Laboratory of french Electric vehicles

Reunion Island to became a Laboratory for mass testing French Electric cars.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Tuesday that he intends to turn the French overseas territory of La Reunion (Fr) into the world’s first site for the mass use of electric automobiles. There will be a whole new infrastructure for charging Electric cars.

Renault and five other corporate partners signed a letter of intent yesterday for a new electric vehicle test in France (Reunion Island). The tests of  50 vehicles will be to make a prove that battery-powered vehicles which will be charged from renewable sources (photo-voltaic panels) have a lower overall life cycle CO2 impact than comparable internal combustion vehicles.

The program  includes the deployment of a charging network to support the test fleet. There are other partners, like  General Electric, Total and the utility EDF – New energy, which specializes in renewable electricity.

Read the official press release:

PRESS RELEASE

In the presence of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Renault, EDF, GBH (Groupe Bernard Hayot), Total Re?union, GE Money and the GERRI agency today signed a letter of intent on the experimentation of 50 electric vehicles in Reunion together with battery charge infrastructure powered mainly by renewable energies.

The letter of intent signed today in Reunion by the six partners mentioned above, under the patronage of Nicolas Sarkozy, marks their commitment to the VERT project (Electric Vehicle for a Technological Reunion), a principal component of the GERRI program (Grenelle Environment Forum in Reunion – Succeeding in Innovation).

The document establishes the framework of an experiment to test electric vehicles and the corresponding charge infrastructures powered by dedicated renewable energy sources (notably photovoltaic). The idea behind the project is to demonstrate that the overall CO2 performance of the electric vehicles in Reunion is superior to that of today’s thermal combustion and hybrid vehicles.

The purpose of the VERT program is to test the implementation of a network of charge infrastructures sized in number and charge technique (normal or fast) to meet the mobility needs of a territory with a limited geographical area.

VERT is also an opportunity to test specific electric mobility offers aimed at company or government vehicle fleets and at individual customers.

Lessons learnt from the project could be applied to countries or regions with similar electric systems.
The French Environment and Energy Management Agency, ADEME, will be submitting a file on the VERT project at an upcoming call for expression of interest (EOI).

Source: Autoblog