Google goes electric with cars and solar power

by Alex Zaharov-Reutt

Wednesday, 20 June 2007

Page 1 of 2 ! Google’s ‘RechargeIT’ initiative transforms hybrid cars into mostly electrically powered vehicles that barely use the fuel tank to double the fuel economy of regular hybrids, pump energy back into the grid and reduce emissions while providing US $10m to speed up progress. With Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google, already an investor in Silicon Valley’s ‘Tesla Motors’ electric car company, along with Google’s recent moves to work on energy efficient technology with Intel, Google is positioning itself to make as big a difference to the world of renewable energies as it has in search and online advertising. Google’s philanthropic arm, Google.org, has announced both in a press release and at Google’s Official Blog that it is has already awarded “$1 million in grants and announced plans for a $10 million request for proposals (RFP) to fund development, adoption and commercialization of plug-ins, fully electric cars and related vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology”. The project is known as RechargeIT, and took four Toyota Prius hybrids and two Ford Escape hybrids and added extra batteries and a regular power point allowing the car to be charged via the electricity grid, with the cars now able to be called ‘plug-in hybrids’. The resulting fuel economy from most electric operation with actual fuel used only sparingly meant that Google’s modified hybrids can achieve 70-100 miles per gallon, at least double that of regular hybrids and quadruple that of fuel-only powered cars which get deliver approximately 20 miles per gallon. Given car companies’ reluctance to issue fully electric cars ever since the GM ‘EV1’ debacle that was highlighted in the docu-movie ‘Who Killed The Electric Car’, Google’s actions to dramatically accelerate the uptake, popularity and massive environmental benefits that electric cars (even if they come equipped with a fuel tank and hybrid engine) are tremendously important in making electric powered cars sold at retail a reality. There’s clearly still plenty of work to go before cars go fully electric and the price of hybrids drops further. That’s despite the efforts of car companies who have released a few hybrid cars onto the world market, with Toyota doing best with the Prius, but Google’s results with the RechargeIT project have clearly demonstrated just how much more today’s car manufacturers could truly be doing if they really wanted the best fuel economy for consumers. Google also showed how the electricity generated and stored in each car’s suite of batteries as the car is driven around during the day could be resold back into the electric grid when it’s most needed, likely at the evening peak time as people return home from work, with Google calling the development ‘vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology’. Dr. Larry Brilliant, the Executive Director of Google.org said that: "Clean energy technology can dramatically shift how we make and use energy for our cars and homes by charging cars through an electric grid powered by solar or other renewable energy sources, and selling power back to the electric grid when it's needed most. This approach can quadruple the fuel efficiency of cars on the road today and improve grid stability”. The US $1 million that Google has already awarded has gone to a range of organizations who will use the money to promote electric and hybrid vehicles. $200,000 will be used by the Brookings Institution to support a 2008 conference on US Government policy to promote plug-in hybrid cars, while another $200,000 will go to CalCars to support work on a public education campaign for plug-in hybrids. So, where will the rest of the money go, where does Google want to spend an addition US $10 million, and does it add any shine to Google's 'Dont Be Evil' directive? Please read onto page 2 for the conclusion. << First page <   1 2 Next page > Last page - Post your comment >>

 

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