March 15, 2009
Jump-Starting The Electric Car Dream
Some Are Getting Charged Up About A "Crazy Idea" To Transform How We Drive
-
Play CBS Video Video Making The World A 'Better Place' Shai Agassi is on a monumental quest to make the world a '"better place." He wants to replace everyone's gas-fueled cars with environmentally friendly electric cars. David Pogue reports.
-
Fill 'er up! Better Place's director of infrastructure products and international deployment development Tal Agassi demonstrates the use of a charge spot for an electric vehicle at a car park in Ramat Hasharon, Israel, Dec. 8, 2008. (AP Photo/Moti Milrod)
Sunday Morning presents stories with currency about the financial state of our world.
- Las Vegas Stripped
- The Art Of Survival
- A Closed Video Store's Second Act
- Jump-Starting The Electric Car Dream
- Millionaires-In-Chief
- In Good Company
- Discount Detox
- Suze Orman: What To Do Now
- And Who Was Ponzi?
Silicon Valley millionaire Shai Agassi has a huge, huge idea.
"When you find a great purpose in life, you gotta pursue it," he said.
He calls his idea Better Place. And investors love it - they've already poured $300 million into it.
One believer is Alan Salzman, CEO of Vantage Point Venture Partners: "I think it's one of those seminal companies that is going to change the way the world functions."
Governments are getting behind it too.
GAVIN:disk2 We believe this is the future.
And what is the big idea? Solve the climate crisis, create jobs, and eliminate our dependence on foreign oil … in three easy steps.
Step 1: Persuade the world's car companies to make electric cars with swappable batteries.
"You'll plug in a cable and that's it," Agassi said.
Step 2: Persuade governments to install millions of recharging outlets.
"They will be at home, they'll be at work, they'll be at downtown and retail centers," Agassi said. "And by the time you came back to your car, it's topped off."
Step 3: When people want to go on longer drives, when there's no time to recharge the battery, build battery-swapping stations all over the world.
Agassi described lanes like in gas stations at these "switch" stations. "You go into the switch station. Your depleted battery comes out, a full battery comes in. And you keep driving. It takes you about two, three minutes."
See? Easy! All Shai Agassi has to do is oversee the largest global infrastructure project in history, replace 2 billion gas cars with electric ones, and then convince you to buy them.
Has anyone told him, "By the way, this is crazy?"
"Oh, about nine out of ten people say it's crazy!" he laughed. "But the other ones are actually saying, 'Where can I put my money?'"
That would include Alan Salzman of Vantage Point.
"We have this very simple investment thesis, and it's served us well for the last 25 years," he said. "And that is, 'Bet on the inevitable.' I'll grant it's of large scale. But none of this requires what we think of as new laws of physics. This is all doable."
In fact, Nissan and Renault have agreed to manufacture the first battery-swappable cars. Prototypes are already on the road.
Now, to pull this off, Better Place is going to need more than money, and more than technology. It's also going to need the people in the halls of political power to sign on.
And that's the amazing part: Country by country, Agassi is convincing governments to install all those power outlets for his electric cars.
(AP/G. Yamamoto, Hon. Advertiser)
(Left: Shai Agassi, founder and CEO of Better Place, shows the electric components under the hood of a converted Nissan Rogue to Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle, in Honolulu, Dec. 2, 2008.)
"We are talking about 25 countries around the world, and various different governors and mayors in the U.S."
That includes San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. He told Pogue that he and the mayors of Oakland and San Jose want to create 250,000 stations (or points of contact) for electric charging."
For a company only a year-and-a-half old, Better Place has made amazing progress.
But it's all for nothing, unless people actually buy those cars.
How much would one cost?
"If you take the battery component out of our car, which is what we do - we don't let you buy the battery, we buy the battery - an SUV will cost roughly the same as an equivalent gas SUV, roughly in the $20,000 range. A sedan will cost roughly the same range."
But here's the twist: The car gets cheaper the more you agree to drive.
"We're just like a cell phone company," Agassi said. "We sell miles. We pay for your financing of the car, depending on how many miles you commit. Sort of like how many minutes you commit [on your phone]. You can go all the way down (and in the case of people who drive a lot, like taxis) to zero."
"Free car? If you sign up for the maximum minutes plan?" asked Pogue.
"This is Oprah for everybody, right?" he laughed. "You all got a free car!"
Now, not everybody is sold on Agassi's plan. There will be challenges ahead, as Mayor Newsom is well aware.
"So, we're talking about 250,000 charging stations," Newsom said. "Nine Bay Area counties that can't get along on any other issue, and they're gonna create a standardized outlet system and a ubiquitous service? Very difficult. So, that's a legitimate critique. Though, we say, 'Prove us wrong.' Don't assume us wrong. We believe in this."
According to Better Place, wide-scale testing begins next year. By 2011, cars and charging spots will be operational in Israel, Denmark and Hawaii.
"For a transformation of this magnitude, it's immensely fast," Agassi said.
He thinks he knows how to make the world a better place … and it's crazy enough that it might work.
"That's the stimulus project we've been looking for," he said. "It's the infrastructure project of our generation."
For more info:
© MMIX, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Michelle Obama tells how her role as the First Lady has changed her perspective.
- 1
- 2
- next
See all 32 Commentshttp://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/19/electric-cars-for-all-no-really-this-time/?scp=4&sq=renewable%20energy%20cars&st=cse
Electric Cars by 2012 Obama's second term!!! Go electric!!! Go President Obama!
Ajay Jain
1. Lead acid batteries are easily recycled resulting in no lead waste in our landfills.
2. Lead acid batteries are unlikely to be used in electric cars anyway. They are, in fact, not even used in today's Hybrids excepting the one battery that is used to start the internal combustion engine.
Go with gravity. Put a flat battery that slides under under the trunk in the rear like a drawer. It would be easiest to slide in, even with a hand truck or hand fork lift type of device, opening up opportunities for millions of small "ma & pa" garages to act as battery stations.
So it doesn't take 3 minutes, but 10 or 15, at some garages, not a big price to pay for universal acceptance, even for cross-country trips.
Don't like the idea of having to put the battery in from underneath the car. There should be a more off-the-shelf equipment method like using hand or powered forlifts, which would open up more opportunities for stations with minimal capital, that could later work up to automated equipment. Keep it simple as possible.
I like the idea of a charging station with its own wind turbine, solar panels, or hydro-power station, but there should be exceptions made for shoestring operations of independent station owners.
If the market works, people will naturally go to the alternative energy sources.
--
Yeah but then I won't get your money.
--
Listen to this man! He's patriotic.
There's an endless supply of oil waiting to be bought. I would encourage every American to buy a Hummer and drive as much as possible.
Posted by daffy64 at 1:36 PM : Mar 18, 2009
Yea, Zgomer is well known as well.... a gomer.
--
Listen to this man! He's patriotic.
There's an endless supply of oil waiting to be bought. I would encourage every American to buy a Hummer and drive as much as possible.
--
Yeah, but then where will Canada, Venezuala, and Saudi Arabia get their money from?
Keep the cash flowing over the border.
Posted by poguenyt at 6:15 PM : Mar 16, 2009
----------------------
This has to be the Joke of the day.
Posted by dmw1167 at 7:16 AM : Mar 17, 2009
---------------------
Pickens thinks its real funny--he'll be laughing all the way to the bank.
- 1
- 2
- next
See all 32 Comments