “fill the tank” in the Tennessee Valley at about 90 cents, and it will take about four to eight hours to do so at a residence.

Mr. Perry said plans are to get that time frame down to four hours in 2012.

Jim Frierson, who directs the Advanced Transportation Technology Institute in Chattanooga, said Nissan’s plans are “music to our ears.”

He said the drive for putting electric vehicles on the road is “the space race of the decade.”

In terms of recharging infrastructure, plans are to start in the Nashville-Murfreesboro-Franklin area. Nissan’s USA headquarters are located in Franklin. Then, plans are to gain infrastructure in Knoxville and Chattanooga and eventually into North Carolina, Mr. Perry said.

While the car will be made in Japan at first, Mr. Perry said the company likes to produce vehicles where they’re purchased.

Announcing EV Driven

Lisa Rein — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 23:15:07 +0000

We want you to know about a new website and community for people who are passionate about Electric Vehicles. We’re excited to be a part of: EV Driven.

EV Driven aggregates the latest content from all these electric car blogs:

* Creative Greenius
* DIY Electric Car
* Electric Car Blog
* Electric Cars are for Girls
* Green Car Congress
* Green Gearhead
* My Green Wheels
* Open Source Civic EV Kit
* Plug In Partners
* Plugs and Cars
* Porsche 914 EV Conversion
* Revenge of the Electric Car
* Robs RAVolt

EV Driven is the brainchild of Dr. Tony Karrer.

ElectricAid.org Test Drives The Think City Electric Car

Stefano Paris — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 08:30:24 +0000

Last week Norway’s ElectricAid.org uploaded a very entertaining and artistic video test drive review of the Think City electric car. Watch the video in High Definition by clicking here. If you enjoy Top Gear you’ll love the humor and creative editing in this video short.

ElectricAid.org video Test Drive of the Think City Electric Car.

[Source: ElectricAid.org, YouTube]

Aptera 2e makes public debut

Stefano Paris — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 07:21:41 +0000

We have TWO reports from guest bloggers who attended the Aptera in the Wild EVent Thursday night at Smooth’s Sports Grille in Long Beach, CA. Also embedded below is a recent Aptera 2e demo ride video (with founder Steve Fambro) from the 2009 TED conference (held in Long Beach, CA) recently uploaded by Aptera forum member Josh.

Guest Blogger – Jenean Smith
It was a rainy night but I decided to jump in my car and see the new Aptera in person tonight in Long Beach. None of the usual suspects were there, (no one I recognized at least), which is a good sign that more and more people are interested in EVs. It’s a very sleek car indeed and now with front wheel drive — like something from a Doctor Who episode transported into the future and modernized for 2009.

Guest Blogger – Jim Hannigan
I went by Smooth’s on my way home from work. The Aptera was parked in the restaurant’s sidewalk seating area that in the winter is roofed over and enclosed with vinyl fabric. 25 or 30 people were there along with another eight or so Aptera employees as identified by their logo shirts. There was no organized presentation while I was there, but the vehicle could be touched, photographed (I only had a cellphone) and at least for a while some were allowed to sit in it.

I was not aware that this was the first time an Aptera had been shown in public. Several of those in attendance excitedly recited their reservation numbers.

I was told the car was a driveable pre-production unit and that some features would be changed. This one had the rear quarter windows and outside mirrors but not the opening door windows shown on the website. Aptera used it for VIP rides at the TED conference earlier in the day (supposedly including Tesla founder Martin Eberhard).

Questions on battery specifics, observed range, powertrain details etc. were all left TBA.

The vehicle is striking in appearance and was very well finished inside and out. The interior, controls and switches all seemed production grade. Exceptions were the A/C air vents which were complex and delicate looking plastic pieces that I was cautioned not to touch.

The car looks small but is dimensionally large; nearly 15 feet long and over 7 feet wide across the outboard front wheels. The aero tail is relatively high but the front looks very low. I was initially surprised at the small size of the manufacturer’s license plate on the car until I remembered the Aptera is classed as a motorcycle. I would have liked to have seen the car on the street around other cars for perspective.

The car was powered up to the extent that the flat-panel dash, Nav displays, parking and brake lights worked. I was able to get a few seconds in the driver’s seat. The seats were comfortable, but not deeply contoured. Footwells seemed wide, and head and legroom were good. Front visibility was very good, but not so to the rear : the side mirrors were tiny and the rear window presented a small aperture a long way back.

It is far too early for performance claims but Aptera will likely beat Tesla for eventful ingress/egress. I’ve owned a Lotus for years and got in and out without a problem, but I watched just about everyone else hit their heads either on the “butterfly” doors or on the doorframe or both.

An Aptera 2e demo ride video with Aptera founder Steve Fambro from the 2009 TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) conference recently posted by J osh (Aptera forum member):

Josh’s TED Aptera 2e Ride With Steve Fambro from A Nonymous on Vimeo.

E-mail notification of Aptera in the Wild:

Date: Thu, 5 Feb 2009 11:36:10 -0800
From: Aptera
Subject: Aptera in the Wild

Dear Aptera Family Member,

In our last newsletter we announced that Aptera would be giving 2e test drives to attendees of the TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conference in Long Beach. We know most of you aren’t attending this exclusive event, so when Smooth’s, one of Long Beach’s premier night spots and sports bars, offered us an opportunity to showcase the vehicle for the rest of our followers, we seized it.

Join us 6:00pm Thursday night, Feb. 5, at Smooth’s to see the vehicle in person and meet other Aptera fans. We know that this is last-minute, but we want you to know about any opportunity to see the Aptera in a public setting.

When: 6pm to 9pm Thursday, February 5, 2009
Location: Smooth’s Sports Grille, 144 Pine Avenue, Long Beach, CA 90802

Thank you,

The Aptera Team - Aptera Motors 2009

Video of Plug In America’s Inaugural EV Parade West

Stefano Paris — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 06:51:49 +0000

Plug In America's Inaugural EV Parade West rally - Photo courtesy of Dave Brown

Regular readers of this blog will know all about Plug in America’s triumphant Inaugural EV Parade West in Santa Monica, CA a few weeks back. Now here’s a chance to enjoy some video from the event.

A final count of 77 electric vehicles and over 250 people participated in the rally and subsequent parade. All types of electric vehicles drove quietly and emission free in formation for a few miles through city streets. Plug In America’s dedicated volunteers worked their magic during the few weeks leading up to this latest EVent to organize a very successful and historic green parade. EV grins were everywhere and the enthusiasm for plug-ins couldn’t have been greater. Plug In America’s Inaugural EV Parade West rates as one of the best plug-in EVents to date.

Click play on the below 38 minute video of Plug In America’s Inaugural EV Parade West to watch 26 minutes of rally speeches and experience the parade festivities. Thanks to Viddler’s great contextual timeline tagging feature, you can easily skip to any speaker or portion of the video without delay.

Here is the speaker line up from the event:

· Chris Paine, Director, “Who Killed the Electric Car?”
· Ed Kjaer, Director of Electric Transportation, SoCal Edison
· Kevin McKeown, Santa Monica City Councilman
· Jordan Howard, Youth Leader of Green Ambassadors
· Fran Pavley, California State Senator
· Paul Scott, Plug In America co-founder/board member

2009.01.17 Plug In America’s Inaugural EV Parade West video

[Click here for more photos of PIA's Inaugural EV Parade West EVent.]

Photo Gallery Of Pictures From Inaugural Parade

P.G. Morgan — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 21:36:24 +0000

These were all taken by our production photographer, Todd Westphal, during last month’s Plug-In America Inagural Parade.

Even Tugboats Are Going Electric

Paul Scott — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 20:41:10 +0000

Photo Credit: Foss Maritime

Remember the Balqon container truck I wrote about a while back, the Port of Long Beach truck that can haul 60,000 lbs and that’s starting to replace diesel spewing internal combustion trucks? Well add another link in the chain to clean our ports with a PHEV tug.

Built by a company called Foss, this tug is capable of 60 tons of bollard pull, (OK, I had to wiki that: Bollard pull is a value that allows the comparison of the pulling power of watercraft, particularly tugboats. I bet even Dan Neil didn’t know that one:~)

Since battery weight in a boat isn’t much of an issue, they can use low cost lead acid batteries, yet still get all the power and energy they need. Plugging into the SoCal grid, in this case, SoCal Edison, this PHEV tug is significantly cleaner than its diesel burning brethren.

The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach together constitute the largest port facility in the U.S. and the diesel burned in the ships that dock there, the tugs that move them into berth, and the trucks that haul the containers inland, even the cranes that remove the containers from the ships, shortens the lives of thousands downwind of the port. Now they are all are going electric, either fully or plug-in hybrid – one at a time. We’re just beginning, but over the coming years, most of the diesel burned in that small area will be replaced with domestic electrons. Too bad the people living there can’t hold their breath that long.

Photo Credit: Foss Maritime

The ports need to step up and install solar to generate as much of those kilowatt hours as possible. They have plenty of room for several megawatts of PV there.

I couldn’t help but notice the tug was made in tiny Rainier, OR. I wonder how many people can be put to work building these for ports all over the world? Betcha they’d like to find out.

“Hello, Barack, can we talk… ?”

Paul

See the article by Bruce Buis for WorkBoat.com:

New hybrid tug from Foss

Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:
http://divcom-fish.informz.net/admin31/content/template.asp?sid=12781&ptid=169&brandid=3174&uid=755713994&mi=445439

New hybrid tug from Foss By Bruce Buls, Technical Editor

It’s real. It’s green (and white). It’s the new Foss hybrid!

Last Friday, almost 300 of us commercial marine types showed up at Pier D in Long Beach, Calif., for the official unveiling of the world’s first hybrid tug — Foss Maritime’s Carolyn Dorothy.

For Foss and the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, the ceremony marked the culmination of a large investment of time and money. Together, the two ports contributed about $1.5 million (out of a total over $8 million) for the tug’s design and construction with the expectation of reduced emissions.

And what they didn’t see, they got.

Smoke, that is.

