Daimler and RWE team up on pilot e-car

By John Reed in London
Published: September 5 2008 23:37

Daimler and RWE are teaming up on an electric cars project in Germany’s first such pairing between a carmaker and a power utility.
RWE will set up about 500 charging points in Berlin by the end of next year to serve more than 100 electric cars built by Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz and Smart brands, the two companies said yesterday.

Daimler is already testing electric Smart cars in London, and plans series production of them from late 2009. It also plans to build a small Mercedes A- or B-Class electric model from 2010.
RWE said that the Ruhr region, where the company is based, might be the next urban area for expanding recharging infrastructure for cars. Daimler is considering taking electric cars to other European cities and to the US, where it launched its conventional-engine Smart car earlier this year.
Car companies and electric utilities are forging ties in anticipation of the rollout of electric or plug-in hybrid cars by several manufacturers from about 2010.
Early electric cars failed to sell in large numbers in large part because of the demands they put on drivers to find public places to recharge them.
Payment for the electric charge also presents drivers and power companies with challenges. Carmakers see the problem as being more acute in Europe than in the US, where more drivers have home garages.
Jürgen Grossmann, RWE’s chief executive, said the charging points would be installed in drivers’ homes, workplaces, and public parking areas, and that paying for the charge would be “as simple and convenient as when using one’s mobile phone”.
Daimler and RWE are working on an in-car communication device that “recognises” customers when they charge their cars in public places so that they can be billed for the power at home.
RWE and Daimler said they were researching the use of car batteries as “reservoirs” for power that cars might later feed back to the grid.
Toyota and EDF last year announced a partnership on road tests for a plug-in hybrid vehicle in France, and plans to roll out car-recharging infrastructure around Europe. Next week, the two companies will announce the launch of road tests for the plug-in vehicle in the UK.
The vehicle will form part of EDF’s company fleet, and about 50 members of the utility’s staff will test it for about a year, Toyota told the Financial Times yesterday.
The two companies say they have developed an “innovative charging and invoicing system” incorported into the plug-in car which will be compatible with a new generation of public charging stations.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008