Better Place

Reporting from Tel Aviv, Israel

Better Place, the electric car start-up, made clear when it unveiled its first vehicle demo center near Tel Aviv this week that far more is at stake in its Israel transportation trial than green clout.

"Israel is detaching itself from oil," said Shai Agassi (photo), the 41-year-old, Israeli-born founder of the company. The government "really wants this to happen," he said. "It is a national project."

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is considering building Better Place's car recharging infrastructure at its bases to support a coming fleet of electric troop carriers, as well as civilian electric cars when they become available, Israel's Globes reports.

It's no big surprise. Israel was the first country in the world to commit to installing the California start-up's nationwide car charging network (not to mention the CEO of Palo Alto-based Better Place is Major General Moshe Kaplinsky, former Deputy Chief of Staff of the IDF). But the news is still worth noting for a number of reasons.

First, the report underscores the global trend of major militaries embracing electric vehicles to break foreign fuel dependence. Second, the IDF is considered one of the most technologically advanced militaries in the world. If its electric vehicles and charging infrastructure prove viable options with clear benefits, then the IDF could propel other governments and militaries to adopt them. That could help Palto Alto-based Better Place, which seeks to blanket the world with its electric recharge grids and define the global standard.

Third: The news is more proof that oil-poor Israel is aiming to be an electric car epicenter.

Ontario, Canada -- which is already on track to shut down coal by 2014 -- has become the nation's first province to adopt Better Place's electric car recharging grid. It joins Israel, Denmark, Australia, the San Francisco Bay area and Hawaii in making a deal with the Palo Alto start-up.    

Details remain thin. But according to press releases (here and here), Better Place will partner with Bullfrog Power, the Canadian retailer of renewable energy, to power the charging infrastructure with clean sources.

The mass-market electric car could finally hit California's roads.

That's thanks to the mayors of San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose, who have declared their intention to transform the Bay Area -- and eventually California -- into the "Electric Vehicle Capital of the US" (video of the press conference here). To do so, they've signed up Palo Alto EV firm Better Place to deliver the charging infrastructure -- the first US deployment of the company’s technology.

The Better Place goal: 250,000 charging ports, 200 battery-exchange stations and a control center to service Bay Area electric car drivers. The cost: $1 billion. The time frame: permitting of the network will begin in January 2009 and construction in 2010. Commercial availability of the electric cars is targeted for 2012.