After the usual round of speeches, handshakes and photos, the tug itself took center stage and did a few turns in the harbor all without firing up a single engine. With 126 lead-acid batteries and two Siemens motor-generators, the Carolyn Dorothy is capable of running at up to 4.5 knots in zero-emissions mode.

Now, it can’t run like that for long — and that was never really the intention — but it’s cool that it can.

Essentially, the hybrid’s game plan is to use a variety of power sources that match the needs of the moment. If the tug is sitting out by the gate waiting for a ship to arrive, batteries alone can supply the hotel load and some maneuvering. While running out there, it can make almost 6 knots from the power of a single generator. And if the tug is pulling a 12,000-TEU containership against wind and tide, it can utilize both mains, both gensets and both motor- generators to produce over 60 tons of bollard pull, just like its Dolphin-class sisters.

That’s the beauty of the new tug: it doesn’t have to waste fuel and engine hours (while spewing out emissions) when doing little or nothing. And it rarely idles the main engines, which is the least fuel efficient and dirtiest load condition.

Foss partnered with Canada’s Aspin Kemp & Associates to produce the new hybrid. AKA designed and built the power management system that controls all the parts. Foss built the boat at its Rainier, Ore., shipyard.

It’s a huge credit to both companies that the tug was delivered on time and on budget, something that’s often hard to do with proven technology, let alone the first of its kind. Congratulations to them both.

For more about the Carolyn Dorothy, be sure to catch our story about this trend-setting new harbor tug in the March issue of WorkBoat.

The EV Curveball

Andrew Grin — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 23:10:10 +0000

Welcome back to guest blogger Andrew Grin …

Andrew Grin and his modified Hyundai Tuscon

As a new driver, learning on the roads of Kansas City, I pass by Suburbans and Tahoes on a daily basis.

“Who Killed the Electric Car?” made me realize the huge impact that these big SUV’s have on our environment and our country. The film inspired me then as a young 14 year-old to take a stand against the flawed status quo. At that moment I made a promise to myself to never call a gas car my own. I have stuck by that promise, and am now the proud owner of a newly converted 2005 Hyundai Tucson electric vehicle.

The first question anyone asks after turning 16 is ‘Did you get your license yet?’ – which ultimately leads to ‘What kind of car are you driving?’ In the midst of conversations during lunch about engines and audio systems, I like to throw in my curveball : “I drive an electric car.” Some have no clue what I am talking about, while the car junkies have heard of plug-in hybrids like the Chevy Volt. The usual questions that follow are “how far?” and “how fast?”

Very simply, the Tucson travels far enough for my daily needs (about 50 miles), and it can travel up to highway speeds (75+). I love answering questions, and, after hearing me talk, almost no one doubts the viability of a plug-in car.

The Suburbans of my middle American town are going to have to get used to me rolling by in my converted electric car. The future is coming, not only in the form of a sporty Tesla, or any brand new car, but also something for the average America. A converted electric car.

Smart Meters and Electric Cars

Paul Scott — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 18:38:25 +0000

This is a well written story in the Pasadena Star News about how the utilities are gearing up for the coming plug-in vehicles. While many people are wringing their hands over how the grid, old and cranky as it is, will be able to handle the millions of EVs that will be on our roads in the years to come, several forward-thinking utilities are beginning to implement the smart meters that will enable the grid to handle the added load by timing the charging to when the capacity is there to handle it.

Ed Kjaer, the director of electric transportation for Southern California Edison, demonstrates how the Mitsubishi innovative Electric Vehicle or MiEV plugs into their Garage of the Future at their Electric Vehicle Technical Center in Pomona on Thursday, January 22, 2009. (Photo by Eric Tom)

“The idea is for electric cars to take advantage of “off-peak” hours of low energy demand late at night, when the lights are out and TVs are off, but power plants are still producing, explained Ed Kjaer, director of electric transportation at Edison.”

The new digital meters are being installed by the thousands in many utility districts, and in SoCal Edison’s case, they expect to be fully installed by 2012. That should be in plenty of time since even the most optimistic of us (that would be me:~) don’t expect much more than a million vehicles delivered nationwide by 2012. To be honest, we’ll be very lucky to see that many. The grid today could handle many millions of EVs charging late at night when rates are lowest.

While the timing of charging can be handled through the use of these smart meters, this does not preclude the need for upgrading the grid, a project that will save massive numbers of kWh that are currently being wasted due to the incredibly old and cobbled together grid we’ve got now. By 2012, we should have made some progress on this, just in time to re-elect Obama to his second term.

Paul

Here’s the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:
http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/ci_11539009
Smart meters and electric cars: a match made in efficiency

By Rebecca Kimitch, Staff Writer

Posted: 01/23/2009 02:49:34 PM PST

Edward Kjaer, the director of electric transportation for Southern California Edison, demonstrates how the Mitsubishi innovative Electric Vehicle or MiEV plugs into their Garage of the Future at their Electric Vehicle Technical Center in Pomona on Thursday, January 22, 2009. The garage studies the integration of the electric vehicle into the power grid system where it either charges or discharges to accommodate the owner’s electricity needs. (Eric Tom, Correspondent) The picture of our carbon-free energy future is often depicted by a sea of solar panels shimmering in the sun, or orderly lines of giant white wind mills covering a hillside: large structures that capture nature’s gifts. But an increasingly important energy resource is little more than a digital electric meter.

And it is this meter that will make possible the widespread use of electric vehicles, according to representatives of Rosemead-based Southern California Edison.

Automakers unveiled more than a dozen production-ready, plug-in electric and hybrid electric vehicles at the Detroit auto show earlier this month, many of which will be on dealership lots between 2010 and 2012.

Several automakers, including Ford, have partnered with Edison to ensure those cars can get their electricity from somewhere.

“When we look at the electrification of vehicles, there are a lot of different issues involved,” said Ford spokeswoman Jennifer Moore. “There is the technology, there is the market, but there is a bigger question than that: it’s also very much about connecting to the nation’s (electrical) grid and where the electricity comes from.”

With a national electrical system that at times and places is severely strained and in need of expansion, the last thing anyone wants is for electric vehicles to be powered by building more emission-producing power plants.

Edison’s answer: new meters.

The idea is for electric cars to take advantage of “off-peak” hours of low energy demand late at night, when the lights are out and TVs are off, but power plants are still producing, explained Ed Kjaer, director of electric transportation at Edison.

“We have a huge amount of generation capacity in the U.S.,” Kjaer said. “But it is an inefficient system. You have to build power plants to meet the peaks when every single air conditioner is going full blast.”

Though some types of power generation can easily be

Edward Kjaer, the director of electric transportation for Southern California Edison, describes some of the systems that are used in their Garage of the Future at their Electric Vehicle Technical Center in Pomona. (Eric Tom, Correspondent) turned off and on, others like nuclear and wind continue producing whether the electricity is used or not. Studies have found that electric vehicles could be charged with electricity produced under the current system, if done at the right time, agreed National Resources Defense Council scientist Simon Mui.

It might seem that simply plugging in your Chevy Volt or Ford Escape before bedtime would do. But increased use of electric vehicles could lead to everyone plugging in at the same time, peaking demand and complicating things, particularly if electric vehicles take hold of entire neighborhoods, as car trends often do, Kjaer explained.

So instead, Edison and auto manufacturers are turning to “smart metering” technologies. Such technologies allow consumers and, potentially appliances, to be aware of how much electricity is being consumed everywhere so that they can try to consume when other people are not.

While traditional meters do nothing more than report to electric utilities how much electricity is consumed in a given amount of time, smart meters give real-time information and allow for two-way communication between the power grid and consumers.

This would allow utilities to stagger when electric cars are charging, or charge up power all at once if generation is high.

Plug-in hybrids require about as many annual kilowatt hours of power as two or three plasma TVs or air conditioners, according to Mark Duvall, director of electric transportation for the Electric Power Research Institute.

Edison figures it will have smart meters installed in all its customers’ homes by the end of 2012, in compliance with California Public Utility Commission requirements.

Smart meters have uses far beyond electric vehicles. Future appliances, such as dishwashers or dryers, could also react to real- time electricity use before deciding when to power on.

Because wind typically blows harder at night, environmentalists are particularly excited about its potential on such a system, Mui said.

To be sure, smart meters alone will not produce highways full of electric cars. The sticker prices of all-electric and plug-in hybrids will be well beyond the reach of average consumers for several years, hardly dipping below $30,000, Kjaer said.

Early support from those who can afford them, as well as the federal government, will be necessary, he said.

The economic stimulus package currently before Congress could include incentives for both buyers of electric vehicles and electric vehicle battery manufacturers.

While it is not the first time a future of electric cars has been on the horizon, industry experts say this time its for real.

“I have never before felt that we were at this point,” Duvall said. “The auto industry is aligned, the public is aligned, even the president is aligned. He even knows what a plug-in hybrid is.”

“We are dealing now with a perfect storm,” agreed Kjaer. Energy security, the politics and marketing of oil and concerns about climate change are creating an unprecedented global push toward electric vehicles. And President Barack Obama told the country during his inaugural address: “We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.”

And we will use meters.

rebecca.kimitch@sgvn.com
(626) 962-8811, Ext. 2105

Bright’s Plug-In Car: Aerodynamics Are Key

Paul Scott — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 23:10:53 +0000

This new company, Bright Automotive, is founded by ex-GM EV1 people, and the super efficient Rocky Mountain Institute to make plug-in hybrids in Indiana.

Like Paul MacCready’s original design for the Impact that established the world’s lowest drag coefficient of .195, Bright will be building cars that “do more with less”, a philosophy MacCready was famous for (and the title of a wonderful biography on him). It’ll be interesting to see how their vehicles compare to all the rest in terms of efficiency.

At the end of this article, Prof. Andy Frank makes the observation that parallel hybrids (Toyota Prius) are cheaper than series hybrids (Chevy Volt). This runs counter to what I’ve been led to believe, so since Mr. Frank is on this list, I’m asking him if he’ll explain why this is. I’m still not convinced.

Paul

Think Tank’s Plug-In Car: Aerodynamics Are Key

Bright Automotive says it soon release an electric car with a 100 mile per gallon plus plug-in – and the company says it will keep the car economically priced.

