It's Electric!

“This is yet another fantastic way the District is at the forefront of providing alternative and environmentally friendly transportation options for District residents and visitors,” said Mayor Fenty. “We are excited to make this technology available and easily accessible to everybody.”

The first public curbside 240V Level II Coulomb ChargePoint station is now located at the Franklin D. Reeves Center, 2000 14th Street, in northwest DC. There are two spaces available for charging vehicles on the west side of 14th Street adjacent to the Reeves Center. The installation of the ChargePoint station was done by PEPCO and Coulomb distributor NovaCharge, LLC.

“This charger represents a new direction for fuel efficient vehicles throughout the region,” said DDOT Director Klein. “We continue to ask people to reduce their carbon footprint and make greener choices and so we are striving to provide the infrastructure and technology to support those goals.”

Through a $15 million grant, funded by the US Department of Energy, the Coulomb ChargePoint America program will provide 4,600 charging stations by October 2011 through nine regions in the United States: Austin, Texas, Southern Michigan, Los Angeles, New York, Orlando, FL, Sacramento, CA, the San Jose/San Francisco Bay Area, Bellevue/Redmond, WA and Washington, DC.

The ChargePoint America program is now offering hundreds of free EV charging stations for public and home charging to individuals and businesses. Coulomb’s ChargePoint America program is made possible by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) through the Transportation Electrification Initiative administered by the Department of Energy. The objective is to accelerate the development and production of electric vehicles to substantially reduce petroleum consumption, reduce greenhouse gas production, and create jobs.

The ChargePoint® Network is open to all drivers of plug-in vehicles and all manufacturers of plug-in vehicle charging stations. ChargePoint Network’s unique features include:

• The ability for a station owner to set fees for use of their stations (including free charging)
• The ability for drivers to access stations without a subscription via contactless credit cards (Visa, MasterCard, AMEX, and Discover)
• 24/7/365 telephone driver support via a toll free number on all charging stations
• Smart Grid ready with built in Utility Grade Capable Metering, Time of Use (TOU) pricing and Demand Response control
• Multiple Smart Phone applications (iPhone and Blackberry) to find unoccupied stations and navigate to them
• The lowest operating cost possible due to real-time operational monitoring, alerts, diagnosis, and control of millions of stations

About ChargePoint America

The $37 million ChargePoint America program is made possible by a $15M grant funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act through the Transportation Electrification Initiative administered by the Department of Energy. ChargePoint America will provide 4,600 public and home ChargePoint Networked Charging Stations by October 2011, adding to the existing ChargePoint Network. Coulomb will work together with its distribution and industry partners to evaluate the demand from the respective geographic regions and allocate charging stations based on this and other factors. The ChargePoint America project will collect data characterizing vehicle use and charging patterns, and ChargePoint America will deploy FREE public and home charging stations to individuals and businesses. Organizations in and around the metro Washington DC area interested in receiving free public charging stations should visit the ChargePoint America web site www.chargepointamerica.com  and sign up by completing the application form . Individuals interested in purchasing an EV should sign up  to receive more information about qualifying for a free home charging station. Additionally, the ChargePoint America web site provides a way for drivers to suggest public locations  for charging stations.