Road to electric cars not so easy

Portland jumps on the trend, but hard issues remain

By Jim Redden

The Portland Tribune, Aug 26, 2010, Updated Aug 26, 2010 (5 Reader comments)

CHRISTOPHER ONSTOTT / TRIBUNE PHOTO

Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski was the first to test drive the new zero-emission Nissan Leaf electric car when the first quick-charge station was unveiled at PGE's downtown World Trade Center headquarters earlier this month.

Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski has spent months publicizing the state’s partnership with Nissan and Portland General Electric to promote electric cars.

Kulongoski even went so far as to make a deposit to buy an all-electric Nissan Leaf during a recent press event to unveil the nation’s first quick-charge station at PGE’s downtown World Trade Center headquarters. He also test drove one around town, proclaiming it “impressive.”

But funny things happen when ideas catch on. The Leaf won’t be available to the public until December. In the meantime, Daimler beat Nissan to the market with an electric version of its iconic Smart ForTwo microcar. Just a week after Kulongoski’s event, the German-made car was showcased at a ceremony in Beaverton. That city’s mayor, Denny Doyle, plugged the Smart ForTwo Electric Drive — as it is officially called — into a new charging station installed at the Beaverton library.

And now Ford has stepped into the fray, presenting an electric version of its Focus compact car and Transit Connect commercial van during a panel discussion on the future of electric cars at Portland State University earlier this week. Ford’s presentation came just months before Chevrolet plans to begin selling the Volt, an electric car with a small gas engine that recharges the batteries.

The three recent electric-car events underscore what Kulongoski has been saying for months — that the Portland area is rapidly becoming a hub for electric-car technology. But not all the news is good. Although the charging station unveiled in Beaverton was made by a local company, that firm will not participate in the program endorsed by Kulongoski to install thousands of charging stations throughout the Willamette Valley in coming years. Most of them will be built in Michigan.

The installation of the Willamette Valley charging stations is being administered by ECOtality North America, a San Francisco-based company that won a $99.8 million grant for the work from the U.S. Department of Energy last year. ECOtality chose Michigan-based Roush Manufacturing to build the stations, which will be installed in four other states, too. A smaller number of quick-charge stations, similar to the one at the World Trade Center, also will be installed. That station was built by Takasago Ltd., a subsidiary of NEC.

ECOtality will use only Roush’s charging stations, because it wants to better manage the data and reporting requirements associated with the project, says company spokeswoman Caitlyn Cieslik-Miskimen. She says other companies still can install their stations anywhere they want, just not as part of the government-backed project.

“We are promoting a free market to give options to consumers,” she says.

The station at the Beaverton Library was made by OpConnect, a startup Beaverton company. Although it’s not participating in the ECOtality program, OpConnect chose to donate the stations to Beaverton. It has yet to find another site for a second station in the area.

“It’s hard to compete against someone who is giving stations away,” OpConnect CEO Dexter Turner says of Ecotality’s installation plan.

Competition begins to build

The recent competition between automobile and charging-station manufacturers shows how seriously businesses are taking the government-backed push to put more electric vehicles on the road. The movement took off last August when the energy department awarded its grant to ECOtality to oversee the installation of stations in Arizona, California, Oregon, Tennessee and Washington.

The company partnered with those states and several other businesses to raise an equal match to secure the grant. Partners include Nissan and Chevrolet, both of which expect the availability of charging stations to increase the sales of their electric cars.

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