By Michael Kanellos, for Greentech Media

“The slimming of the battery essentially comes because of a focus on weight, aerodynamics, rolling resistance, new construction materials and other design factors, he said in an interview. By reducing wind resistance and weight, the company’s engineers effectively are reducing the amount of work an electric engine will have to perform to get the car up to driving speeds, which in turn conserves battery power.”

Here is the full text of the entire article in case the link goes bad:

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/think-tanks-plug-in-car-aerodynamics-are-key-5561.html

Think Tank’s Plug-In Car: Aerodynamics Are Key Bright Automotive says it soon release an electric car with a 100 mile per gallon plus plug-in – and the company says it will keep the car economically priced.

by: Michael Kanellos

January 21, 2009

How can you quickly improve the performance of the battery in an electric car? Lose weight.

Bright Automotive, which spun out of the Rocky Mountain Institute in January, is building a plug-in hybrid vehicle that will get 100 miles a gallon (see Green Lightpost). Just as important, Bright is going to try to keep the car economically priced, in part by reducing the size of the battery.

The battery pack in Bright’s car, conceivably, could be made 40 percent smaller than the batteries in similar plug-ins, according to CEO John Waters. To date, the relatively high cost of batteries has kept electric and plug-in vehicles at the fringes of the auto industry.

The slimming of the battery essentially comes because of a focus on weight, aerodynamics, rolling resistance, new construction materials and other design factors, he said in an interview. By reducing wind resistance and weight, the company’s engineers effectively are reducing the amount of work an electric engine will have to perform to get the car up to driving speeds, which in turn conserves battery power.

“It’s a revolutionary platform,” he said. “The platform that’s been on the road today is 100 years old. [The traditional technique for making cars] uses a lot of steel.”

Granted, nearly every other electric car company is trying to increase performance through aerodynamics and new construction materials. Bright will also face the same challenges in raising capital and moving from crafting prototypes to producing commercial vehicles. But it does have experience on its side. Waters worked on the battery for the General Motors EV1 and also worked at Ener1, which makes lithium-ion batteries. Many of the other executives have years of experience in the auto business.

Weight and poor design result in a disproportionate amount of fuel consumption in vehicles, Waters said. The U.S. Post Office operates 162,000 delivery trucks that get around 10 miles per gallon, he said, and these trucks drive around 18 miles a day. If those trucks are put into use 300 working days a year, that’s 87.5 million gallons of gas consumed by those white little trucks trolling your neighborhood. Boosting mileage to 100 miles per gallon conceivably could save nearly 80 million gallons of gas.

A one cent increase in the price of fuel raises the operating budget of the federal government by $8 million, Waters said.

“That’s a lot of money the federal government is putting into fuel,” he said.

Waters wouldn’t provide a lot of details on the vehicle. Bright has built a “mule” or concept prototype with a working drive train that it demonstrated to select guests and policy makers in December. In May, the company plans to show off a commercial prototype at the Electronic Vehicle Show in Stavanger, Norway. A commercial release, ideally, could occur three or so years from now.

The car will go 30 miles on batteries before the gas engine kicks in and be street-legal. (Some manufacturers such as Zenn Motor broke into electric cars with limited speed vehicles that top out at 25 or 35 miles per hour.) Together, the gas and electric engines will give the car a 400 mile range, or far farther than the fully electric $109,000 Tesla Roadster.

Although Bright will pursue the mass market, we mostly discussed the delivery vehicle market.

Bright’s vehicle will also likely keep the series versus parallel debate alive in the hybrid world. In a series hybrid, the electric engine propels the car down the road. The onboard gas engine largely exists to recharge the batteries for the electric engine. The Chevy Volt is based around a series hybrid design and so is the Karma coming later this year from Fisker Automotive.

The series hybrid architecture, however, is complex, say critics. In a parallel hybrid, both the gas engine and electric engine are used to propel the car. The Prius is a parallel hybrid and Toyota plans to use a parallel hybrid architecture in its first plug-in hybrid. UC Davis professor Andy Frank, the so-called father of the plug-in, has formed a company, called Efficient Drivetrains Inc., that will make components for parallel hybrids (see Green Light post).

“They think [series hybrids are] cheaper but [they] is not. In order to get the same performance, you have to get a much bigger electric motor,” Frank said in an interview in August.

Bright is based around a parallel hybrid.

Plug-in America’s Inaugural Parade

Colby Trudeau — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 18:16:14 +0000

Guest Blogger Colby Trudeau takes us behind the scenes at Plug In America’s Inaugural Parade

All photos take by our Production Photographer, Todd Westphal.

What an amazing day! Last Saturday, January 17th, 2009, 77 highway capable plug-in vehicles, their drivers, and spectators came together to celebrate the upcoming inauguration.

Jordan Howard, member of the "Green Ambassadors" youth group.

After gathering in the parking lot of Santa Monica Civic Center for a press conference, the cars silently paraded out into the city streets armed with signs, American flags, and enthusiastic passengers.

Chris Paine in his Tesla as he drove in the Plug In America Inaugural Parade.

It all started when we heard that Plug In America had not been accepted into the 2009 Inaugural Parade. One of our board members, Paul Scott, suggested having our own parade here on the West Coast.

We started organizing and planning – with an initial goal of 30 plug-ins for the parade. Less than three weeks later, we found ourselves driving through the streets of Santa Monica surrounded by nearly 80 plug-in vehicles, including a number of prototypes from major auto manufacturers.

Yet again, our supporters amazed us with their numbers. After confirming 74 plug-ins for the parade, not only did every single one of them show up, but also three more unexpectedly arrived.

In addition to drivers and their families, numerous EV enthusiasts from around the US and Canada came to Santa Monica for our event.

The EV movement is here and no one can stop it!

Plug In America is very excited with the Obama administration’s plans for one million plug-ins by 2015, but we would like to see it happen even faster.

Plug In America calls for one million plug-ins by 2012, the end of the new president’s first term, and 10 million by 2016.

I was absolutely astounded at how well this parade went and I can only imagine what the future holds.

This event was the first of many steps that the EV movement will take on its journey with the new presidential administration.

Will CARB’s New Rules Damage EV Startups?

Lisa Rein — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:35:57 +0000

Paul Guzyk and Daniel Sherwood of 3Prong Power. Photograph by Chris Duffey.

3Prong Power converts existing Toyota Priuses into plug-in hybrids that can run entirely on electricity.

The company launched last month at Green Motors in Berkeley, California. But it now looks like the California Air Resources Board (CARB) is about to adopt some new regulations which could put it out of business quickly.

3Prong says the two new sets of regulations, scheduled to be voted on at CARB’s January 22-23rd meeting, insert hundreds of thousands of dollars of unfair and unneccesary costs into the process. Some immediately – such as the requirement for somewhere between 20-100,000 dollars in testing – but it’s the 10 year 150,000 mile warranty on the batteries themselves that’s the dealbreaker.

Some have suggested that these new regulations are a way to give large car manufacturers the upper hand, by starving out the smaller companies that are just starting to enter the market:

“They’re suppressing the little guys — the people who work out of their garages, the people who create,” said Robb Protheroe, owner of Plug-In Supply, which provides electric batteries to 3Prong Power and four other small companies around the state. “It’s Who Killed the Electric Car 2.0.”

Who’s Killing the Plug-In Hybrid?

The same state agency that drove the electric car off a cliff is now poised to wreck a new Berkeley company that triples the gas mileage of a Toyota Prius.

By Robert Gammon for the East Bay Express
Here is the full text of the entire article, in case the link goes bad:

http://www.eastbayexpress.com/news/who_s_killing_the_plug_in_hybrid_/Content?oid=903061

East Bay Express Who’s Killing the Plug-In Hybrid?

The same state agency that drove the electric car off a cliff is now poised to wreck a new Berkeley company that triples the gas mileage of a Toyota Prius.

By Robert Gammon January 14, 2009

Daniel Sherwood and Paul Guzyk never dreamed they would be accused of harming the planet. After all, the primary goal of their Berkeley startup company, 3Prong Power, is to curb greenhouse gas emissions. They convert Toyota Prius hybrids into mostly electric vehicles that get 100 to 150 miles per gallon. But a powerful state agency is poised to put 3Prong Power out of business and deal a severe blow to a promising new industry.

Next week, the California Air Resources Board is expected to adopt strict new regulations based on the theory that the innovative technology sold by 3Prong Power and other companies may be bad for the environment. Sherwood and Guzyk say that if the board adopts the new rules at its January 22 and 23 meeting, it likely will force them to shutter their business, which just had its grand opening last month at Green Motors on San Pablo Avenue.

In addition, proponents of the nascent plug-in hybrid industry say the air resources board also may snuff out a key component of what environmentalists believe will be the next generation of eco-friendly cars, thereby hampering our ability to wean ourselves from foreign oil, avoid petroleum wars in the Middle East, and slow the potentially devastating effects of global warming. “It’s simply too early for government regulation of plug-in hybrids,” said Felix Kramer, a leader of CalCars.org, a Palo Alto-based nonprofit that has led the fight for plug-in vehicles. “Acting too soon will shut off innovation and will kill companies that are just getting started.”

Air resources board employees say the new regulations are not designed to squelch technological breakthroughs or bankrupt new businesses. They say they are merely trying to protect consumers’ rights and ensure that the new technology doesn’t roll back their attempts to limit cancer-causing emissions. After all, the board’s main function is to regulate smog — not greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.

Indeed, the story of the board’s attempt to regulate plug-in hybrids has turned out to be a battle between an agency whose primary mission is to protect Californians from breathing unhealthy air and a group of environmentalists and engineers who are fighting to slow global warming. The new proposed rules also appear to contradict the board’s own recent attempts to curtail greenhouse gas emissions in the wake of a groundbreaking global warming law signed by the governor in 2006.

And even though the air resources board appears to have some valid concerns about plug-in-hybrid technology, to date it has acted more like an uncompromising bureaucratic agency than a trendsetter committed to saving the earth. In fact, it represents a classic case of not being able to see the forest for the trees.

