California Gov. says, "We will get to 5 Million Electric Cars..."

Gov. Brown wants 5 million electric cars on the road by 2030

Gov. Jerry Brown wants to dramatically increase the number of electric cars on California's roads in order to slash the state's largest source of greenhouse gas emissions - transportation. In an executive order unveiled Friday, Brown set a new goal of getting five million zero emission vehicles on the road by 2030.

 From Article, (Gov. Jerry Brown wants to dramatically increase the number of electric cars on California’s roads in order to slash the state’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions – transportation.

In an executive order unveiled Friday, Brown set a new goal of getting five million zero emission vehicles on the road by 2030. That’s a fourteen-fold increase from the number currently on the road -- 350,000.

“We’re going to get there, believe me,” Brown said in his State of the State speech on Thursday. “We all got a lot of work.”

To meet the new goal, Brown is calling for a $2.5 billion investment in hydrogen and electric vehicle chargers and vehicle rebates over the next eight years. Most of the money will come from the state’s cap-and-trade program, which generates revenue by making polluters like power plants and gasoline refiners purchase permits to emit carbon dioxide, a contributor to climate change.

“This is a recognition on the part of the administration that we need to increase our commitment not just to selling the vehicles, but to investing in electric vehicle infrastructure,” said Adrienne Alvord, the western states director of the Union of Concerned Scientists.

There are just 14,000 public charging stations in California today, and researchers have identified the lack of places to plug in is as one of the biggest obstacles to getting more electric vehicles on the road. By increasing the number of electric chargers to 250,000 (and adding 200,000 hydrogen fueling stations) state officials hope to ease “range anxiety,” the concern that electric vehicle drivers will be stranded without a place to charge. They also hope the chargers will increase the visibility of EVs as a viable alternative to gasoline-powered cars.

“The biggest single barrier to greater penetration of electric is lack of consumer awareness that there are vehicles available that can meet their needs,” said Mary Nichols, head of the California Air Resources Board, on a conference call Friday. “There have to be enough of them out there that people can see so they get a chance to look them over and realize that they’re not being asked to participate in some risky new experiment. They’re being offered an opportunity to buy into some very attractive new cars.”)

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