"Monday, 08 Dec 2008

Better Place Joins Subaru, Other Japanese Carmakers In Ministry of Environment Electric Vehicle Project

Kiyotaka Fujii Named Head of Better Place Asia Pacific-Japan
Tokyo (Dec 08, 2008) -- Better Place, the world’s leading mobility operator, today announced that it is joining Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd., maker of Subaru automobiles, and other Japanese carmakers in the first Ministry of Environment, electric-vehicle (EV) project in Japan. Better Place, the only foreign company participating, was invited by the Japanese Ministry of Environment to build a battery exchange station for EVs and showcase the technology in the world’s biggest auto-manufacturing nation...


...Better Place Japan will be led by Kiyotaka Fujii, the former president and CEO of retailer Louis Vuitton’s Japanese subsidiary and SAP Japan. Based in Tokyo, Fujii also will lead the company’s efforts in the Asia Pacific region.

“The Better Place model works across cultures and continents and no one is more qualified and better suited to ensure Japan moves forward in terms of sustainable transportation and energy than Fujii-san,” said Agassi. “When he led SAP Japan, business expanded threefold. He’s the type of leader we want spearheading our efforts in Asia Pacific.”

“While Japan has succeeded in building a robust economy, it should reduce its dependence on oil and lower its carbon footprint. Japan also should look to be a leader in support of electric vehicles by investing in electric charging infrastructure,” said Fujii. “I’m confident that the collaboration between the public and private sectors represented by the Ministry of Environment project will provide major impetus for the adoption of electric vehicles in Japan.”
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http://www.betterplace.com/press-room/press-releases-detail/better-place-joins-subaru-other-japanese-carmakers-in-ministry-of-environme/

This makes sense in a country like Japan where 2/3 of electricity is supplied by inflexible nuke and coal-/crude-fired plants, provided charging at the public charging spots during peak hours is avoided and charging at home during off-peak hours is encouraged by price incentive. This is happening in Israel also: http://www.freep.com/article/20081209/BUSINESS01/812090324/1014/BUSINESS01
France, also heavily dependent on nuke, is implementing similar project.

What happened? They took a crap on their buddies over at Nissan??:confused: I still got to ask; why in the world do the Japanese need PBP? They are one of the world's premier engineering countries. If they want EVs, charging stations and battery swap out facilities, they can handle it all by themselves. The Japanese government just has to tell industry, here's money, make it so.

This Agassi guy has a truly golden tongue.

What happened? They took a crap on their buddies over at Nissan??:confused: I still got to ask; why in the world do the Japanese need PBP? They are one of the world's premier engineering countries. If they want EVs, charging stations and battery swap out facilities, they can handle it all by themselves. The Japanese government just has to tell industry, here's money, make it so.

This Agassi guy has a truly golden tongue.





Now, if you read the article it's not like Japan is handing over their country to PBP. They are doing a pilot project to test out a swap-out station and probably trial the complete system. They didn't release the details of the entire project so we will have to wait and see.

Also, Japan has a very strong bureaucratic system. It can be very hard to get a massive country-wide program of this scope started (I guess that‘s true just about anywhere but more so in Japan). However, I think that we can all agree that if Japan views this pilot project as successful and decides to get behind it that they will then turn their considerable talents to the task. I you travel around Japan for even a short time you will realize that they do infrastructure on a scale like no other country. One thing that really shocked me is how strongly everything is built in order to withstand earthquakes. Seriously, It looks like bridges and building structures are four times (just a wild guess) more stout than "normal" infrastructure. It's very obvious. Thus, that makes it even more impressive. Not only do they have subways, trains, high-speed trains, etc. but they look like they can take just about anything nature can throw at them.

If Japan decides to go EV and allows PBP to put in the charging infrastructure, you can expect compatible cars from every one of their major auto manufacturers, not just from Nissan.