3Prong Power and similar small companies that have cropped up around California over the past year are threatened by two sets of new regulations proposed by the staff of the air resources agency, also known as CARB. First, the board’s staff wants to force the new startups to put their technology through a series of rigorous and expensive smog tests that could cost between $20,000 and $125,000, depending on how many cars the agency decides must be examined. The board’s staff also wants to require the new companies to provide consumers with warranties for the changes they make to hybrids for up to ten years or 150,000 miles.

But the tests are too costly for the typical small startup to afford and the warranties are unattainable because the electric batteries currently used to power plug-ins don’t last ten years. “For California to be on the cutting edge of green-tech, they need to be more of an enabler than a restrictor,” Guzyk said. “For us, the new regulations, especially the warranty, are a deal breaker.”

3Prong Power and its competitors transform Priuses into plug-in vehicles by putting a large flat battery in the trunk. The battery can be recharged by plugging the car into any electrical socket and allows the Prius to run entirely on electricity for speeds up to 34 miles per hour. Going faster than that triggers the car’s gasoline-powered engine, transforming the vehicle back into a traditional hybrid. The conversion can double or even triple fuel economy, thereby severely limiting carbon dioxide emissions. CO2 from cars does not contribute to smog and is not harmful to human health but it is one of the leading contributors to global warming.

State Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner of Berkeley, an environmentalist and a Prius owner, said she understands the air resources board’s concerns about smog. But she believes the agency needs to balance the regulation of smog and of greenhouse gases and should attempt to reach a compromise that will keep 3Prong Power and other small startups from going belly up. “I’m hopeful that CARB will meet with the companies and really try to partner with them,” said Skinner, who attended 3Prong Power’s grand opening in December and wants to convert her Prius to a plug-in. “These are small companies. They are innovators. There must be a way to share the burden.”

But the proposed regulations are not expected to significantly burden major car manufacturers that are planning to introduce new plug-in hybrids in the next couple of years. General Motors plans to unveil the Chevy Volt, a plug-in hybrid, sometime in 2010, and Toyota may begin selling a plug-in Prius in late 2010 or early 2011. Both cars will be subject to the new CARB rules, but GM and Toyota should have no problem affording the rigorous tests or financing the warranty requirements.

But the new rules could make it virtually impossible for current Prius owners to transform their cars into super-efficient vehicles that get up to 150 mpg. The new regulations will drive up the price of such conversions, putting them out of reach for most Prius owners, and ensuring that the only way to purchase a next generation eco-friendly car will be from one of the world’s two largest auto companies. “They’re suppressing the little guys — the people who work out of their garages, the people who create,” said Robb Protheroe, owner of Plug-In Supply, which provides electric batteries to 3Prong Power and four other small companies around the state. “It’s Who Killed the Electric Car 2.0.”

The award-winning 2006 documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? pinned some of the blame for the death of the electric vehicle in the United States on the California Air Resources Board. In 2003, the board relaxed its landmark support for so-called zero-emission vehicles after being sued by the major car companies and the Bush administration. Automakers and the administration convinced air board members that hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles were a more viable technology than battery-operated cars, despite the fact that fuel-cell vehicles currently cost about $1 million each and are believed to be at least fifteen to thirty years away from mass production.

The board had voted in 1990 to require that at least 10 percent of cars sold in California to be zero-emissions vehicles by 2003. The board’s ambitious goal was to significantly reduce smog in a state with the worst air quality in the nation. To meet the regulations, GM, Toyota, and other automakers began manufacturing electric cars and they quickly gained an underground cult status. But the auto companies hated the CARB rules and never really wanted to sell the cars. They claimed the vehicles weren’t popular with most consumers because the car’s battery had a limited range of 60 to 100 miles before having to be recharged. The documentary showed, however, that the car companies never marketed the electric cars to a mass audience and didn’t make them available to everyone who wanted one.

When the air resources board relaxed its rules in 2003, it allowed car companies to receive credits toward zero-emission standards by building so-called partial-zero-emissions vehicles — super clean cars that produce little or no smog. The board considers Priuses and other hybrids, along with several gasoline-powered cars, to be partial-zero-emissions vehicles, not because they get good gas mileage and limit CO2 emissions, but because they produce very little smog-causing gases.

Over the past few years, many environmentalists have become convinced that plug-in hybrids represent the next generation of super clean cars that will help continue the battle against smog and assist in the fight against global warming. Like hybrids, plug-ins have no range limitations, because when the battery runs out, the hybrid system takes over. That means you can drive around town as an electric car, and then jump on the freeway and head to Los Angeles, without having to recharge the battery. Plug-ins also get far better gas mileage than traditional hybrids — a regular Prius gets 50 to 60 mpg, compared to a plug-in Prius’ 100 to 150 mpg. As a result, the plug-ins burn much less fuel, thereby significantly reducing CO2 emissions. In fact, plug-ins can produce virtually no emissions at all while driving around town, as long as you don’t exceed 34 mph or press the gas pedal past halfway and engage the gasoline-powered engine.

On a recent test drive around Berkeley and onto Interstates 880 and 580 to Richmond, one of Sherwood and Guzyk’s cars drove like any other Prius, except for the incredible gas mileage and the quiet serenity of being in an electric car. According to the car’s dashboard computer, we got 77.7 mpg on what was mostly a freeway excursion. And around town, we were virtually all electric except for a brief stretch in excess of 34 mph on Gilman Street, or when a new driver hit the gas pedal too hard during acceleration. Sherwood said many of their customers pride themselves on making sure they never engage the gas engine and run electric for days, if not weeks, at a time.

It takes 3Prong Power a little more than a day to convert a Prius to a plug-in, and costs customers about $6,700. The price is high, but you can make up for the initial costs by saving money on gas over time, especially if gas prices rise dramatically again. Sherwood said the company has remained busy in recent months despite gas falling from $4 to about $2 a gallon. Before the holidays, they had four cars on their waiting list. Since opening inside of the Green Motors dealership in March of last year, the company has converted a dozen Priuses.

The conversion is simple. Guzyk installs twenty lead-acid batteries packaged together in a suitcase-like steel box that he locates in the trunk just above the spare tire. The batteries essentially take up no trunk space because they go in a hidden compartment that most Prius owners don’t realize they have. In addition, he puts the battery on a hydraulic system to make for easy access to the spare tire. Guzyk then connects the battery to the car’s computer system and instructs it to use the lead-acid batteries only when driving below 34 mph. He then drills a hole in the bumper so that the owner can easily plug-in to a wall socket and recharge the battery at home. It takes four hours to completely recharge a battery that is good for ten to twelve miles of electric-only driving. “When your batteries run out, you just start up the motor and it runs like a regular Prius,” Sherwood explained.

3Prong Power is the only plug-in conversion company in the East Bay. There are two in San Francisco, Luscious Garage and Pat’s Garage, and one on the Peninsula, A+ Japanese Auto Repair in San Carlos. Both 3Prong Power and Luscious Garage use lead-acid batteries, which are recyclable but only last about two to three years, while the others use lithium batteries, which last longer and are significantly more expensive. A conversion system at Pat’s Garage, for example, costs $10,400.

But if the air resources board approves the new regulations next week, those prices could rise dramatically. Or the businesses themselves may simply cease to exist.

So why are plug-in hybrids potentially harmful to the planet? Air resources board officials are concerned about two potential problems that could increase smog emissions in some conversion systems. The first has to do with the car’s catalytic converter. Located underneath the car, between the engine and the tailpipe, the catalytic converter cleans the emissions that spew out of the engine before they’re released into the air. Catalytic converters, along with so-called leak-proof emissions systems, are the primary reason why today’s cars are so much cleaner than those of several decades ago.

But catalytic converters only work well when they’re warm, and they warm up when the engine turns on. Consequently, gasoline-power vehicles pollute the most when the engine is first turned on in the morning after being off for many hours. This high-pollution moment is referred to as a cold start. A regular car or hybrid typically has only one or two cold starts a day. However, it’s possible for plug-in hybrids to have several of these high-pollution moments in a single afternoon of driving. The gasoline engine might click on several different times when driving around town — whenever the car exceeds 34 mph or the driver hits the gas pedal too hard. “The potential exists to significantly increase emissions,” explained John Swanton, an air pollution specialist for the air resources board.

The other potential problem with plug-in hybrids involves unburned gasoline vapors — a real threat to air quality. When gasoline-powered vehicles are turned off, some of the fuel in the gas tank evaporates. These vapors are stored in an adjacent canister built to hold up to three days worth of vapors. If you leave your car’s engine turned off for more than three days, the canister overflows and the vapors leak into the air and cause pollution. But if you turn your car on before the three days are up, the canister vents the vapors through the engine, allowing the catalytic converter to clean the emissions before they come out of the tailpipe.

Most people typically don’t keep their cars turned off for more than three days. But with a plug-in hybrid, it’s possible for the gasoline engine to not turn on for days or even weeks at a time. That’s especially true if drivers never hop on the freeway and don’t otherwise exceed 34 mph. As a result, it’s possible for plug-in hybrids to spew gasoline vapors out of the vapor canister on an almost-constant basis, turning a Prius into a gross polluter.

Consequently, air resources board engineers are recommending that plug-in hybrids undergo extensive cold-start emissions and gasoline-evaporation testing. According to agency documents, the tests likely will cost about $20,000 to $25,000 per vehicle. Swanton said in an interview that the board may only require that one vehicle be tested, but the agency’s own documents state that the board may force companies to submit up to five test vehicles, meaning the total test costs could amount to $100,000 to $125,000.

Such tests would be prohibitively costly for small startups like 3Prong Power. They also appear to be somewhat capricious. Swanton said the agency’s concerns stem in part from testing by at least one major auto manufacturer, which found significant pollution problems in cold-start emissions testing of its own plug-in hybrid prototypes. But the test results “are confidential,” because they’re considered trade secrets, he said. In other words, a state agency is about to adopt new regulations that could cause some companies to go bankrupt based on testing results that allegedly reveal a problem that it won’t reveal publicly. “It’s ridiculous,” said Robb Protheroe, owner of Plug-In Supply. “So you’re going to have a government agency producing regulations based on confidential data? It should be transparent.”

