Charging station
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Rapid electric car charging stations for cars like the 2012 Nissan Leaf and 2012 Mitsubishi i may soon become a lot more common in the U.S. thanks to a new rapid charging station Nissan says it will launch in the U.S. by early 2012. The charging station, which is based upon the CHAdeMo direct current rapid charging standard, is being launched by Nissan as part of a global electric vehicle infrastructure collaboration with multinational logistics firm Sumitomo Corporation. Nearly half the size, one-third the price Almost one half of the physical dimensions of previous generation rapid charging...
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Should Chevy Volt Owners Worry About Charging Fires? Utility Says Yes, Common Sense Says No
A fire in Mooresille, North Carolina last week involving a 2011 Chevrolet Volt has led Duke Energy to advise its customers against charging the plug-in hybrid at home in case it starts a fire. But is the advice justified, or just another example of what happens when irrational fear of a new...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Warning: Pumping Gas Can Be Seriously Bad For Your Health
We all know that exhaust fumes do bad things to us and our planet, and that gasoline fumes contain carcinogens, but the biggest risk to your health might come from the gas pump itself, not the gasoline. That’s the verdict of a recent study by Kimberly-Clark Professional, which found that the...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Police Spotted In Electric Car Charging Space: Nobody Charged
Many town and city councils across the U.S. are introducing legislation to enable electric car owners to park for free as a way of encouraging more people to make the switch from gasoline to plug-in cars. Normally, these free parking spaces include access to a suitable level 2 charging station...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Nissan Drops 2012 Leaf Charging Station Price. Is It Cheap Enough?
Yesterday, Nissan announced that it had reduced the price of its official 2012 Nissan Leaf home charging station to make it more affordable to Leaf drivers. But while Nissan has dropped the price of a standard supply and installation of the Nissan-branded Aerovironment charging station from $2,200...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Tesla's 2012 Model S Charging Equipment. Redesign For Redesign's Sake?
Last weekend, Tesla released more details about its up-coming 2012 Model S all-electric luxury sedan at an exclusive reservation-holder and media Model S event in Fremont, California. While some of the new information -- like the sub-4.5 second 0-60 time of the new Model S Sport variant -- got us...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
UPDATE: To answer the question posed in our headline: No, we do not believe Houston has the largest electric-car charging site. See below. When we think of Texas, we think of many things: open roads, desert landscapes, Beyoncé. And of course, we also think of oil, since Texas is one of the country's largest producers of the stuff. So it might seem a little strange to learn that Houston, Texas is now home to North America's largest car-charging site. But then, truth is always stranger than fiction. The site is Houston's Tranquility Park Garage, which has been tricked out with 28...
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Electric Car Charging: Coming To Central Parking Garage Near You
Central Parking, a nationwide parking garage company responsible for 1.1 million parking spots -- and its Tennessee-based subsidiary USA Parking Systems -- will soon host electric car charging facilities at 2,220 of its parking garages. Under an agreement signed earlier this week, the Car Charging...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Leaf Drivers Publicly Shame Selfish Charging-Station User
Imagine the scenario: You’re heading to a meeting and leave your shiny 2011 Nissan Leaf electric car plugged in at the local charging station, confident that it will have enough charge to get you back home when you return in a few hours. Then you return to find another electric car owner has...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
GM Riles CA Electric-Car World (Again) Over AB475 'Charger Sharing' Ban
California's electric-car advocates are often "true believers," and they can be single-minded in the pursuit of what they believe is right. But the nuts-and-bolts experience they've gained during the state's 15 years of electric-car use can be invaluable--which is why policy-makers and car...
John Voelcker -
Getting An Electric Car Charging Station? Make Your Contractor Watch This (Video)
Here at GreenCarReports we like to cover every aspect of owning and driving an electric car -- from choosing the right model for you through to learning how to get the best range and buying a dedicated charging station. But what about getting your electric car charging station installed? Do you...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
China’s E-Taxis Are Not Quite As Slow to Refuel As You Think
Last month, we brought you the story of the electric taxis that carry passengers through the busy City of Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China, based on a low-tech way of quickly swapping out empty battery packs for fully charged ones. At the time, we chose to focus on the process of battery swapping, covered...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
In what we see as a shrewd move that will help keep Portland, Oregon at the forefront of the EV movement, the city has dedicated a full city block, called Electric Avenue, to EV charging.
