Nissan is asking the U.S. government to put some money where its mouth is and start building out plug-in vehicle infrastructure. Remember that in January's State of the Union address, President Obama reiterated his goal of 1 million plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles on the road by 2015. At a New York conference this week Andy Palmer, a senior vice president at Nissan, said that goal is "reasonable" if the infrastructure is built up nationwide. Specifically, Palmer said, "Carmakers can't go and put hydrogen fueling and charging stations throughout the U.S., but the government can."
Currently, a charging network is nearly non-existent when compared to gasoline stations in the U.S. According to the Department of Energy, there are approximately 700 car charging stations and, at last count, 121,446 gas stations. The government would have to spend some serious coin to fund a nationwide network. However, let's not forget that every household outlet in the country is a potential charging station (albeit a slow one) and most EV owners are doing most of their charging at home, so the 700 vs. 121,446 number is not as lopsided as it originally seems. According to Pike Research, Nissan has nothing to worry about since the number of EV charge points around the globe will total 4.7 million by 2015.
[Source: Automotive News | Image: Jonas Dalidd]
Currently, a charging network is nearly non-existent when compared to gasoline stations in the U.S. According to the Department of Energy, there are approximately 700 car charging stations and, at last count, 121,446 gas stations. The government would have to spend some serious coin to fund a nationwide network. However, let's not forget that every household outlet in the country is a potential charging station (albeit a slow one) and most EV owners are doing most of their charging at home, so the 700 vs. 121,446 number is not as lopsided as it originally seems. According to Pike Research, Nissan has nothing to worry about since the number of EV charge points around the globe will total 4.7 million by 2015.
[Source: Automotive News | Image: Jonas Dalidd]
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