Protheroe also pointed out that California is literally strewn with new and used car lots full of vehicles that don’t get turned on for weeks, or months, at a time. If air resources board engineers are correct, then tens of thousands of these cars are constantly spewing unburned gasoline vapors into the air, doing far more damage than the relatively small number of hybrids that have been converted to plug-ins. “Why don’t they ask the dealers to go out and start their cars every third day?” Protheroe asked.

It turns out, however, that the argument over emissions and evaporative testing is mostly academic. Last year, a Massachusetts-based plug-in hybrid conversion company passed the air resources board tests easily. The company, A123 Systems, which makes the Hymotion lithium battery supplied by Pat’s Garage in San Francisco and A+ Japanese Auto Repair in San Carlos, found a simple solution for the cold starts and unburned gasoline vapors problems. They just make sure the Prius’ gasoline engine turns on when you start your car. That way, the catalytic converter warms up and the evaporation canisters are vented, explained Pat Cadam, owner of Pat’s Garage. It’s counterintuitive, but it works. It turns out that you have to turn on the gasoline engine and burn gasoline in your mostly electric car to make it more eco-friendly.

Because of this breakthrough, Sherwood and Guzyk of 3Prong Power aren’t worried about passing the tests. It’s an easy software adjustment for them to tell the Prius’ gas engine to turn on whenever the car starts. But they say they still can’t afford the expensive testing. Nor can they afford the extensive warranty requirements the board is expected to pass next week.

When the air resources board capitulated to the auto industry and relaxed its landmark zero-emissions rules, General Motors, Toyota, and other carmakers immediately pulled almost all of their electric cars off the road. The companies never actually sold the cars to consumers; they only leased them. But in exchange for the relaxed rules, the air resources board required that the car companies provide extended warranties on the new partial-zero-emissions vehicles, including the Prius. The agency mandated a fifteen-year or 150,000-mile warranty on the car’s emissions system, and ten-year or 150,000-mile warranty on the battery.

The agency adopted these new warranty requirements because it was allowing car manufacturers to replace zero-emission vehicles — the electric car — with autos that are not quite as a clean. Electric cars don’t need extended warranties because they produce no emissions even when they break down. By contrast, a partial-zero-emissions vehicle might become a conventional polluter if one of its key components fails. Consequently, the air resources board engineers reasoned that when a company, such as 3Prong Power, converts a partial-zero emission vehicle to a plug-in, it should provide the same kind of long warranty it requires of the major auto manufacturers.

Under the warranty rules proposed by the agency’s staff, a plug-in conversion company must provide an extended warranty for the Prius parts it alters or affects, along with a warranty for the parts it installs, including the battery it adds. The length of the warranty depends on how old the car is. 3Prong Power only works on Prius model years 2004 to 2009. So if the company converts a 2009 Prius, then it must warranty the Prius emissions parts for ten years or until the car reaches 150,000 miles. It also must warranty the Prius battery for ten years or until the car reaches 150,000. And it must warranty its own battery for ten years or 150,000 miles.

3Prong Power and A123 Systems have no trouble with providing warranties for the Prius parts they alter or affect. Sherwood explained that Priuses are very well-made, built to last, and that converting them to plug-ins doesn’t harm them in any way. But 3Prong Power and A123 Systems object to having to provide a ten-year warranty for their own batteries. After all, the plug-in batteries don’t replace the Prius’ battery, they only supplement them. As a result, if the plug-in battery fails, the car simply reverts to being a regular hybrid. And because the batteries they install don’t last ten years, both 3Prong Power and A123 Systems put in a simple switch for consumers to turn off their battery if they malfunction or die, thereby turning their cars back into regular Priuses.

3Prong Power, A123 Systems, and other plug-in advocates argue that the length of the warranties should be left up to the marketplace. If one company offers a two-year warranty on its battery, and another offers three years, then consumers should decide which company to buy from. “The people who are buying these conversions are grown up and ought to be able to make their own decisions,” said CalCar.org’s Felix Kramer, who in 2006 became the first non-technical owner of a plug-in hybrid in the nation. “They know what they’re getting and they should be able to get it if they want it.” Sherwood also said they’re completely upfront with their customers, and inform them that the batteries only last two to three years and that replacing one costs about $900.

Swanton said the air resources board may be open to some sort of compromise on the warranty issue. But he noted that investors who have expressed interest in financing plug-in hybrid conversions may balk if there is no warranty requirement. Venture capitalists might not invest in a technology that only lasts two to three years, he argued, noting that there is no guarantee a consumer will replace his or her plug-in battery when it dies. Swanton, however, appeared to indicate that board staff was less willing to allow wiggle-room on the emissions and evaporative testing costs.

He pointed out that under the existing state motor vehicle code, companies such as 3Prong Power are technically operating illegally. The code makes it unlawful to degrade a car’s emissions by adding an after-market part and consequently requires testing of systems such as plug-in conversion kits. In the past, state officials have used this law to target street racers who add turbochargers and other devices to make their cars faster. Swanton acknowledged that enforcing the law against plug-in conversion companies has not been a priority for state officials, because those businesses are attempting to achieve a public good — reducing greenhouse emissions. But that likely will change if the air resources board adopts the new regulations.

Sherwood, 33, said he started 3Prong Power with Guzyk, 43, because he’s been interested for years in getting people “off petroleum.” He also said it never occurred to him that state officials would determine that converting Priuses to plug-in hybrids could potentially worsen a car’s emissions and add pollution to the air. He believes the state agency has failed to see the big picture in its attempt to regulate the field. Clearly, plug-in hybrids are usually cleaner than regular hybrids, he said, because they burn less fuel and run on electricity when driving around town. In addition, the A123 Systems testing proves that a simple fix can address the legitimate concerns of the air resources agency.

Still, the agency’s staff is attempting to regulate with a heavy hand. There is no good reason why it can’t work more closely with small companies such as 3Prong Power and help them finance the costly smog tests or provide them waivers for the time being. After all, Priuses themselves are exempt from smog regulations until 2011. Moreover, if A123 Systems passed the smog tests, then 3Prong Power should be able to as well, since it’s essentially using the same technology.

As for the proposed extended warranty requirements on plug-in batteries, the board should not adopt them. The contention that venture capitalists may not invest in plug-in technology without the warranties is not the board’s concern. Its mission is to clean the air, not make investors rich.

And finally, the board’s attempt to strictly regulate plug-in hybrids flies in the face of the sweeping new regulations it adopted just last month to combat greenhouse gas emissions. Among other things, the new rules will reduce the amount of carbon in motor fuels and require future cars to get better gas mileage. The regulations stemmed from a 2006 landmark law that put California at the forefront in the fight against global warming.

Clearly, the board’s proposed regulations on plug-in hybrids are not in keeping with last month’s vote, nor will they help California maintain its leadership role in combating greenhouse gases. It also makes no sense to snuff out the efforts of green entrepreneurs before they’ve even had a chance to grow.

Interview with Chris Paine in the Whole Life Times

Lisa Rein — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 02:30:19 +0000

Chris Paine in the Whole Life Times

The Whole Life Times just published an Interview with Chris :

The Electric Car Returns (and This Time It’s Personal)

Filmmaker Chris Paine, director of Who Killed the Electric Car? and its forthcoming sequel, talks to us about the fate of GM, the downfall of hydrogen and why electric cars truly are making a comeback By Siel

What happens to an electric car deferred? Ask Chris Paine, director of the documentary film Who Killed the Electric Car? (2006), and you’ll learn that those once-dead electric vehicles (EVs) are now exacting a shocking revenge.

Paine was one of the first to lease a General Motors EV1 in 1997 — only to get the car wrenched away from him five years later when he took it in simply to get a brake light fixed. In Who Killed the Electric Car?, Paine followed the plight of his EV1 to its (literally) crushing end. Today, EVs are making a comeback, and Paine’s chronicling the EV’s resurrection in his follow-up film, The Revenge of the Electric Car, set to jolt theaters in spring 2010.

After all, it takes someone who refers to his Prius as “the gas guzzler” and his Culver City, Calif., home as “the Plug-In Mecca” to tell this EV story right. For his sequel, Paine’s been gauging the mood at the now-much-gloomier GM headquarters, visiting geothermal-powered and EV-friendly Iceland, and test driving his brand new Tesla in Los Angeles.

Q: I hear you didn’t even like cars — yet now you’re seen as a champion for the electric car. What got you interested in EVs?

A: Electric cars just totally changed the game! I never liked automobiles because I don’t like burning gasoline. I don’t like how it smells; I don’t like the smog. Obviously cars brought a lot to our society, but they’ve also had a tremendous cost. When I started driving electric cars, I got really excited because you had all the fun of a car, but without nearly as much of the damage.

Reproduced with thanks to Whole Life Times. Here’s the full text of the interview, in case the link goes bad:

http://wholelifetimes.com/2009/01/conversations0901.html

January 2009 | Conversations The Electric Car Returns (and This Time It’s Personal)

Q: I hear you didn’t even like cars — yet now you’re seen as a champion for the electric car. What got you interested in EVs?

Q: How do you get around now?

A: For the last five years, after they took the GM EV1 away, I’ve been driving a Toyota RAV4 EV. And like the EV1, the RAV4’s been service-free. A lot of people feel that that’s the real reason car companies don’t like electric cars — because EVs kill the parts and service business. Electric cars don’t need any tune-ups.

Q: And you just got a Tesla.

A: The Tesla is a beautiful car — I’ll give it that. It’s by far the most expensive car I’ve ever owned in my life. And I think it’ll probably hold its value because it’s such a collector’s item. But down the road, the idea of the Tesla is to use this car to kick the company off, and then to get a sedan under $50,000 that’ll appeal to a lot more people.

My primary car is the RAV4, which I was thinking of selling on eBay because one of these sold for $65,000 or so. I also have a gas-guzzler for when I want to go up to San Francisco or drive up to Colorado.

I just finished a house that I’m calling the “Plug-In Mecca.” The whole roof of the house is solar, so I can plug in all sorts of different kinds of cars. The RAV4, the Tesla and my electric bike all have different kinds of charging systems, so it’s kind of fun having them on hand.

