Shai Agassi Goes Down Under

Better Place founder Shai Agassi has announced that Australia will become the third country to implement the group's vision of electric vehicles powered by renewable energy, following Denmark and Israel.
Shai Agassi, an entrepreneur and programming expert, founded a series of technology companies in Israel in the 1990s. Today Agassi is CEO of Better Place. Previously, he was President of the Products and Technology Group (PTG) at SAP AG.
Better Place, with commitments in Israel and Denmark and a partnership with Renault-Nissan to build electric cars with exchangeable batteries, has begun an ambitious venture to deploy a smart network of recharging spots, including battery exchange stations and charging spots at businesses and homes. Better Place is hoping to begin full scale deployment of its system in Israel in 2011, with Denmark following three to six months later and Australia a year after that.
Better Place will use its scalable model, which Israel and Denmark have adopted, to build an EV (electric vehicle) network in Australia. According to their model you’ll be able to recharge your EV battery overnight in your garage or your parking lot and/or exchange batteries at stations, which resemble car washes, spread around every 40 kilometres or so, faster than filling up your petrol tank today.
Under the Better Place model, consumers can either buy or lease an electric car from the French automaker Renault or Japanese companies like Nissan and then buy kilometres on their electric car batteries from Better Place. Better Place plans to own and operate the batteries and power generation (via AGL Energy , in Australia's case), and to sell kilometres travelled to drivers on a subscription basis, in similar fashion to the mobile phone industry, rather like one might buy a cell phone from the manufacturer (eg nokia or apple) and then air time from a supplier (orange or selkom). With that the Better Place network is intended to support all kinds of electric vehicles, including plug-in hybrids as well as cars that operate with exchangeable batteries.
Better Place in Australia plans to start by setting up charging stations in the Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney, and then connect them with "electric highways," with stations set up every 40 kilometres.
“As the world’s sixth largest country, our network build out in Australia will demonstrate that the Better Place model works in all countries, regardless of size,” said Shai Agassi. Australia has the world’s seventh highest per capita rate of car ownership, with nearly 15 million cars on the road after adding something like a million new cars in a regular year.
Better Place and Macquarie Capital Group will raise $1 billion to build a network of 250,000 charging stations and battery exchange stations in key locations along the east coast by 2012. Wind turbines owned by AGL Energy will power the network. AGL Group General Manager Jeff Dimery said AGL will provide all of the renewable energy needed to power the EVs, while this initiative will accelerate the shift toward renewables that’s already underway. “AGL is committed to increasing its renewable energy generation and believes it is important to collaborate and implement cross industry initiatives to counter climate change. Because EVs charge primarily at night, they can maximize the potential of intermittent renewable energy such as wind.”
If it works the Better Place model will go a long way to helping Australia move towards oil independence. Agassi claims that oil is the sole major commodity that Australia still needs to import. Therefore the model has not only ecological implications but also political implications, possibly freeing Australia from energy dependence on regimes, whose interests do not always coincide with those countries that have developed economies.