President Barack Obama announced the availability of $2.4 billion in funding to put American ingenuity and America’s manufacturers to work producing next generation Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles and the advanced battery components that will make these vehicles run.
Several early models of passenger vehicles have enough energy stored in advanced batteries to power several homes for hours. Hybrid electric buses and heavy trucks could power many homes or a school or a hospital in an emergency. Recent announcements demonstrate that electric utilities and some auto makers want to make V2G a reality. The Smart Grid Consortium, established in December 2007 by Xcel Energy, will select a community of approximately 100,000 residents to become a Smart Grid City using V2G. The Renault-Nissan Alliance and Project Better Place have signed a MOU to create a mass-market for electric vehicles in Israel.
When Coke and Pepsi were in the middle of their diet wars, California was an early battle ground. Now millions of Californians are being targeted as early adopters for a low carbon fuel diet. More miles, less carbon emission. It is the law. Executive Order S-1-07, the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS), calls for a reduction of at least 10 percent in the carbon intensity of California’s transportation fuels by 2020.
Toyota Prius enthusiasts may now be forced to wait until 2011 to order a Prius with lithium batteries. It was hoped that the shift to these batteries would give hybrids better miles per gallon and accelerate the availability of a plug-in hybrid sold and warrantied by a major auto maker. Toyota (TM) did provide significant encouragement with the announcement that it is demonstrating ten plug-in hybrids (PHEV) and plans to follow with commercial sales. The new Toyota with its NiMH battery pack and has an all-electric range of only 13 kilometers (8 miles) and a maximum speed of only 100 km/h (62 mph) in electric-only mode. GM may beat Toyota to the PHEV market. Independents like A123 will be there first.