My gas-guzzler, by the way, is a Prius, which I try not to drive. Until Toyota gives consumers a plug-in option, I consider myself officially at odds with that company — although I have to appreciate that the Prius is a pretty amazing car.

Q: What about hydrogen? In California, Governor Schwarzenegger seems dead-set on developing the hydrogen highway.

A: Schwarzenegger got some very bad advice, and he pursued hydrogen because it seems like a good option at first. The problem is, the hydrogen car is not here until 2020 at the earliest, in terms of something that can be built in mass quantities. The second big problem with hydrogen is that it’s very expensive — energy-expensive — to make hydrogen fuel. It’s cheaper just to use a battery and electricity than to go and make this whole in-between step of making hydrogen. The reason hydrogen created a lot of vitriol is because it was used as a bait and switch to kill existing technology that was ready to go.

Q: In the past, you’ve pointed out that big car companies keep delaying EV production for the consumer market. With the promise of GM’s Chevy Volt and other EVs, are you more hopeful now?

A: I’m much more hopeful today than I was in 2005, simply because the car companies have painted themselves into a corner. People are demanding electric cars and plug-in hybrids. Even the car companies are saying, “Well, no one’s trying to buy our SUVs, so for us to stay in business, we need to have other kinds of cars.”

Q: When gas prices went up, people started driving less, and interest in EVs soared. But now, gas prices have fallen below $2 in some places. Is this discouraging?

A: Certainly, when oil prices are down, it makes it harder for the competition. However, I think in the medium and long term — and maybe even the short term — electric cars are going to come on, because there’s a huge national security push to get us off oil altogether.

And on the environmental side, people are saying, “I’d rather have something I can fuel myself or has less of a carbon footprint.” Oil price fluctuations are tough for small companies to deal with as consumer demand goes up and down, but I think the long run looks pretty bright.

Q: GM, the main company featured in Who Killed the Electric Car?, is now in serious financial trouble and asking for a bailout. Could you have predicted this?

A: We absolutely did predict it. In the movie, Joe Romm [author of The Hype About Hydrogen: Fact and Fiction in the Race to Save the Climate] says, “This may be the most serious blunder in the history of the automotive industry.” And he was right. The problem is that car companies put everything in gasoline, the SUV, the truck. They had no alternate plan. It was just very bad decision-making.

Q: What motivated you to make The Revenge of the Electric Car? Did you have a sequel in mind when you were making Who Killed the Electric Car?

A: We didn’t think about a sequel at all. What happened was the incredible reversal of everything we covered in the first movie. It’s fascinating what’s happened, from Tesla to the Volt to what hundreds and hundreds of garage mechanics are doing, converting cars. I think the theme in the last movie was “Change has stopped.” And for this movie, the theme would be “Change prevails.”

Q: When do you expect the EV to exact revenge?

A: I know that Mitsubishi, Nissan and a lot of smaller companies all will have cars available to buy in 2009. For the big car companies, it’s probably going to be 2010, 2011. When the EVs are in showrooms for sale, and people are buying them, and the SUVs are sitting unsold everywhere.

I think we’re halfway there. Certainly, we’re there with SUVs being on the sidelines. We’re maybe not there yet in terms of EVs being available.

Q: When GM forcibly took back your EV1, your CD collection and gym bag were still in the car. Did you ever get those back?

A: I got them back, but they never told me where the car was! I said, “I’ll go pick up the stuff,” and they said, “We can’t tell you where the car is now, but we’ll arrange for you to get your stuff back.” Then they sent the stuff back to me.

The joke of the time was that the electric car became like an X-Files episode. When I started working on Who Killed, I thought the film was more a parody, like, “Only in LA would celebrities hold a funeral for a car.” The incident with my car made us start to think that maybe the story was more of a murder mystery.

Stay tuned to the story at whokilledtheelectriccar.com and revengeoftheelectriccar.com

Electric Cars: Yes We Will

Chris Paine — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 21:01:54 +0000

400,000 at the Lincoln Memorial concert

Dateline: Washington, DC

The buzz is everywhere and completely electric in Washington DC this week. And some of that energy is headed directly to plug-in cars. We’ve heard electric cars mentioned time and again in our two days here, and we haven’t even been to Live Earth’s Green Gala yet. It’s just remarkable to see what a few short years can do in terms of global consciousness and awareness.

Case in point: we opened the paper on our arrival to see a full 1/4 page photo of this message greeting Obama from the sides of the train tracks on his big journey from Philadelphia to DC: Electric Cars: Yes We Can!

"...advocates send the president-elect a message as his inaugural train passes south of Delaware on its way to Washington..."

Surely these citizens deserve a cup of fair trade java and low interest solar panels for their communities. And here in DC, you can’t stop hearing these phrases: green energy, green transportation, and green jobs to build them. Can it really be true? It’s like waking up in a dream.

Inspiring words at the Alliance for Justice gathering this morning

As the inimitable Van Jones, Eli Pariser , JoDee Winterhoff and Nan Aron said to a group this morning: we are in a rare window of far reaching change. It’s a dangerous time because reactionary pressure can replace progress if everyone waits for one person (Obama) to do everything for everyone, and disappointment sets in. It’s up to each one of us to use this opportunity to really bring about the change to make a renewable energy, green economy work.

So its off to the Green Gala, and no doubt another great reference to electric cars. ”Words without thoughts, never to heaven go,” as Shakespeare once wrote. Similarly, “Words without actions, never to future go.” But the political, technical, economic forces have never been more aligned with the public will for deep change.

Let’s welcome a wise new President and a bold new era!

Tesla Offers ‘Sport’ Model…0-60 in 3.7 seconds!

Paul Scott — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 02:02:52 +0000

Roadster Sport with optional clear-coat carbon fiber top.

When I was a kid in Arab, Alabama, in 1965, I discovered slot cars. They were a new phenomenon then and quickly got everyone’s attention.

They were fast as hell, sounded cool, and it only cost one penny per minute for track time.

I remember the really fast cars had “re-wound” motors, whatever that was. All I remember was that those were the cars that always won, and boy, were they quick!

Now, I’m reading about Tesla coming out with a quicker car. What, the Roadster wasn’t fast enough?

Listen to what Elon says:
“The Roadster Sport does 0 to 60 mph in 3.7 seconds, compared with 3.9 seconds for the standard Roadster. It comes with a hand-wound stator and increased winding density for lower resistance and higher peak torque.”

It’s re-wound motors again!

Sounds just like the talk I used to hear at the slot car track in Arab during my junior high days. The technology allowing for the world’s quickest cars is not much different from the technology behind those fantastic cars of my youth.

The point here is that efficiency and power in the EV world come from tweaking the wiring of motors and better batteries, not in increasing the bore of cylinders and higher octane gas. A Tesla Sport will beat the snot out of virtually any gas powered production vehicle, and do it with a tiny fraction of the energy the gas burner will use. And all of the energy will be from domestic sources, not some Saudi oil field protected by billions of our tax dollars and our soldiers’ lives.

And before you dismiss this Tesla improvement as some rich person’s fantasy come true, keep in mind that all of the technological improvements to the Roadster will be used in the moderately priced Model S, and eventually in the Blue Star economy Tesla.

This is a trickle down theory you can believe in!

Read more in the email Elon Musk sent out January 11, 2009…

Here’s the entire email Elon Musk sent out on January 11 2009:

Subject: Introducing the Roadster Sport

We wanted our loyal customers to be the first to know that we are now taking orders for the Roadster Sport, and we’ll be talking about it this week at the 2009 North American International Auto Show.

Roadster Sport with optional clear-coat carbon fiber top.

The Roadster Sport delivers 15 percent more peak power and does 0-60 mph in 3.7 seconds, compared with 3.9 seconds for the standard Roadster. It comes with a hand-wound stator and increased winding density for lower resistance and 15 percent higher peak torque. In addition to Yokohama’s Ultra High Performance tires, the Roadster Sport has improved suspension with adjustable dampers and anti-roll bars that will be tuned to the driver’s preference.

The Roadster Sport starts at $128,500 in the United States and €112,000 (excluding VAT) in Europe. Deliveries will begin in late June. Customers who haven’t taken delivery – even those whose car is already in production — may upgrade to the Roadster Sport.

We are quite confident that this car will smoke nearly any rival in its price class – yet it is twice as efficient as compact hybrid sedans. It also represents a significant milestone for Tesla as the first production derivative of the company’s proprietary, patented powertrain. It’s de facto proof that Tesla’s technology is flexible and expandable.

We are planning to unveil the all-electric, zero-emission Model S five-passenger sedan soon – and we will absolutely honor our customers by giving them a sneak peek before the media and public. You’ll hear more about it in the next couple months.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank you for your continued support. We delivered 147 Roadsters in 2008, exceeding an aggressive internal benchmark — and vastly more than skeptics thought possible. We are in the midst of an ambitious production ramp-up, from 15 to 30 per week by the spring. Many of you can look forward to getting your car in the upcoming weeks and months – and those of you with higher VINs can take comfort in the fact that we’re producing more and more cars every week.

I am leaving soon for Detroit, where Tesla will have a space on the floor of the Detroit auto show for the first time. This is only proper, befitting our status as the newest member of the global automotive industry. If you are coming to Detroit to see the country’s largest auto show or just following it online, please be sure to see what we’re up to.

Thanks again for your continued support.

Sincerely,

Elon

The Climate Change Caravan

Alexis Ringwald — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 18:04:28 +0000

Say Hello to Guest Blogger Alexis Ringwald – with this first dispatch from the Climate Change Caravan in India.

On January 3, 2009, a group of passionate individuals launched the Climate Solutions Road Tour : an epic month-long 3,500 km journey from Chennai to New Delhi, India to demonstrate that clean transportation solutions do exist and call upon automakers globally to build them.

