Yesterday, GE Industrial Solutions announced the latest in a line of solar-powered initiatives and partnerships designed to help electric car owners power their cars with solar power: a distribution agreement with photovoltaic solar power specialist REC Solar.
The agreement, which will see REC Solar become an official distributor of the GE WattStation level 2 electric vehicle charging station, comes hot on the heels of an announcement earlier this month in which GE announced it had partnered with Inovateus Solar to sell a range of solar-powered carports.
Unlike GE's large-scale carports, which cost anything from $29,000 up to $1.18 million, GE’s WattStation will help provide a low-cost electric vehicle charging solution for REC Solar's photovoltaic solar panel installations for smaller businesses, local governments and even residential customers.
The idea of combining electric vehicle charging stations and solar panels is hardly new. For many years, owners of previous-generation electric cars like the 2001 RAV4 EV have combined a small solar installation on their homes to charge their cars up during the day, and earlier this year, Ford announced that it was entering into a partnership with SunPower called “Drive Green For LIfe” to offer discounts on domestic photovoltaic solar panel installations to owners of the 2012 Ford Focus Electric.
GE WattStation Publicity Shot
The new partnership between REC Solar and GE means that instead of having a single one-size-fits-all solution, REC Solar can offer bespoke solar-powered electric car charging solutions to any of its customers.
GE’s latest partnership makes it the leader in solar-powered electric car charging technology, with solutions now available for everyone from residential customers through to massive sports stadiums, multinational companies and shopping malls.
There’s no word on how much the GE WattStation will cost when purchased as part of a REC Solar installation, but we’d like to hope that it will be offered at a low-enough cost to encourage those who don’t even own an electric car to consider paying a little extra to future-proof their home or business.
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