http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/21/world/middleeast/21israel.html?ei=5065&en=e8435952c4b2651d&ex=1201582800&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/1xww0 January 21, 2008 Israel Is Set to Promote the Use of Electric Cars By STEVEN ERLANGER JERUSALEM — Israel, tiny and bereft of oil, has decided to embrace the electric car. On Monday, the Israeli government will announce its support for a broad effort to promote the use of electric cars, embracing a joint venture between an American-Israeli entrepreneur and Renault and its partner, Nissan Motor Company. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, with the active support of President Shimon Peres, intends to make Israel a laboratory to test the practicality of an environmentally clean electric car. The state will offer tax incentives to purchasers, and the new company, with a $200 million investment to start, will begin construction of facilities to recharge the cars and replace empty batteries quickly. The idea, said Shai Agassi, 39, the software entrepreneur behind the new company, is to sell electric car transportation on the model of the cellphone. Purchasers get subsidized hardware — the car — and pay a monthly fee for expected mileage, like minutes on a cellphone plan, eliminating concerns about the fluctuating price of gasoline. Mr. Agassi and his investors are convinced that the cost of running such a car will be significantly cheaper than a model using gasoline (currently $6.28 a gallon here.) "With $100 a barrel oil, we've crossed a historic threshold where electricity and batteries provide a cheaper alternative for consumers," Mr. Agassi said. "You buy a car to go an infinite distance, and we need to create the same feeling for an electric car — that you can fill it up when you stop or sleep and go an infinite distance." <more>