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Costco Pulls The Plug On Electric Vehicle Charging Stations
Back in the 1990s, when it seemed like electric vehicles were gaining traction with consumers, Costco did something unusual: the big-box retailer installed charging stations at many of its California locations. Now, however, those stations are being removed, and electric car fans aren't happy...
Richard Read -
Top Gear Nissan Leaf Episode Sparks Healthy Debate, Positive Reactions
A little over a week ago, the BBC aired an episode of its popular motoring entertainment program Top Gear in which presenters Jeremy Clarkson and James May searched in vain for an electric-car charging station. They needed to recharge their fully-drained 2011 Nissan Leaf in the rural English county...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Nissan Gives First Charging Station To City Visited By Top Gear (BREAKING)
If you’ve been following the story of what happened when popular British entertainment show Top Gear took a 2011 Nissan Leaf and 2011 Peugeot iOn (nee Mitsubishi i) for a drive to the rural eastern U.K. city of Lincoln, you’ll know that Nissan wasn’t exactly happy with the way its...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
IKEA Latest To Announce Electric Car Charging Points At Stores
Furniture and homewares giant IKEA has joined a grown list of retail firms announcing plans to install electric car charging points at their stores across the nation. Just this week we reported about Walgreens announcing plans for 800 charging points, and before that we saw Cracker Barrel and Best...
Viknesh Vijayenthiran -
Lowe’s: “Let’s Build An Electric Car Charging Station Together”
If you’re the kind of person who thinks that a fun weekend consists of redecorating your bathroom, landscaping your garden or perhaps making your own shelving units from scratch, you’re probably familiar with Lowe’s, the Home Improvement Store. But what you may not know is that as...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Consumers and automakers both know that range anxiety is a huge barrier standing between shoppers and electric vehicles. But soon, EV owners will have yet another tool in their anti-anxiety toolkit, and it comes from a partnership between GPS heavyweight TomTom and charging station manufacturer Coulomb Technologies. The gist of the deal is simple: in the near future, TomTom's database will include a complete list of Coulomb charging stations. What's more, TomTom users will be able to reserve a charging spot right from their dashboard. And of course, TomTom will calculate the quickest route to...
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Bureaucrats Banish Better Place Because Charging Stations Aren’t Green
Did you hear about the Danish town where everything has to be Green? No, neither did we - until just now. Enter Frederiksberg Town Council, which has vetoed the installation of electric car charging stations owned by electric vehicle charging company Better Place because they are the wrong color...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Leviton Announces $1,049 DIY Install Electric Car Charging Station
Electrical supply firm Leviton Manufacturing announced yesterday that it was now accepting orders for its $1,049 EVB22-3PM Level 2 charging station. Designed to provide up to 3.8 kilowatts to charge electric cars like the 2011 Nissan Leaf and 2011 Chevrolet Volt, the Leviton unit can be installed...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Mitsubishi Joins The Crowd, Unveils Solar Charging Station At HQ
It's moving from an innovation to a fad, this business of solar-powered charging stations for electric cars. The latest car company to jump on the bandwagon is Mitsubishi, which will launch the diminutive four-door, four-seat 2012 Mitsubishi 'i' electric minicar in November at a price of just...
John Voelcker -
DC Quick-Charging Stations: Why Does California Lag, Not Lead?
There are now more than 4,000 Nissan Leaf electric cars on the road in the United States, and the 2012 Mitsubishi “i” is poised to arrive at dealers late this year. Each car offers a DC quick-charge port using the Japanese CHAdeMO standard, for which most 2011 Nissan Leaf owners paid...
George Parrott -
Will Euro-Squabbles Cripple Cross-Border Electric Car Charging?
Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it, said the philosopher Santayana. And there seems to be a very real chance that Europe is heading toward a variety of multiple and incompatible electric-car charging standards. That's a path the U.S. rejected a decade ago. And it's one that...
John Voelcker