San Francisco Plugs In To the Future with Electric Vehicle Recharging Stations
Last November, I joined Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums and San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed to announce a nine-step policy plan for transforming the Bay Area into the Electric Vehicle Capital of the United States. Our bold regional initiative has been recognized by Coulomb Technologies, Better Place, General Motors (GM), and other companies who have made the Bay Area a high priority in their EV investment programs. In November, Better Place said it would invest $1 billion to create networked electric mobility systems in the Bay Area. Last month GM announced it will roll out its plug-in Chevy Volt in San Francisco, and Nissan named the Bay Area a prime location for launching its battery powered car.
>> Read more on this topic from a policy perspective on RedGreenAndBlue.org.
Commercial availability of EVs is targeted to begin in 2010. GM plans to begin selling its long awaited Volt in San Francisco next year. A number of other manufacturers have electric vehicles in development, including BMW, Ford, Nissan, Toyota and Volkswagen.
In the meantime, we are working on a plan to roll out charging stations across the Bay Area. Our city fleet manager is discussing the purchase of plug-in vehicles with other Bay Area cities and we are in talks with major auto companies about getting our hands on the limited first wave of EVs to integrate into our fleet. By making greener driving choices, San Franciscans and our Bay Area neighbors can set an example for people across the nation.
The time for dramatic change is here. In the United States, transportation accounts for about 40 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions; and in San Francisco, that figure is greater than 50 percent. Pollution is changing our climate, damaging the air we breathe and threatening our food and water supplies. Our dependence on foreign oil is costing us billions of dollars annually. Electric vehicles have the possibility to transform our economy, revive our car industry, and improve our environment. To make sure electric vehicles succeed this time around we need to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in battery technology and the infrastructure.
Listen to Mayor Newsom’s radio show online or subscribe to his weekly policy discussions on iTunes. Join Mayor Newsom on Facebook. You can also follow him on Twitter.
More photos from the event:
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- plug-in hybrid
Image credit: Couloumb Technologies
Again the people who sell this fail to declare where all the extra electrcity is to come from. Power plants burn coal and other Hydrocarbons or create nuclear waste. Plug in Hybrids are not the solution!
Where did all the extra electricity come from to support plasma TVs? How about electric outdoor lighting at Christmas?
Power plants, even coal plants, are a single point of pollution control that is manageable. All Internal Combustion Engine vehicles with Catalytic converter run great on the day you walk off the showroom floor…but the older they get, the less efficient the cat system and pollution goes up significantly during the life of the vehicle.
It’s not like 1,000,000 electric cars show up on March 1, 2010 in San Francisco. Solar Power on the housetop is likely to outstrip electric vehicle implementation for the next 10 years.
Complaining about where energy comes from misses the forest for the trees. The first priority has to be decoupling our economy from oil. Once it runs on home-grown energy, we can tackle sourcing issues.
This is especially true because distributed, clean energy is easy to overlay on the current system, creating a clean grid, family by family. It may only be a plug-in hybrid now, but soon, it will be a plug-in hybrid which is recharged every day or night by solar panels at home or work.
Progress is progress. Don’t bash it just because it’s not a revolution.
As Always if Newsom was so concerned about Green, and transportation,
why is MUNI still a wretched mess. Basically from his elitist ego view, transportation for the domestic help and homeless to sleep.
It’s an embarrassment to watch the poor tourists ride in this stench.
So for being Green, what about doing something for and about public transportation? Muni makes the Manhattan 6 (lex local) seem like a car service. Maybe thats because New York Is actually a real functioning city. San Francisco is just a hamlet,with an elitist ego that thinks it’s a city.
Better Place specifically contracts to buy all its electric energy from renewable.
Take Denmark for example. It’s the second country to take up the Better Place module. It has more wind energy at times (especially at night) than it consume. There are times at night they have to PAY to send their excess to Germany.
When Better Place offered to buy their renewable energy at discount rates utility companies were more than happy to accept them because electric cars can charge at night and can easily use their otherwise wasted energy.
So batteries are the vital missing link to shore up the inevitable erratic renewable energy. Combined with Smart Grid technology electric cars are the perfect way to maximize the efficient use of excess energy.
I think this is fantastic. Good to see industry commit to delivering vehicles and technology to support the vision. The people of the Bay Area will be very receptive to this project - ensuring it’s success and eventual rollout to other cities. Kudos!
I wish we’d focus ‘plug in’ on fleets, and not waste money on first generation battery powered vehicles. I’ve yet to see the ratio of sockets to cars? Or length of cords needed.
It seems that we’re just extending assumptions forward, instead of stepping back and looking at the long term evolution of electric vehicles that will integrate fuel cells, batteries and capacitors. It seems strange that we’re acting as if batteries have ‘won’ - and ignoring advantages that remain in the long term favor of fuel cells/capacitors.
But, I guess we need to take baby steps. I just wish we’d keep public out of it– and focus on fleets. Plugging in just seems to be a band aid… when compared to longer term options like ’swap out exchange’ and rapid refueling (via chemical storage, not electrons)
Garry Golden
Editor
The Energy Roadmap.com
http://wwww.theenergyroadmap.com
Damn, I still can NOT believe that people are so dumb that they think these “horseless carriages” can ever replace a horse. You can’t run them on hay. You have to use that stinky black goo that comes from the ground and messes up the fishing.
Mark, If you don’t mess with them, the catalytic converters and other pollution controls work very well. The ‘86 Mustang that I had at each and every California retest delivered very low readings. One anomaly though. The high RPM test was always better, but I couldn’t run there because California seems to think that 105 MPH is too fast. That is the speed to which the test RPM equates.
San Francisco bay area leads this country in solar power activity. Does nobody see the connection of solar generated power with regards to the advancement of eletric vehicles?
Even though our solar business has grown over 800% in the last two years, it is amazing just how many people still don’t get it.
http://www.mygreenscene.com/thesolarmaidcompany/index.html