Bay Area's big-city mayors endorse $1 billion plan for electric cars

San Jose Mercury News

The Bay Area could become the nation's electric-car capital if an ambitious $1 billion plan announced by a Palo Alto start-up — and endorsed today by the Bay Area's big-city mayors, including San Jose's Chuck Reed — comes to fruition.

Better Place, the start-up headed by former high-tech executive Shai Agassi, already has struck deals in Israel, Denmark and Australia to build battery-charging stations and garages where drained batteries can be quickly swapped for fully-charged ones. Today's announcement was the first U.S. deployment of the company's technology. Based on Better Place's preliminary market research, it will take about 100,000 charging stations, 50 battery exchange stations, and a control center to service Bay Area electric car drivers.

"We need to put together a new industry, and it needs to scale very fast," said Agassi at a San Francisco City Hall press conference. He was flanked by Reed as well as Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom.

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