Twenty Mitsubishi i-MiEV electric cars have arrived in Melbourne to be part of a $5 million electric vehicle trial by the Victorian Government.
Victrian Premier John Brumby said “We are committed to making this state an electric vehicle friendly location and we understand how important cleaner, greener and innovative travel options are to Victorians. That’s why the Victorian Government is currently working with the RACV to find around 180 households interested in taking part in an electric vehicle trial. The successful applicants will get an electric car for three months and we look forward to Mitsubishi being part of that trial. This world-leading trial will create real conditions by testing how drivers, vehicles, plug-in charging infrastructure and the electricity network will interact in real-life situations.”
The five-year electric vehicle trial is part of the $38 billion Victorian Transport Plan to find new ways of making electric cars more efficient and practical for Victorian families and roads. The trial will include passenger cars, light commercial vehicles and electric two-wheelers. There are plans for around 180 charging points and 60 vehicles which will rotate between different households and fleets,
A futuristic electric taxi known as the Unicab is seen as a leading contender to replace New York’s fleet of 26,500 yellow cabs over a ten year period beginning in 2013.
The design is based on a concept from Melbourne’s award-winning RMIT student designer Damian Lucaciu. It incorporates ideas from clean-air experts and the NSW Disability Council’s founder Jacob Baldwin.
It boasts open space, low floors, a ramp for the disabled and seats for up to seven passengers.
Australia’s first public on-street electric vehicle charging station has been opened in Derby Place, Glebe. It uses 100 per cent GreenPower from Origin.
The station was installed by Visionstream and is managed by ChargePoint. It will be available to customers of the GoGet car rental company which has a converted plug-in hybrid Toyota Prius. The car has an electric motor range of 30 kilometres, 2 kilometres longer than 80 per cent of GoGet trips and can be recharged in three hours.
Sydney’s Lord Mayor Clover Moore said "I made a commitment last November at a climate change summit in Copenhagen that we would accelerate the introduction of electrical vehicles into Sydney and that we would deploy our first charging station in 2010." The Lord Mayor says she wants Sydney to be ready when electric cars start arriving in 12 to 18 months.
At the U.N. climate change summit, fourteen world cities, including Sydney, vowed to work together over the next year to make their cities more "plug-in ready" for electric vehicles.
The other cities which acmmitted to becoming ready for electric vehicles are Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Toronto, London, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Bogota, Buenos Aires, Sao Paolo, Delhi, Seoul and Copenhagen.
Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore said Sydney will fast-track the uptake of electric vehicles by establishing charging stations and converting car fleets. She said the City of Sydney Council wanted to set up the first public charging stations before the end of next year.
A Sydney company, ChargePoint Australia Pty Ltd, has signed an exclusive agreement with Coulomb Technologies for the supply of electric vehicle charging systems. The systems will be trialled in car parks in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth in the first half of 2010.
Luke Grana, CEO of ChargePoint Australia, said that he expected installations to rapidly multiply around the nation as major car manufacturers release their own pure electric and hybrid vehicles and that they will also soon to be followed by a faster charger for service stations. Home garage systems are still in development.
Chargers located outside the home will work on a pay per use system in which drivers dial a number listed on the charger or otherwise through a smart card which can be topped up online.
Mr Grana said that the average Australian car cost about $10 to drive 100 kilometres while an electric vehicle cost about $2 per 100 kilometres.
Coulomb Techologies was established in 2007 by a group of computer industry entrepreneurs in the Silicon Valley. It is developing ChargePoint systems for the US, Norway, the Netherland and Germany.
The New Zealand Parliament has passed legislation exempting electric cars from road tax.
Previously, electric vehicles were taxed the same as diesel vehicles at between 3.6 and 4 cents per kilometre.
Transport Minister, Steven Joyce, said that combining highly efficient electric motors with New Zealand’s competitive advantage in renewable electricity generation would reduce the greenhouse gases produced by the transport sector.
The new legislation will come into effect on October 1 and continue until 2013 when it will be reassessed.
The Mitsubishi iMiEv has become the first all-electric car to be approved for use on Australian roads.
The iMiEV’s lithium-ion bnatteries can be fully charged in 7 hours and give a range of 160 kilometres at speeds of up to 130 kilometres per hour.
Mitsubishi plans to begin mass production of the car in Japan in July. It had been planning to build 2,000 of the vehicles this year but interest has been so strong that the figure has now been increased to 5,000.
Mitsubishi CEO Robert McEniry said: ”This is really the start of the future for the car industry, I think we’ll see a lot more of these vehicles being introduced into the marketplace. The car you see is ready for volume sale. Australia is the first country to get full certification.”
Mr McEniry said the company is planning on the car going on sale in 2010 but refused to comment on a price.
The California-based electric car operator, Better Place, has announced agreements with AGL Energy and Macquarie Capital Group to raise $1 billion and begin deploying an electric vehicle network powered by renewable energy in Australia.
Better Place has already secured funding to install 500,000 uniform electric car charging points at designated parking lots in residential areas and workplaces in Israel and another 500,000 in Denmark. Renault-Nissan will build electric cars for these countries and elsewhere. A range of models will be come into mass production between 2010 and 2014.
Better Place plans to use its scalable model, which Israel and Denmark have adopted, to build an electric vehicle network in Australia. Macquarie Capital will assist in business development and help raise $1 billion for the network build. AGL will provide electricity from renewable sources to power the electric cars.
Hyundai has announced that it will be the first car manufacturer to sell electric cars in New Zealand. It has already sold the first vehicle which will be delivered in November.
The cars will be fully electric, plug-in Hyundai Getz models, which are already available with petrol engines. The vehicles will be retro-fitted with batteries and an electric motor to replace the original engine. The retro-fitting will be done by Blade Electric Vehicles, which will set up a production facility in New Zealand based on projected sales of 200 vehicles a year.
David Crawford, general manager land transport environment and safety for the Ministry of Transport, said the Government saw this "as an important first step towards achieving transport-related targets in particular, the Government’s target to become one of the first countries in the world to widely use electric vehicles".
Electricity company, Meridian Energy, also plans to introduce electric vehicles. It will have several Mitsubishi MiEV vehicles for trial and promotion purposes early next year
According to a Mitsubishi spokesman, Australia will have its first plug-in electric car by the end of next year.
The Mitsubishi i MiEV should be in showrooms by the final months of 2009 with a starting price in the $30,000 range.
The company plans to skip the petrol hybrid phase of future car development and go straight to an electric vehicle. "Mitsubishi don’t make hybrid cars. They make electric cars. And we will have one here as soon as we possibly can," says the Managing Director of Mitsubishi Motors Australia, Rob McEniry.
The i-MiEV has three motors – one turns each of the front wheels, with the third powering the back axle. Although the i-MiEV is slightly shorter than a Toyota Yaris or Mazda 2, the small engines and placement of the lithium-ion battery pack in the rear of the car, create maximum cabin space. It has a claimed top speed of 180km/h and a range of 200km.
A Sydney company, ChargePoint Australia Pty Ltd, has signed an exclusive agreement with Coulomb Technologies for the supply of electric vehicle charging systems. The systems will be trialled in car parks in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth in the first half of 2010.
