Washington State Leaps Ahead in PHEV Awareness
May 11, 2007 (From the CalCars-News archive)

We finally have a minute to say that the May 7th
CascadiaMicrosoft Conference on Transportation,
Technology, and Energy. "Jump Start to a Secure,
Clean Energy Future," marked the emergence of a
broad coalition in the Pacific Northwest. Over
300 people from corporations, many levels of
government and a great diversity of organizations
are realizing how fundamental a transformation
they could accomplish -- especially with their
hydropower resources. At the center are plug-in
hybrid cars and vehicle-to-grid strategies.

Here's the link for Cascadia:
<http://www.discovery.org/cascadia> and the link
for the conference:
<http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&id=270&program=C\
ascadia&isEvent=true>.
The organizers have uploaded PDF versions of all
the presentations from the day-long event. We'll
have more to say as soon as we can in particular
about the presentations by John Wellinghoff of
the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Bill
Reinert of Toyota, and Nick Zielinski of GM....

The conference ended up on the upper left of the
front page of the Tuesday Seattle Times, and was
well reported in the Seattle Post-Intelligence as
well. Both stories are below. And Cascadia's blog
<http://www.cascadiaprospectus.org/2007/05/plugins.php>
has links to broadcast stories and other reports.


Fans of plug-in cars build their power base
By Hal Bernton and Mike Lindblom, Seattle Times staff reporters
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003697756_plugin08m.html

Sometime in the future, your car may make your
round-trip commute with electricity generated from rooftop solar cells.

When you want to venture east of the Cascades for
a weekend winery tour, an internal-combustion
engine — powered by biofuels — would kick into action.

This vision has helped propel plug-in hybrid cars
from a footnote in automotive technology into a
serious alternative that car manufacturers are
working to bring to market within the next five to 10 years.

Meanwhile, a grass-roots network of plug-in
converts — professors, students, garage mechanics
and others — is already fashioning the first
generation of these vehicles in hopes of prodding
the industry into faster action. They say these
cars can get more than 100 miles per gallon for some travel.

"We have proved that we can make good-enough
plug-in hybrids now, and don't have to develop a
whole new vehicle," said Felix Kramer, founder of
the California Cars Initiative, which converts
standard Toyota Prius hybrids to operate as plug-in cars.

Kramer spoke at a Monday conference that drew
more than 300 people — including
automotive-industry representatives, federal and
state officials — to the Microsoft campus in
Redmond. The conference was sponsored by the
Cascadia Center of Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank.

Auto-industry officials maintain there are still
significant obstacles to mass-producing these
vehicles. And electric energy may not be
renewable. It often comes from coal-fired and
gas-fired power plants that still rely on fossil fuels.

But interest in this technology has intensified
as gas prices climb to record highs and concerns about global warming increase.

Some local governments are planning to purchase
fleets of plug-in hybrids that could stimulate
the markets and further refine the technology.

"We're committed to plug-in hybrids," said King County Executive Ron Sims.
advertising

There is hope that the Northwest — with Microsoft
and other high-tech companies providing plenty of
brain power — could emerge as a hub of innovation
to spur development of plug-ins.

The cars, for example, could be equipped with
metered smart chips that could allow the
batteries to sell back small amounts of
electricity to the grid. Motorists might be able
to earn several thousand dollars a year and also
help stabilize the regional power system.

The plug-ins attempt to build on the success of
the current generation of hybrid cars, such as
the Toyota Prius. In the first four months of
this year, the Prius surpassed the Camry to
emerge as the top-selling Toyota in the
Northwest, according to Buzz Rodland, of Rodland Toyota in Everett.

"This is an astounding achievement," Rodland said.

The Prius has a small electric battery that,
working on its own, can power the vehicle for
only a couple of miles. The Prius has no plug-in
battery, so the battery maintains its charge with
the aid of the car's gasoline-powered
internal-combustion engine. Some see the plug-ins
as an end unto themselves, while others see a
step on the way to all-electric vehicles, some of which were on display Monday.

Auto-industry officials say one of the biggest
obstacles to plug-in hybrids is the further
development of long-lasting, lightweight lithium
batteries at an affordable price.

"My challenge right now is that I have to get a
battery pack, and I am working my butt off to
ensure that we do have a battery pack," said Nick
Zielinski, an engineer for General Motors. GM is
developing a plug-in Saturn and an ambitious new
vehicle known as the Chevy Volt, which could run on electricity or biofuels.

