EV’s are great for buying around in a green-conscious way, but plug-in people must practice patience while waiting hours to juice up their ride. Better Place’s battery swapping stations offer much faster EV refueling, that is why China Southern Power Grid Co. (CSG) is betting big at the technology. The Chinese utility giant has teamed up with Guangzhou’s municipal government and higher Place to construct an influence pack exchange depot and an EV education center. With exhibits, meeting rooms, and EVs to check drive, the education center aims to assist persuade administrative officials, captains of industry, and the final populace to leap at the electric car bandwagon. Moreover, Ghuangzhou’s government will “encourage local car manufacturers” to create autos with switchable batteries and “promote” EV adoption in taxis and state vehicles — all of which seems more likely to happen post-haste, ’cause what the Chinese government wants, the Chinese government gets .
April 27, 2011
Guangzhou Municipal Government Signs Agreement to assist New Partnership
TEL AVIV (April 27, 2011) – At a signing ceremony today in Israel with officials from Guangzhou, Better Place announced a strategic agreement with China Southern Power Grid Co. (CSG), the arena’s eighth largest utility in accordance with the Fortune Global 500. The agreement, which specializes in joint electric car and infrastructure projects in CSG’s service areas, will further advance electric cars with switchable batteries in China. The agreement demands the businesses to open a battery switch station and joint education center in Guangzhou before the tip of the year, while working to formalize a joint-venture partnership.
Underscoring Guangzhou’s support for the higher Place-CSG cooperation, Executive Vice Mayor Wu Yimin today signed an agreement with Better Place Founder and CEO Shai Agassi that demands the Municipal Government of Guangzhou to aid Better Place and CSG of their efforts to create a supply chain hub and electric car network in China’s third largest city and residential to CSG. The Guangzhou accord demands the municipal government to encourage local car manufacturers, inclusive of Guangzhou Automobile Industry Group, to supply electric cars with switchable batteries. It also requires the town to advertise electric-car adoption in fleet segments including public-sector vehicles and personal-sector fleets equivalent to taxis.
“China Southern Grid is a crucial partner in a big market that’s moving quickly toward the mass-market development of electrical cars and is embracing battery switch because the primary process of range extension,” Agassi commented. “Our collaboration with China Southern and the support of the Guangzhou government open the door to new opportunities for switchable-battery electric cars made by Chinese manufacturers for the domestic and export markets.”
“Better Place has conducted extensive research and testing on its battery-switch technology combined with managed charging, which takes under consideration the attributes and wants of the electrical grid because the electric-car industry grows rapidly in China,” said China Southern Grid Chairman Zhao Jianguo.”We believe that networked infrastructure is important to enable broad adoption and concentrating on charging alone will be too costly and time-consuming. The battery-switch model may become mainstream in China and our joint visitor center and battery switch demonstration project with Better Place might help promote electric-car adoption in China by allowing potential customers to experience this innovative solution.”
“Electric cars present a good chance for China and are critical to accomplish a low carbon economy. We’ll support this rapidly growing industry by encouraging production of electrical cars inside the region and promoting adoption in fleets,” said Wu Yimin, Executive Vice Mayor of Guangzhou. “The cooperation between China Southern Grid and higher Place is a strategic step, and both companies can have our full support. We’re pleased to host the joint education center, the primary of its kind in China, later this year.”
The easier Place-CSG agreement requires the businesses to jointly engage relevant Chinese government bodies and other stakeholders, secure governmental policy support, and promote technical standards, where appropriate, to further accelerate China’s rapidly-growing, electric-car industry. The businesses will develop in phases the joint education center to host government and industry delegations and educate Chinese consumers in regards to the benefits of going electric. The heart will include interactive exhibits, meeting facilities, electric cars that visitors can test drive, and an automatic battery switch station. The power is slated to open before the tip of year in central Guangzhou. Better Place currently operates similar centers near Tel Aviv, Copenhagen, and Toronto, hosting nearly 100,000 visitors per year.
As CSG and higher Place further develop their relationship, the businesses are also taking a look at the possibility of a joint commercial operation in line with a switchable-battery, network-operator model. Their pilot projects and other joint activities will explore the advantages that switchable-battery electric cars and the networked infrastructure that supports them can deliver to the electrical grid in CSG’s service area, which spans five provinces, a million square kilometers, and 230 million people in Southern China.
CSG, which ranks number 156 at the Fortune Global 500 list of the arena’s largest corporations, is a part of the electrical Vehicle Industry Alliance led by China’s State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, or SASAC. The Chinese government created the alliance of state-owned auto, battery, electric, and oil companies with the last word goal of establishing internationally competitive electric-car brands. The Chinese government has declared the electrical-car industry certainly one of seven strategic emerging sectors, stated its intent for China to become the sector’s largest developer and manufacturer of electrical cars, and offered strong support inside the kind of investment and incentives because the country seeks to leapfrog combustion-engine technology and decrease a growing dependence on oil.
Agassi added, “We’re in advanced discussions with quite a lot of Chinese automakers to partner around our open network solution and we’ll share our number of preferred partners with the market once a last decision is made.”
By the tip of the year, Better Place may have battery switch stations under deployment in countries on four continents, including the U.S., Europe, Australia and now China. The deployments form the premise of a growing network for making electric cars more cost-effective, convenient and sustainable than today’s cars with internal combustion engines. The easier Place model also offers governments all over the world an answer for reducing dependence on oil and its harmful contributions to global climate change and native pollution while growing domestic green jobs.
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