It just hit me the other day (after looking at their charge spot and how it works) that the real genius of the plan is the software that is going to make this all happen (OK, the cell phone model is also impressive). Shai Agassi came from SAP and so does the new head of Better Place: Japan. This is a software company that specialized is enterprise level software solutions (http://www.sap.com/usa/index.epx). Here is the video showing how the system will work. Notice there are no keypads, credit card slots or any input device on the charge spot. Just a plug. All of the communication is going to be taken care of using the operating system running inside the car. It's like a plug-and-play device being plugged into a PC. The OS will recognize the car, authenticate the user and begin the charging. You can also access the Internet to see the state of charge. Check out the video:

http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=xmdZ7cXqDxc


You can see that this is a very software intensive application. The quality of the software will make or break PBP. You can also see that once they have this network model up and running, they can easily scale it to global proportions. Brilliant! Any other car that wants to run on their infrastructure must have a device capable of running their operating system.

I wonder about the V2G capabilities of the current version. How will V2G be implemented? How will they credit the customer for the Utilities using the EV’s battery as a storage device? Details should be coming soon. Will the next version of the Volt be PBP compatible? Will there be an aftermarket upgrade? Many questions...


So, don't worry about the Japanese. They will take the basic design of the infrastructure and improve it. Probably end up selling their versions of the infrastructure equipment and cars all over the world.

Have I missed something? I thought Agassi's plan was battery swaping, and this is about standard charge stations. Standardized charge stations I am all in favor of. Doesn't force auto manufacturers to use any particular battery type or form factor. low power (and low cost) versions of this charge station model can be used by restaurants, shopping malls, and hotels, like ATM machines or pop vending machines.
Battery swapping on the other hand will be the most expensive way to purchase energy, and the option of last resort by users. Business volume will be low and set up cost high. :cool:

You can see that this is a very software intensive application. The quality of the software will make or break PBP. You can also see that once they have this network model up and running, they can easily scale it to global proportions. Brilliant! Any other car that wants to run on their infrastructure must have a device capable of running their operating system.


I guess I don't see how this would take very complex software. All the charging station has to do is monitor the car's charge state, dole out coulombs and talk to a central computer that gives an ok to the station, sends you a text (or two) and charges you credit card or account.



I wonder about the V2G capabilities of the current version. How will V2G be implemented? How will they credit the customer for the Utilities using the EV’s battery as a storage device? Details should be coming soon. Will the next version of the Volt be PBP compatible? Will there be an aftermarket upgrade? Many questions...


I don't think they will credit the consumer, unless they have an agreement for you to leave your car plugged in. Wouldn't it just suck to come out to your car and find it drained after charging it all night, just because the smart grid needed extra energy?

I guess I don't see how this would take very complex software. All the charging station has to do is monitor the car's charge state, dole out coulombs and talk to a central computer that gives an ok to the station, sends you a text (or two) and charges you credit card or account.



I don't think they will credit the consumer, unless they have an agreement for you to leave your car plugged in. Wouldn't it just suck to come out to your car and find it drained after charging it all night, just because the smart grid needed extra energy?





Yeah, sounds easy, right? However, controlling that much power delivered to potentially an entire country is a huge task. Also, your second comment shows where some of the complexity lies. A customer will probably be able to become energy dealers where they determine the percentage of the energy stored in the battery pack is available to the utility company. The owner of the vehicle might put in the time they expect to need to drive. Perhaps a daily schedule. Why would the vehicle owner do this? Because it will be valuable to the utility and thus they will be willing to pay for the use of the battery pack. Since PBP owns the battery the vehicle owner does not have to worry about hurting the pack. PBP might become a energy storage solution to the utility companies. PBP has the opportunity to use the battery pack for two purposes. The more I think of this plan the more opportunities I see in it. If we are going to be using more wind and solar resources, we are going to need more electrical storage. Just thinking of 90% of the transportation fleet just sitting there all connected and ready for use makes you wonder.

It's a brand new concept and that's where the complexity comes in. Something of this scope is never as easy at it seems. It's not like it's going to be run by one computer geek with a server in his apartment. It's going to be a huge and complex network that has to deal with customer billing, utilities, charge rates, charge station problems, sensor data, etc.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how the first network turns out and what it can do. It will probably be full of bugs at first and may only have limited functionality. It will get better over time and eventually allow anyone connected to the grid to be a power user as well as a power broker. It may even be extended beyond just cars. It might eventually form the backbone for the new smart grid. I think these are the thoughts that are spinning around in Shai's head. Simple? No. Not if you want to plan for future greatness.