Israel to get world's first electric car recharging network

Project Better Place pledges to build half a million recharging points as it attempts to turn Israel into the first massmarket for electric vehicles

Project Better Place, the new venture from Israeli entrepreneur Shai Agassi that last year unveiled plans to build a committed to $200m global network of electric vehicle recharging stations, has selected Israel as the location for its first nationwide grid of recharging points.

The company said it had today signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Israeli government and car manufacturers Renault and Nissan designed to deliver for the first time "the conditions necessary for electric vehicles to be successfully mass-marketed".

Under the terms of the agreement the Israeli government will provide tax breaks on zero emission vehicles up to 2019, Renault and Nissan will deliver a new generation of electric cars and battery technologies designed to deliver performance comparable with gasoline engines, and Project Better Place will begin work on building 500,000 recharging points across the country.

The company said the scale of the network combined with new in-car computer technology designed to indicate to the driver the remaining power supply and the nearest charging spot would tackle the problem of limited range that has dogged electric vehicles up to now. Meanwhile, Renault is reported to be working on exchangeable batteries that would solve the problem of long battery recharging times and deliver continuous driving akin to gasoline vehicles by allowing drivers to quickly swap in a new battery at recharging points.

Project Better Place said that with 90 per cent of Israeli car owners driving less than 70km a day and all major urban centres being just 150km apart the country was the ideal location for the first nationwide network of recharging points.