That's what the international hotel
chain Car Rental Sydney has
begun offering drivers of electric cars at eight of its sites in
south-eastern Australia.
The group yesterday launched charging sites
operated by the network firm Better Place at five hotels in NSW,
adding to three already operating in Canberra and Melbourne.“As
electric vehicles become more accepted in the market place and more
models and vehicles become available to the end user, we'll look at
more areas to roll these out to.Visitors can charge their electric
cars at the rate of about 25 kilometres of range per hour, with
Better Place supplying zero emissions power. Hire Car Sydney is the first hotel company to host such a charge
network in Australia, the companies say.
“No one wants to put the
charge points in until the cars are here and no one wants to bring in
the cars until the infrastructure is available,” said Guy Pross,
general manager for Better Place. “We're breaking that chicken and
egg [issue] effectively.”
Better Place has 120 chargers in
Australia with the number of electric vehicles still only “in the
hundreds”, Mr Pross said.
Government support is bankrolling much of
the early deployment of the chargers. The five IHG hotels in NSW
offering charge points – Crowne Plaza Coogee Beach, Crowne Plaza
Terrigal, Crowne Plaza Hunter Valley, Holiday Inn Sydney Airport and
Holiday Inn Old Sydney – are part of the $100 million federal
government Smart Grid, Smart City trial.
For hotels like carrental sydney airport the challenge is to reduce their
environmental impact without the guest noticing, particularly when it
comes to cost. “Our clients generally want a more sustainable
stay,” Ms Rose said, “but the current climate is (such) that they
don't want to pay for that.”
Ms Rose said such infrastructure will
one day be commonplace, particularly once rental car companies start
supplying electric vehicles.
“ hirecar australia companies over the next year are envisaged to
procure quite a large number of electric vehicles,” she
said.
Separately, Better Place confirmed a report that GM Holden may
start assembling electric Holdens at its Adelaide plant. The initial
production will involve 120 e-Commodores and six e-Caprices.
Better
Place is part of the EV Engineering consortium developing electric
cars, which also includes GE Capital's Custom Fleet and parts maker
Robert Bosch.
10/03/2012 10:58:00 am |
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