By Peter Choi
I was jogging in downtown one afternoon when I came upon the picture above. First I almost ran passed it but when I saw a orange cord like rope coming out of a car my gauge of curiosity spiked. I stood there for about a minute trying to figure out what I was looking at. Then I remembered reading a article on the news about cars being charged and running only on electricity. When I was reading that article I laughed to myself thinking that the day that happens will probably after we've consumed all the fossil fuel on this planet. But it was already happening and of all the cities Portland. So I did a little research to see what was really going on.
According to Kimberly Melton from the Oregonian, Portland contributed to the green movement by opening Portland General Electric's first charging stations for electric vehicles. These charging stations are located in the parking garage of the two World Trade Center in downtown Portland. It is also the first of 2000 planned to be developed and distributed all across Oregon homes and public places.
These charging stations fully charge the car in about 20-30 minutes, which is the projected amount of time where an individual goes to get coffee or lunch. Nissan leaf was the car demonstrated on the charging machines, which is the new plug in hybrid that already has 17,000 reservations of the car. This is a $33,000 car but with a little tax break, it drops the car to $23,000. The Nissan leaf also gets 100 miles to a charge which is more than enough to drive around the city and perhaps longer road trips.
On top of this Portland State University was among one of the 5 cities that received the first plug in hybrid from Toyota in June. Toyota have decided that Portland is a city that has a wide range of weather conditions and the sensitivity to mixed mobility, which Toyota hopes to be in their future.
No longer are the maybes and what ifs the questions we need to dwell upon. The future is here and we have proven that we have the technology to make an impact on our environment. No longer do we need to depend on fossil fuel and gas for transportation but charging stations that free our air of pollutants and low emissions created from these plug-in hybrid cars. Unlike hybrid cars, plug-ins are all electric and do not have a gas powered motor. It is solely powered by electricity and the miles per charge that it receives from a 20-30 minute wait is extraordinary. We change our minds and our perspectives to understand and absorb this new technology. The technology will continue to advance and with the people supporting the change to sustainability, it will only be a matter of time when our reliance on fossil fuel for transportation will be nonexistent.
http://www.kgw.com/news/business/Prius-Plug-in-gets-tested-at-PSU-95649089.html
http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2010/08/oregon_unveils_its_first_quick.html
http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/news/4215489
http://www.pluginamerica.org/index.shtml
We're only months away from the debut of a whole new class of electric cars. When you get your chance to drive one of these cars, you'll be forever hooked on using clean kWh to power your vehicle and you'll never want to go back to the ugly, dirty, expensive oil that causes our society so much harm.
ReplyDeleteEVs are quiet, powerful and require very little maintenance. All of your money spent to power them stays local, you never give money to those evil people who run the world's oil trade. That alone will make EVs popular.