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Wisconsin Public Power Adds Hymotion Plug-in Prius to Fleet
10 May 2007
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| The WPPI PHEV Prius. |
Wisconsin Public Power Inc., a regional power company serving 48 customer-owned electric utilities in Wisconsin, Upper Michigan and Iowa, has introduced a converted plug-in hybrid Prius to its fleet—the first plug-in hybrid car to be added to a utility fleet in the Midwest. WPPI will add a second PHEV next month.
The WPPI PHEV uses a Hymotion L5 conversion pack—a 5 kWh battery pack with lithium-ion cells from A123Systems—which offers around 30 miles of electric range before utilizing the standard Prius system.
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| The Hymotion pack in place. Click to enlarge. |
A123Systems recently acquired Hymotion, and is planning a commercial roll-out of the conversion packs in 2008. (Earlier post.)
WPPI and 38 of its member utilities have joined the national Plug-in Partners campaign to convince automakers that a market for plug-in hybrids exists.
In almost every conceivable power generation mix, PHEVs reduce greenhouse gases and other pollutants. It is much less difficult to control emissions from a relatively few number of power plants rather than millions of vehicle tail pipes.
—Tom Paque, WPPI Vice President of Marketing
WPPI’s headquarters is powered 100% by renewable energy, and thus the plug-in vehicle will be powered entirely by renewable energy when it runs in all-electric mode.
May 10, 2007 in Plug-ins | Permalink | Comments (12) | TrackBack (0)
Comments
Posted by: Brad | May 10, 2007 at 12:54 PM
Good to hear that it's being run on pure renewable energy. but with the hymotion plug-in prius is there only front seats?
Posted by: Brad | May 10, 2007 at 12:54 PM
Brad, no it takes the place of the spare tire.
Posted by: Bud Johns | May 10, 2007 at 02:28 PM
nice paint job !
Posted by: andrichrose | May 10, 2007 at 02:29 PM
Actually it looks like it takes the place of the compartment above the spare tire, so as long as it can be lifted up you've still got a spare.
Posted by: Erick | May 10, 2007 at 04:57 PM
The power companies have a clear vested interest in promoting plug-ins. I would like to see more of them add plug-ins to their own fleets to advance the development and the market.
Posted by: JMartin | May 11, 2007 at 07:58 AM
I'm wondering about the warranty support from Toyota corp. in other words the enitre fleet is most probably not covered completely by the original manuf. warranty. That's at least the big manuf. stance on garage made plugin conversions recently. Think about it!
Posted by: Coco ICE | May 11, 2007 at 09:16 AM
Plug-ins,Bad Idea.That gives the Utilities an Excuse to ram chernobles and three Mile Islands down our throat.
NO Nukes is GOOD Nukes.
Posted by: Ted | May 11, 2007 at 04:55 PM
http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSTKX00276320070510
Toyota has sold 998,000 Hybrid vehicles by Apr-2007, by now they must have sold 1,000,000 vehicles +.
A big achivement.
Posted by: Max Reid | May 11, 2007 at 06:13 PM
This is great. I hope that A123 sells a bunch of these cars.
It will put more pressure on Toyota to build their own plug in model.
I already own an 06 Prius. The only thing I do not like about it is that I still have to buy gas once a month.
Posted by: KJD | May 11, 2007 at 06:14 PM
We can burn all the fossil fuel and put the carbon in the atmosphere or we can shift to another source of energy. PHEV's offer the opportunity to stop burning foreign fossil fuel, because we could supply 40% of our fuel use from domestic sources and the other 60% from the wall plug. But this step is only part of the solution. We need that 40% to come from biofuels so we stop adding to the carbon in the atmosphere, and we need the power from the plug to come from non-fossil fuel sources - wind,hydro, nuclear and renewables. The way ahead is crystal and feasible, but we need a consensus.
The first really big step will be the 2009 Prius, either coming with a Plug in option, or using an after market conversion such as Hymotion.
Posted by: Van | May 13, 2007 at 07:00 PM
is this technology actually going to be available in our region, or just in california like the ev cars were?
Posted by: luke | August 13, 2007 at 03:18 PM
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Good to hear that it's being run on pure renewable energy. but with the hymotion plug-in prius is there only front seats?