.

happy to see that MY idea of (swappable batteries) "cellphoneCAR" may come true soon...

UN-happy to see that (again) the venture capitals are rewarding (with $200 million!) the "non-inventors" of a (good) commercial/industrial idea that I've suggested and published EIGHT months ago in my (July 23, 2007) "Cellphone Battery Electric Cars" article:

http://www.gaetanomarano.it/articles/033cellphoneCAR.html

then posted/discussed (in the days/weeks after my article) on several scientific and environment forums in Europe and America, commenting MIT Technology Review articles, on the Wired Science blog, News.com and Scientific American articles and blogs, etc. (just do a Google search with the "cellphonecar" keyword to find some of them)

that's what already happened with MY """"Google"""" Lunar X Prize...

http://www.ghostnasa.com/posts/008moonprize.html

also the idea of a wind energy battery recharge come from my article (as you can verify from cached Google pages) ... "To save the high amount of energy lost on the transfer from the power plants, all "refuel stations" located away from urban areas could have their own solar or wind energy power plants (like my "Wind Energy Skyscrapers") to recharge the cars' batteries (24h a day 365d a year) at (nearly) ZERO costs!"

and (I'm sure) that the same thing will happen (soon) with MY "Wind Energy Skyscrapers Power Plants" idea:

http://www.gaetanomarano.it/articles/028energy.html

.

$200M in additional venture capital raised in 2007.

Between Israel and Denmark, 1 Million "outlets" and 250+ robotic battery swap-out stations?  $200M sounds low for that size of project.

No mention of any (very costly) additional electric utility power generation plants?  Nor the additional CO2 produced from coal?  All the (additional) MWs of power needed to recharge motor vehicles within the current maximum capacity - especially for the time of day - daylight business hours?

“Making Electric Vehicles Practical” is just one more application of the development of the resources of the demand side that need the involvement of the utility and the regulator, which are the authorized intermediaries that are blocking progress to the power industry of the third industrial revolution. The problem with today’s market structure is that it centers on the development of the resources of the supply side.--//--//--//--//-- This is what Toby Considine wrote about many other applications in his article Intelligent Grids need Intelligent Buildings, “Current market structures are a boat anchor on innovation. If you invent a gizmo that talks to the power grid and somehow saves energy in the house, today, you can only sell it to around 30 customers – all big power companies. Each of them will be required to run an extensive pilot before they can get anything through their local Utilities Commission. This means your initial sale will have to be, say, 50,000 units warranted for 10 years. Then after a year installing those units, the power company can propose a rate structure for them The Utilities Commission may nix the whole project, or ask for more research.” Using Toby’s input I wrote recently the EWPC article Missing From Gridwise (this refers to the GridWise Architectural Council). --//--//--//--//-- EWPC is a technology neutral market structure that emerged at the beginning of 2007 to allow innovations on the demand side to prosper. The last EWPC article is EWPC’s Tipping Point, whose summary is: “Aiming to be an irresistible article, it should help start a word-of-mouth epidemic of high proportions in the power industry. By respectfully exposing, and responding inquiries, the insidious power of IMEUC False Facts to obstruct progress, it is one of those little things that can make a big difference. Now all stakeholders will be able to learn how Demand Integration to power system planning, operation and control, brings the clarity and direction of the breakthough EWPC market architecture and design paradigm shift to produce large coordination savings for society as a whole. I repeat that ‘California has a great opportunity to repair the damages of the BIG California LIE to the world.’”

A sound innovation that could possibly
transform the entire transportation industry.
A major concern at this point in time
is how to overcome a whole span of
limitations in terms of safety and risk
factors,EMF sustainability and its transient
nature,etc.. to mention just a few.

When I lived in Alaska, 25 years ago, there was already an outlet for every parking place so you could plug in your car's circulating hot water heater in the winter to keep your engine from freezing.  

Assuming there is enough reserve capacity to do this, it sounds like a wonderful idea. But is there enough reserve capacity?

The business model is creative, but is the current electric distribution capacity enough to accommodate an expansion of the this EV infrastructure beyond this pilot project of 125 or so stations?

The trouble with electric cars has always been two-fold; driving range and re-charge time. The new line of Phoenix electric vehicles claims to have addressed at least the re-charge side of the problem in a most dramatic way. And also it has great projector headlights to help you more in safety driving.