Consortium Promotes Widespread Electric Vehicle Adoption

by InvestorPlace Staff | January 12, 2012 9:51 am

With the ongoing rollout of electric vehicles and EV hybrids by big players in the automotive industry–including Ford (NYSE:F[1]), General Motors (NYSE:GM[2]), Toyota (NYSE:TM[3]), Honda (NYSE:HMC[4]), and Nissan (PINK:NSANY[5]), as well as the emerging Tesla Motors (NASDAQ:TSLA[6])–it is no longer difficult to imagine EV adoption increasing steadily, if not dramatically.

A newly formed coalition of transportation industry leaders, though, is trying to speed up EV adoption and development of an EV infrastructure of charging stations and energy storage systems. Called the Electrification Leadership Council, the group includes FedEx (NYSE:FEDX[7]), Hertz (NYSE:HTZ[8]), Navistar (NYSE:NAV[9]), Azure Dynamics, A123 Systems, PG&E (NYSE:PCG[10]), ECOtality, Automatiks, GE Capital (NYSE:GE[11]), CODA Automotive, NextEra Energy, ECOtotality, and representatives from national, state, and local agencies.

The initiative will focus on deployment of EVs, and related technologies, in urban areas and will include research into the most efficient ways to scale up EV adoption.

“Collaboration is key to widespread adoption of electric vehicles. No one company can do it alone.” Russell Musgrove, managing director for global vehicles with FedEx, told GreenBiz.com. “We’re very committed to sharing the lessons we’ve learned in our EV fleet deployments to create an EV ecosystem template that is replicable anywhere.”

FedEx announced in June that it had doubled the size of its EV fleet by putting another 24 new all-electric vehicles into service.

Source URL: https://investorplace.com/2012/01/consortium-promotes-an-electric-vehicle-future-evs-f-gm-fedx-nav-htz/

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