Google.org RechargeIT: Plug-in Hybrids

DAN REICHER: The planet is frying and we need to do
something about it.
LARRY BRILLIANT: Our climate team wakes up every morning,
asking themselves one question, which is how can you
reduce greenhouse gases.
JIM WOOLSEY: Our dependence on oil is a
problem for several reasons.
CHELSEA SEXTON: Once people try plugging in, you don't
ever want go back to the gas station.

FELIX KRAMER: What's driving plug-in
hybrids is three things--
cleaner, cheaper, domestic.
CHELSEA SEXTON: Well, plug-in hybrids, I think, are sort of
the killer app in automotive technology.
They're the best of both worlds between electric cars
and the flexibility of a hybrid.
So a plug-in hybrid is one vehicle where maybe your first
40 miles of the day are all electric.
Monday through Friday, you may never use gasoline.
But if you wanted to drive to Vegas on the weekend, you have
the flexibility to do that and you can put gasoline in the
tank as a backup.
We call plug-in hybrids electric
vehicles with safety nets.
FELIX KRAMER: The big breakthrough comes with the
plug-in hybrid.
You add a larger battery, and you can add
the second fuel source--
electricity.
JIM WOOLSEY: By having a plug-in hybrid, they get to
drive on the power that they're charging overnight--
several kilowatt hours--
which is maybe $0.05 a kilowatt hour in many parts of
the United States.
That's essentially like driving on, let's say, $0.01,
$0.02 a mile.
CHELSEA SEXTON: We're seeing individuals and companies like
Google who are willing to use these conversion cars to show
this technology is real, it is here today, it is possible, so
how come you, the automotive companies,
aren't making them yet?
DAN REICHER: So Google is taking a number of steps to
advance plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.
First we're converting six cars--
four Priuses.
and two Ford Escapes--
to plug-in hybrid electrics.
Secondly, we are going to add about 100 vehicles to our
corporate fleet.
CHELSEA SEXTON: Well, I think it's important for government
to set standards toward making cleaner cars, because what we
know for sure is Detroit doesn't have a history of
wanting to do it on their own.

ALEC PROUDFOOT: For alternative energy sources
like wind and solar, where you might not necessarily be
generating the power exactly when you need it, you can
store it and then delay when it's used by
storing it in the battery.
FELIX KRAMER: The vehicle-to-grid is the big
game changer in this whole situation.
The idea is that batteries in cars can become distributed
energy storage systems for the entire power grid.
The power grid has this problem: It doesn't have a
place to store energy.
PROFESSOR WILLETT KEMPTON: The whole idea of vehicle-to-grid,
or V2G, is that you have to have the power available when
the grid needs it.
ALEC PROUDFOOT: Google is working with our utility,
PG&E, and others to help develop standards for
vehicle-to-grid and to do tests with our demonstration
fleet to see how practical it is, what kind of problems we
run into, and how can we really make this work.
DAN REICHER: So it's a nice coming together
of demand and supply--
a large supply at night that the vehicles can use to charge
up, and high demand during peak periods during the day
when those same vehicles can sell that electricity back to
the power company.
LARRY BRILLIANT: These cars, in essence, allow you to take
the renewable energy-- the solar energy--
let you use it when you need it, and power back to the grid
when you're not using it.
PROFESSOR WILLETT KEMPTON: That means that you're
providing a revenue stream to clean vehicles.
FELIX KRAMER: If we went to sleep tonight and woke up
tomorrow morning and all of the cars in the country were
plug-in hybrids, if they were charging at night, we could
power 82% of them with today's grid.
So that means that we don't have to build any more power
plants to power our cars.

CHELSEA SEXTON: The more we transition to electricity, the
more opportunity we will have to use those renewable fuels--
whether it's wind or solar, whether it's on your house or
as part of the national grid.
So electric cars are the only cars that get
cleaner over time.
JIM WOOLSEY: You're starting to see a lot of the same type
of excitement that greeted the birth of the Internet.
There are people investing in this area that weren't
investing before--
this area-- areas that are relevant to both the batteries
for plug-in hybrids and to the cellulosic fuels.
CHELSEA SEXTON: The best way to get people to plug in is to
give them the option in the first place.
Once people try plugging in, you don't ever want to go back
to the gas station.
MALE SPEAKER: Once all the systems are in place, there'll
be more customers than we can make cars for.
JIM WOOLSEY: I call this a growing coalition between the
tree huggers, the do-gooders, the sodbusters, the cheap
hawks, the evangelicals, the utility shareholders, the mom
and pop drivers, and Willie Nelson.
LARRY BRILLIANT: The reason that we finally came to this
naming of RechargeIT is because you can recharge the
car from the sun, you can recharge the grid from the
car, and you can recharge our enthusiasm for trying to
tackle the problems of global warming all at once.
So RechargeIT.org seems like a perfect name for us.