Aug 07 - San Jose Mercury News
Pacific Gas & Electric and Southern California Edison will begin testing the
electric i MiEV in October.
Who better to test an electric car than an electric utility?
Today, Pacific Gas & Electric and Mitsubishi Motors plan to announce that
PG&E will do just that and begin evaluating a tiny electric car later this
year.
The electric i MiEV, which is based on the "i" model gas-fueled car
Mitsubishi already makes for Japan, most likely will arrive at both PG&E and
Southern California Edison in October, said David Patterson, senior manager
of regulatory affairs at Mitsubishi R&D America in Cypress.
Patterson said probably fewer than a dozen vehicles will be tested by the
two utilities in the three-year program. Mitsubishi also will test the car
at its U.S. headquarters in Southern California as well as at a Michigan
research facility.
The four-passenger vehicle is smaller than a Toyota Scion xD or Honda Fit,
but larger than Mercedes' Smart car. The i MiEV -- which stands for
Mitsubishi Innovative Electric Vehicle -- uses a 330-volt lithium-ion
battery with several charging options. A 110-volt household plug would give
it a full charge in 10 to 16 hours. A 220-volt outlet would reduce the
charging time to six or seven hours, and a fast-charging system that the
utilities will test could reduce that to 30 minutes.
Patterson said the vehicle can go about 75 miles on a charge. Mitsubishi
wants to find out how well a car
this small with a battery set-up designed for Japan will do on the roads of
America. "We need to assess if our battery technology is ready for the
United States," Patterson said.
The vehicle goes on sale in Japan next summer, at around $25,000 to $30,000.
Mitsubishi has not said whether it will sell the car in the United States,
but if it does, it's expected to cost more.
High gas prices and concerns about global warming have piqued interest in
electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids. Patterson said automakers and
utilities must work together to make those vehicles a success.
"We already had one opportunity to have electric vehicles for the U.S.
public," he said of cars such as the General Motors EV1 tested and leased in
the late 1980s and early 1990s, mainly in California. "This is the second
opportunity. We'd better get it right this time, because I don't think we'll
get a third chance."
PG&E has natural gas-powered and electric vehicles in its fleet of repair
trucks, and soon will take delivery of the nation's first plug-in hybrid
bucket truck from Terex Utilities. A bucket truck has a basket platform and
a hydraulic lift that utility workers use to repair power poles and lines.
Southern California Edison is currently testing 20 plug-in hybrid Ford
Escape vehicles.
Contact Matt Nauman at mnauman@mercurynews.com or (408) 920-5701.
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