Elephant and Reva in India

The Climate Caravan includes ten friends and a solar music band, along with three solar plug-in electric Reva cars. The Revas are traveling 200km per charge on Lithium-Ion batteries (the solar adds 8km extra). We also have one waste vegetable oil van, one sustainably harvested jatropha fuel truck and one solar-roofed diesel car that charges laptops and cameras. The caravan will wind its way through 15 major cities, driving across India to gather voices, listening to Indian perspectives on climate change, documenting Indian climate solutions, and supporting young climate leaders who are ready to “be the change,” as Gandhi said.

This historic journey will be the longest electric car caravan in India and the longest joint tour of multiple ‘market ready’ and ’solar-supported’ electric cars worldwide. The Climate Tour was originally envisioned by myself, a Yale graduate and Fulbright Scholar to India who started Valence Energy, a solar and smart grid company, and Caroline Howe, a Yale graduate who worked on green architecture and sustainability at The Energy and Resources Institute and Infosys in India. Both Caroline and I live in India and joined our friends at the Indian Youth Climate Network to implement this project.

It wasn’t until the fourth day that I realized the magnitude of what we were doing. With a loud flag-off by the CEO of Reva electric cars in Bangalore, I zipped out of the city and onto the newly constructed national highway. 140 km later, we pulled off at our first electric car charging point: an Indian Oil petrol station. The irony was not lost on any of us. A few dusty petrol pumps stood in stark contrast to the landscape of pristine farmland and green hills. Several abandoned lorry trucks slept by the side of the road. We dined at the dhaba (Hindi for “road-side restaurant”) as our vehicle batteries quietly charged adding 25 km for every hour of charge, and listened to Mr. Sharma’s, the station owner, vision for the future.

“I feel honored to charge these electric cars at my station. I have never seen these cars on this highway though I have seen them in Bangalore city before. Within ten years, electric cars can replace diesel and petrol and I hope to have an electric charging business. Diesel and petrol make too much pollution. We need electric cars for our planet.”

Indian Oil is one of the largest oil companies in India and maintains stations neatly placed along the highway at perfect distances from each other. This is ideal, I thought, not only for fossil fuels, but for electric car charging as well. “What if,” my mind raced,” every petrol station transitioned into an electric car charging station as well?”

The following day as we neared Hyderabad, our next major city, we faced a startling crisis. Our one diesel vehicle (with the solar roof for laptop and camera charging) had run out of fuel and we were unable to re-fill. We searched frantically, but every diesel station we passed was closed and barricaded with truck drivers sitting idle on the side of the road. The crisis started off as a strike by truck drivers calling on the government to lower the fixed price of fuel. Fuel station owners then retaliated in protest with a counter-strike that shut down stations in urban areas across India. I quickly called the electric car team which was traveling about 50 km behind us. I asked if they could pick up some fuel for us on the highway outside Hyderabad. Again, the irony ! Even in an electricity starved country like India with shortages of 16% on average, we found power more reliable than traditional oil for several days. Although the shortage of oil was only temporary, it highlighted the delicate “energy security” situation that India faces with oil imports at 80% and no domestic sources.

Revas at an Indian Gas Station

We have covered 1,000 km of roads already in our solar electric cars – nearly a third of the total distance planned. As we continue, the momentum will continue to grow and our conviction will strengthen that the world already has the green mobility solution. The journey will end in India’s capital, New Delhi on February 4th, a city adding one thousand new cars to the streets every single day. There will be a grand finale highlighting transportation alternatives for the city, from Reva electric cars to the metro, bicycles and buses.

We are on a “Drive to Change” and we hope that the rest of the world will also drive the change in transportation solutions that we need to see. More soon …

Follow our Climate Solutions Road Tour at: http://www.indiaclimatesolutions.com.

Gadget’s New World

P.G. Morgan — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 00:36:57 +0000

Starting Again (photo: Steve Payne)

Over the holidays, the “Revenge” team spent time filming with Greg “Gadget” Abbott as he moved into a cavernous new warehouse space in downtown LA.

Gadget runs an electric car conversion company called Left Coast Electric. He’s also the star of the TV shows “Smash Lab” and “Monster House”- where he’s shown millions of viewers how to build eye-popping structures from the most unlikely materials. Gadget’s motto is : “If you think it can’t be done, then you’re talking to the wrong people!”

Gadget made a barnstorming appearance in “Who Killed the Electric Car?” and he’s taking a bigger role in “Revenge.” That’s partly because Gadget’s new 2000 square foot shop is being built out of the ashes of his old shop in Culver City. Late last year, Gadget’s workshop was destroyed in a fire. The blaze took away some of Gadget’s most prized work, including a super sleek electric powered Silver Porsche which featured at PlugInAmerica’s Sept 08 gala fundraiser alongside the Tesla Roadster and GM’s Volt prototype. Most people would have been knocked flat by such a turn of events, but the fire seems to have made Gadget and his wife, Charlotte, even more determined to push for a plug-in future.

As befits a man with ten Guinness World Records under his belt, (including the world’s largest electric guitar), Gadget’s rising to the challenge. As 2009 progresses, we’ll be at Gadget and Charlotte’s side as they rebuild their lives. Stage One is transforming an abandoned LA warehouse and rebuilding his silver electric Porsche into a scalable production vehicle. Stay tuned…

Lotus Reportedly Planning Electric Car

Paul Scott — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 21:21:34 +0000

Lotus Evora 2+2

Well, it had to happen. Lotus is making an EV. Actually, it’s a plug-in hybrid much like the Chevy Volt.

After both Tesla and Chrysler chose the Elise and Europa, respectively, for their slot car-fast EVs, it only makes sense that the car company named after a flower would make its own “flower power” speedster.

GM is supplying the range-extending genset which makes sense as they they’ll be able to amortize it and drive the cost down.

Like the Volt, they are shooting for a 300 mile range with the first 40 miles all electric. Performance specs are not published as yet.

Looks like most of the battery EV makers are shooting for a 100-150 mile range, with Tesla shooting for over 200. The PHEV people are aiming at the 40 mile all electric range. Then there’s Toyota, with the plug-in Prius claiming maybe 20 mile AER.

You can see how the evolution to electric will happen. We will get affordable BEVs with a 100-150 mile range, perfect for commuting. And, for those who want long range and heavy capacity, they’ll gravitate to PHEVs.

Read about Lotus’s plans from Motor Trend’s Wide Open Throttle posting after the jump.

Here is the full text of the Motor Trend Wide Open Throttle posting (in case the link goes bad).

URL: http://wot.motortrend.com/6393134/green/all-aboard-the-bandwagon-lotus-reportedly-planning-electric-car/index.html

All Aboard the Bandwagon: Lotus Reportedly Planning Electric Car
Posted Today 01:05 PM by Carlos Lago
Category: Green, Industry News, Europe, Lotus, Geneva Motor Show, Lotus Elise, Coupes, Hybrid

Lotus, which made a splash in 2008 with its well-received Evora 2+2 (pictured), will produce a high-performance electric vehicle, according to a report in the Financial Times citing comments from Lotus chief executive Michael Kimberley. The move shouldn’t come as a surprise, as Lotus already supplies versions of its vehicles to automakers for use as electric cars.

Lotus assembles bodies for the Lotus-Elise based Tesla Roadster, and the Dodge ENVI concept is essentially a Lotus Europa with an all-electric powertrain. Kimberley told the FT that the Lotus effort will differ from the Telsa and ENVI in that it will utilize a gasoline engine hooked to a generator as a range extender — much like GM’s coming Chevrolet Volt and the Fisker Karma. The Karma is making its production debut at the rapidly-approaching 2009 Detroit auto show.

Kimberley also told FT that the company is working with a “major automotive manufacturer,” on the car’s range extender and related electric tech. It’s more than likely that the manufacturer in question is GM, which is supplying Fisker with its 260-hp, 2.0L turbocharged Ecotec four as the Karma’s range-extending engine. Both GM and Fisker say their cars will have an overall range of at least 300 miles, with 40 or so of those miles possible using power from a lithium-ion battery pack only.

Kimberley told the FT to expect the electric Lotus shortly. It’s possible a concept version of the car could be unveiled as early as this March at the 2009 Geneva motor show. Of course, we’ll bring you more on the new electric Lotus as it becomes available.

[Source: Motor Trend WOT, Financial Times]

Toyota To Show EV Concept Car At Detroit Auto Show

Paul Scott — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 23:33:36 +0000

“Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. Inc. said today that it will show a small electric concept vehicle at the Detroit auto show next month.” – Toyota Division Communications

Considering the implication of those two short lines, they were barely whispered to the press.

Toyota is going to show a Battery EV at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit next month, 12 full years after they began leasing the RAV4 EV to fleets in California, and 7 years after 328 private citizens got their hands on one. This is a remarkable turnaround, given their almost fanatical desire to destroy every existing example of the RAV program.

Of course, it’s only a “concept” car, and we know that means they could be a good two years from actually releasing something, but the fact that they’re showing it at all speaks volumes.

This leaves Honda alone among the top 10 with no “announced” EV program. With all the car makers in the world running as fast as they can toward plugging batteries in to the grid, Honda continues this farce of a program with fuel cells. It’s pretty clear they’ve got plug-in vehicles in development. They’re not stupid, they’re just not talking about them yet. But effort devoted to an inherently inefficient technology like fuel cells will only delay the inevitable roll out of the Honda EVs. How much market share do they want to concede to Toyota, Tesla and Mitsubishi?

I have to mention that this announcement coincides neatly with news today of Toyota’s first ever loss ($1.66 billion). Coincidences can be fun.

U.S. Battery Makers Power Up

Paul Scott — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 02:28:51 +0000

I wrote a few months ago about the Japanese and European carmakers teaming up with Asian and Euro battery manufacturers with $200-$400 million deals to build large production facilities that will soon be cranking out high volumes of LiIon batteries for plug-in cars. Since achieving cost parity with internal combustion requires batteries to cost less than $500 per kWh, this is a welcome sign that we’ll be seeing those prices in short order.

In recent months however, many experts have spoken of the need for battery production within the U.S. It’s one thing to switch from mostly foreign oil to 100% domestic electricity, but it’s also important to have a domestic source of batteries. The big Euro and Asian car makers are going to soak up most of the world’s production, a feat easier done when they own the factories making the batteries.

