Now tourists can try out Better Place swappable batteries. For $65 a day, electricity and battery packs included. Better Place, Israel’s controversial electric car network provider, has had its share of issues and adverse publicity which began to heat up after its iconic founder and international CEO Shai Agassi was sacked this past October. This act [...]
The Israeli electric car company Better Place is seeing rough times (it just hired its third CEO in as many months after firing two others), but it has reduced its leasing plan to about $400 a month including charge and battery swaps to attract more customers. Thanks to the millions in marketing done by Better Place, [...]
Not exactly the 2014 Corvette, this smaller and cheaper electric model may be popular for older purchasers and the eco-aware in the Middle East This past year, a lot of adverse publicity issues surrounded the Better Place electric car network company, that included the firing of its international CEO Shai Agassi. This was followed by [...]
Is Better Place hiring a new CEO? In a surprising article in the Israeli business newspaper Globes today, Israel’s electric car network company Better Place seems to have lost its new CEO, Evan Thornley from Australia. This is after a short three months on the job. Thornley was put in place to start a recovery program [...]
Israel’s electric car company Better Place is going to experience an overhaul, and will manage its existing resources in a new way, according to Evan Thornley, the company’s new CEO who just moved to Israel from Australia. Instead of focusing on selling Renault-made cars and charge plans to keep them juiced, the company is going [...]
Better days for Better Place EV car company. Moshe Kaplinsky at the company’s first battery charge station in 2008. It seems things at Israel’s Better Place electric car company are going from bad to worse. Israeli news outlets are reporting that the company’s CEO Moshe Kaplinsky has quit, over disagreements with the company’s main shareholder [...]
Israel’s iconic CEO Shai Agassi has been fired from his position at the electric car company Better Place. He will be replaced by Evan Thornley, the current CEO of Better Place Australia. This news comes hot on the tracks of the company’s bold move to finally offer an attractive leasing/charge plan for its electric cars, [...]
The best news to come from Better Place is an attractive $510 leasing plan per month which includes 1000 km. Israel’s Better Place, headed by the iconic entrepeneur Shai Agassi has just released news of an attractive leasing deal bound to win over new subscribers: for NIS 1990 a month ($510 USD), for 36 months, [...]
3D printing technology could lead to a greener product manufacturing and consumption. We were about 15 kilometers east of Limerick, Ireland when our tire blew out. So we melted the old tire into the 3D replicator, printed a new one and we were on our way. Actually, no– we limped along on a dodgy spare [...]
Rent an electric car when you travel to Israel. Often thought of as too expensive or sophisticated for the average driver, plug-in electric vehicles will soon be available even to the occasional driver. Israel’s largest car rental company, Eldan, signed an agreement with Better Place electric vehicle company on December 5, making hundreds of Renault [...]
A pregnant me at the very sunny Better Place visitor center last year. With the launch of the first nationwide electric car networks rolling out in Israel and with Denmark just months away, the electric car company Better Place today reports that it has secured another $200 million in financing, on top of the $55o [...]
Beep beep! This solar powered taxi intends to tour the globe on zero gas and a full tank of sunshine. Swiss inventor Louis Palmer‘s solar powered taxi will be rolling into Israel next week, after having traveled to over 40 countries and through 60,000 kilometers already. Without a single drop of standard fuel. Powered by [...]
Iran’s solar-powered Gazelle 2, hopes to place well in trans Australia trials Iran’s Gazelle 2 solar powered electric car may not have massaging seats, but it certainly looks better than the Palestinian-built solar car in Hebron. The sleek one-seater that weighs only 150 kg, was unveiled at Teheran University by the car’s project manager, Dr. [...]
A Better Place electric car and an on-the-spot loan to drive it from Union Bank, in Israel Want to drive an all electric car Better Place but can’t afford it? In a release issued by the company today Better Place, the Israeli-designed electric car with battery switch stations, and the country’s Union Bank have signed [...]