Zielinski hopes the vehicles could be available
within the next five to 10 years.

Others say current technology is sufficient to
launch plug-in technology. University of
California students have worked with their
professors to build prototypes. And a small
cottage industry has emerged to convert, with the
aid of additional battery packs, a standard Prius
into plug-in vehicles that can get substantially better gas mileage.

The conversions, however, void the Toyota warranty for the vehicles.

"The official me says you shouldn't be doing
this," said Bill Reinert, a Toyota engineer. "The
unofficial me says these guys are cool, but the official me has to win out."

A study released earlier this year by the
Richland-based Pacific Northwest National
Laboratory said that if the current U.S. car,
pickup and sport-utility vehicle fleet was
converted to plug-in technology, the electrical
system could power most of these cars for 33
miles per day. The plants would have to run more
intensively, generally using more fossil fuels.

The study found the conversion would reduce
greenhouse-gas emissions, in some regions by as
much as 40 percent. But the increased use of coal
to generate electricity would cause substantial
increases in a significant pollutant — sulfur
oxides — in the areas around the power plants.

Some imagine a future where panels of
photovoltaic solar cells sprout on top of homes
and office buildings to provide new sources of
clean power for plug-in hybrids or all-electric cars.

"Today's sun will give you tomorrow's driving,"
predicted Andrew Frank, a University of California at Davis professor.

Hal Bernton: 206-464-2581 or hbernton@...


Visions of a Northwest hybrid car future abound
By ROBERT McCLURE, P-I REPORTER
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/314740_hybrid08.html

Imagine at first hundreds of Northwesterners --
but later thousands, and ultimately tens of
thousands or even millions -- plugging in their
electric hybrid cars every night. Then they all
commute the next day without dipping into their fuel tanks.

Imagine that the other cars on the road, still
using fuel systems more like today's, get around
on the byproducts of cow poop or wheat stubble.

CAPTION (PLUG ON CAR) This could be a common
sight on area roads in the future if hybrid gas-electric vehicles take off.

Imagine further that this new fleet of cars
carries devices to signal the traffic-light
system, reducing congestion by half at rush hour.
And imagine these same devices prevent cars from
running into one another no matter what their
idiot drivers do. The same devices could offer
drivers a choice between the fastest route, the
cheapest route (because many roads will have tolls) and the "greenest" route.

These were some of the visions that emerged
Monday at a broad-ranging conference of
Seattle-area businesspeople, utility executives,
public officials, environmentalists and others
titled "Jump Start to a Secure, Clean Energy
Future" at Microsoft Corp.'s Redmond campus.

State Transportation Secretary Doug McDonald said
questions about how to start a Northwest pilot
project on plug-in electric hybrids are flying
fast as the technologies are emerging.

"Just exactly where is the project going to
happen? Just exactly when is it going to start?
Just exactly what is it going to be about?"
McDonald asked participants. "We don't exactly
have all those answers just exactly yet."

CAPTION: Frank Ziegler, hybrid technologies
director of sales and distribution, demonstrates
his company's all-electric motorcycle. He says it
will travel up to 85 mph and travel 75 miles
before needing a four-hour recharge. The bike was
developed in Mooresville, N.C.

That hasn't stopped many entrepreneurs from
launching into efforts to move the technology
along, get it to market -- and make some money.

But one roadblock for the Northwest is that lack
here of an efficient market for buying and
selling power, such as the ones in Texas and
California, said David Kaplan, president and
chief executive officer of V2Green.

His Seattle software and electronics company is
working on moving power from the electric grid to
plug-in hybrids -- and back again, allowing
owners of the cars to earn cash for the power their cars create.

"Can we launch a Northwest pilot demonstration
project this year?" Kaplan wondered aloud. "The
basic technologies are all developed and pretty
well understood. However, what has to happen is
all these technologies have to be pulled together."

Technology companies, electric grid operators,
utilities and regulators all have to communicate,
Kaplan said -- which was exactly the goal of the
sponsor of the conference, the Cascadia Center, a
project of the Seattle think tank Discovery Institute.

"The key is uniting them and getting them talking
to each other," said Bruce Agnew, the center's
policy director. "In the end, you could be
completely petroleum-free, which is our goal."

P-I reporter Robert McClure can be reached at
206-448-8092 or robertmcclure@....