As this article explains, we now have movement toward a domestic supply. One can only guess where we’d be had this started a decade earlier.

As they say, “It’s all about the batteries.”

See the LA Times article:
U.S. Battery Makers Work to Power Up

A coalition of 14 companies this week announced the creation of a new business alliance aimed at promoting domestic production of lithium ion batteries. Automakers hope to use the batteries in next- generation hybrids as well as plug-in electric cars.

Industry consultants say U.S. companies are losing a race to commercialize the technology to rivals in Asia and Europe. General Motors has said it might use foreign-produced batteries in the Chevrolet Volt, the plug-in scheduled for production in 2010.

The coalition – known as the National Alliance for Advanced Transportation Battery Cell Manufacture – is based in Chicago. The Energy Department’s Argonne National Laboratory, located in suburban Chicago, has also signed on to the project.

The alliance includes battery giant Johnson Controls and smaller players in the field such as ActaCell, Altair Nanotechnologies and Dontech Global.

Here is the complete text of the article – in case the link goes bad:
http://articles.latimes.com/2008/12/20/business/fi-battery20

U.S. Battery Makers Work to Power Up
LA Times, December 20, 2008

Fourteen companies join to promote domestic production of lithium ion batteries for autos. They will seek federal funding to build at least one prototype development center.

December 20, 2008 U.S. battery manufacturers are taking steps to raise the industry’s profile, a move that backers hope will speed commercialization of high-tech, American-made car batteries.

A coalition of 14 companies this week announced the creation of a new business alliance aimed at promoting domestic production of lithium ion batteries. Automakers hope to use the batteries in next- generation hybrids as well as plug-in electric cars.

Industry consultants say U.S. companies are losing a race to commercialize the technology to rivals in Asia and Europe. General Motors has said it might use foreign-produced batteries in the Chevrolet Volt, the plug-in scheduled for production in 2010.

The coalition – known as the National Alliance for Advanced Transportation Battery Cell Manufacture – is based in Chicago. The Energy Department’s Argonne National Laboratory, located in suburban Chicago, has also signed on to the project.

The alliance includes battery giant Johnson Controls and smaller players in the field such as ActaCell, Altair Nanotechnologies and Dontech Global.

James Greenberger, a Chicago attorney who is leading the alliance effort, said the group would seek to develop one or more manufacturing and prototype development centers in the United States. The centers could carry a total price tag of between $1 billion and $2 billion over the next five years. The group hopes to get much of the money from the federal government.

“We think this is the most effective way that government can leverage public money to both establish lithium ion battery manufacture in the United States and revitalize the automotive industry in the long term,” Greenberger said.

Alex Molinaroli, president of Johnson Controls’ power solutions division, said the alliance could help promote the industry as a source of new high-tech American jobs.

“I don’t think it’s good enough that the American consumer is going to have a vehicle that’s electrified or have hybrid capabilities,” he said. “It doesn’t help us if we have no capability in the U.S.”

The alliance took its message to Congress this week, as staffers from at least four House members from Illinois took part in a conference call with the group. A staff member from the office of Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) also participated in the call. Greenberger said he had been working to inform aides to President- elect Barack Obama as well.

Battery executives and industry consultants say governments in Japan, China, South Korea and Germany are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into production of lithium ion batteries, which have chiefly been used in cellphones, laptops and other electronics.

Filming Tesla (2 of 2)

Jessie Deeter — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:28:34 +0000

Our co-producer continues her account of shooting behind the scenes at Tesla.

As we captured key meetings with department heads, Elon stressed his commitment to ramping Tesla up – and the fact that his role was hands-on. He reminded person after person that no problem or detail was too small. The buck stopped with Elon.

Elon Musk (left) inspects a Roadster

We pulled a marathon day, and our cameraman, Adam, worked valiantly to keep up. Filming meetings is actually difficult to do well. You need to know the subject, know the players, and then make split-second decisions as to how to follow the action. Along the way, we captured a couple of job interviews and captured Elon’s policy of interviewing most employees in person.

One of our interviews was a young engineer. When asked about the recent layoffs he said “You have to cut your burn rate. It’s just the way business works — for start-ups especially.”

A couple of Tuesdays later, I took a cameraman back to witness an “all hands meeting” at Tesla’s Menlo Park office. Again, the back warehouse was full with cars about to be delivered. This time, we saw cars approaching VIN number 100. Elon voiced his displeasure with an internal issue that had been passed on to the press by an employee. Then a slide show came on, and we got a sneak peak at a photo of ‘Model S’. OMG. I don’t usually think of sedans as sexy, but this car is gorgeous. If and when this happens, Tesla will have trouble keeping them in stock at any price point. My family of five might just have to be first in line.

Filming Tesla (1 of 2)

Jessie Deeter — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:20:16 +0000

Tesla Roadsters awaiting final prep and delivery to first owners.

Let me just give it away now….the first day we filmed this fall at Tesla, we got to see not one, not two, not three, but, and I counted—over 40 production Roadsters in the Menlo Park buildings. There is something about the sight of more than four million dollars of incredibly sleek, fast (they do look fast – even standing still) car flesh under one roof that really makes you tingle. It was tangible proof that the cars were…..well, that the cars were, and that the production line was moving. It’s also when and where our Director, Chris, finally got to meet his car, a real beauty. See Chris’s Blog Post about his Tesla delivery.

Once again, it’s an exciting time to be following the electric car world. We’ve been following the Tesla story since they were in “stealth” mode, in the spring of 2006. Most of you have seen those few precious seconds of Tesla footage in “Who Killed the Electric Car ?” What most of you couldn’t guess is that when JB Straubel backed the car out of an enclosed trailer below the windmills of Altamont Pass for our film shoot, there was a gaping hole where the front grill should have been. When asked, JB replied that some details, like the entire grill, were not yet finalized. Hmmmm. A quick trip down to Home Depot for some landscaping mesh plus some metal binder clips from Office Depot gave us all we needed [the film crew mind you, not Tesla engineers] to fabricate a grill worthy of a film appearance. Elapsed time: 35 minutes. JB was impressed! We even let him ‘keep’ our design.

That was our first brush with Tesla. Then, the company was pure California start-up – occupying a no-frills warehouse space in a little lane in the heart of Silicon Valley. We found a bunch of geeks, EV nerds and entrepreneurs who were thrilled to be able to actually get jobs working on a technology that they thought might help change the world—and what a sexy technology! The car we filmed that day was just a rough version of the highly refined luxury mobile offered today, but still it was the quickest 0-60 that I’d ever done.

Two years later, we took our crew back to Tesla to film the arrival of production car #1, Elon’s personal hot car. The mood in the air was pure victory, even though the car was well over a year coming than originally forecast. Journalists jockeyed for the pole position to capture Elon’s triumphant peel out of the driveway in his new baby. The crowd was on fire.

Six months later the world had changed. The financial market had tanked, taking Tesla’s cash source with it. And the online rumor mill had changed its tune from “Gee, isn’t this an amazing technology that we wish we could all own?!” To, “Gee, how much longer do you think this company can last with dwindling cash reserves, missed delivery targets,” and a new blogger chorus: ”Tesla sucks for making a cool car that none of us can afford to own.”

With storm clouds brewing, our “Revenge” team was lucky enough to be granted access to Tesla’s San Carlos shop to check in with Elon, and see how his first weeks as CEO were shaping up.

While I can’t tell you everything we filmed, or Elon would have to kill me. What I can tell you is that we were able to witness some serious team building and whip cracking …which we’ll share with you soon!

Revenge of the Electric Car

Porsche Goes Hybrid

Tesla To Offer Auto Leases

Are You Plugged In?

Tesla Tribute

Coming Soon – The Electric City

‘Revenge’ Hits Indiana

Trainspotting

Tesla to stop Roadster production

Coulomb Gets Charged Up

Tesla Announces IPO

Better Place gets $350m from banks, investors

Enter the Russians

Europe Goes Electric

Toyota digs for Lithium

Letter from Copenhagen

When Bob Met Elon … and Chris

Say Hello To The Cadillac Converj

Ford Starts EV Test Drives

EVs in England

Nissan Leaf Hits Seattle

Nissan Plans Leaf with Complete Charging Infrastructure

GM’s Volt Program = $700m

GM puts $336m into Volt plant

Nissan in China

Tesla Prepping IPO

Aptera delays 2e until 2010

Cash for Volts?

Chrysler Changes Its Mind About EVs

Chrysler dismantles electric car plans under Fiat

Chrysler dismantles electric car plans under Fiat

PBS looks into the Electric Future

Stan Ovshinsky’s New Project

Chris Paine in the ‘Daily Beast’

At Home with Bob Lutz

Nissan’s Big Plans

Nissan’s Big Gamble

Tesla, Ford and Nissan win big with DOE grants

It’s Happening

Chu Declares Electric Transportation “Inevitable”

And now…the Plug In Tanker

Chelsea Test Drives The Volt

Tom Hanks, The New Yorker — and Electric Cars

The Power of Electric

A Bright Day in DC

MINI E Makes LA Debut

Elon — and Model S — on Letterman

Wally Rippel drives the MINI E

Tesla Model S Launch

4-camera-guys

3-kissing-teslas

2-chrispaine

1-tesla-backend

5-jessie-deeter

6-covered-teslas

7-elon-crowd

8-elon-w-tesla

9-tesla-porn

Andrew’s High School Electric Hyundai

Driving Nissan’s Trial EV

MINI E arrives in US

Obama gives $2.4bn Jump Start To Battery Makers

Gearing up for the MINI E

Florida’s EV Tax Break

Bring on the EV Trucks

Fisker Automotive Karma ad airs on KTLA

Nissan Promises EV for 2010

Announcing EV Driven

ElectricAid.org Test Drives The Think City Electric Car

Aptera 2e makes public debut

Video of Plug In America’s Inaugural EV Parade West

Photo Gallery Of Pictures From Inaugural Parade

anothernicecar

better-ev-sideshot-sm

chargebabycharge-sm

chris-in-tesla

coolsign

ladybeinginterviewed

miev-sideshot-sm

yeswecan-sm