Better Place launches another brand new business in Israel – used electric car sales. Better Place, the company bringing an electric car infrastructure to Israel, has been changing so much about how the Israeli public thinks about transportation. It has educated the public about the benefits of using electric cars, taught us that a whole [...]
How can eco-friendly transportation be improved in the suburbs? When contemplating whether to live in a city or in the suburbs, most people weigh the pros and cons of having more space or less space, being closer to better schools for their kids or having the convenience of everything nearby in an urban environment. But [...]
BrightSource’s latest deals, Tel Aviv’s light rail, EUREKA in Israel and more headlines related to Israeli cleantech and the environment. Innowattech and the Israel National Roads Company (INRC) have developed a new technology that can detect overloaded trucks without their having to stop. Natural building techniques are being reintroduced to Bedouins in Israel’s south and [...]
Cars cause more greenhouse emissions than planes, Cleantechnica reports earlier this month. So while it may be important to offset and reduce our flying habits, Mike Granoff, head of oil independence policies at the EV company Better Place explores how his company’s switchable battery solution can reduce auto emissions today. Looking to the east, he [...]
Volkswagon Group, the world’s third largest car manufacturer is looking to Israel for cutting-edge technologies for its cars. We take a look at four technologies Volkswagon should consider. Image via Mike Babcock. Ynet is reporting that the Volkswagon Group, made up of SEAT, Skoda and Lamborghini and others, has hired an Israeli company founded by [...]
Natural gas for electric cars? The power has to come from somewhere. You might be wonderiing what the Tamar natural gas fields have to do with the Better Place electric car technology company, which recently received a big financial boost from the HBSC banking consortium, and now (hopefully) the Chinese auto company to produce another [...]
Would you drive a Chery? The Chinese firm is partnering with Israel Corp. a major stakeholder in Better Place to develop its own electric car with Austrian and Italian partners. The tiny nation of Israel is stoked, because it could be the first nation in the world to adopt a fully electric car for the [...]
Green Prophet’s Karin was at the Better Place public education facility opening in Israel a couple of Sunday’s ago, where she met Sara from ISRAEL21c who made a video of the public debut. A little video of the center’s opening and Sara is enjoying the ride, is featured above.
Karin attends Better Place press conference as company launches its electric car testing facility for the public, in Israel. The sun’s in her eyes as she clutches the door of the new Renault Nissan car. Or maybe she’s blinded by all the excitement? The media gathered outside the old oil storage containers –– a remnant [...]
Will Israeli designed recharging stations keep America going? Despite the world economic slowdown, a number of advancements were made worldwide in the fields of alternative and renewable energy. The hottest energy trends of 2009, according to MIT review are: Natural gas drilling technology New batteries for hybrids Carbon capture Smart grid Cellulosic ethanol (biofuel from [...]
For 25 years Denmark has supported the adoption of electric vehicles by excluding them from the hefty 200% tax levied on new cars. However, due to the limited capabilities of the models available, only 497 electric cars are registered in the entire country, as the New York Times pointed out in a recent article. All [...]
ETV Motors claims their recently unveiled proof-of-concept vehicle can run for 50 miles on one charge. Watch their video, courtesy of ISRAEL21c. The new ETV jet turbine engine generates its own electricity to recharge the battery pack and is different from the Prius and other hybrids (read the pleasure of owning one) because “it’s always [...]
The Tesla Roadster is a purely electric sports car. Coming to Abu Dhabi? The oil-rich United Arab Emirates owe most of their wealth to their natural abundance of petroleum. But what they’re starting to do with that wealth is very interesting. Abu Dhabi, for example, is increasingly leveraging its oil wealth in favor of positioning [...]
Although the year 2030 is only some 20 years away, many drivers in developed countries may be driving electric powered cars by then. This prediction was brought out by a study by the Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology at the University of California at Berkley in which electric cars with “switchable batteries” like that of Shai [...]
Shai Agassi’s Better Place electric car company seemed to be on the right track with their conception of a totally electric family sized car. The Israeli company, with offices located in the Kiryat Atidim high tech park, outside of Tel Aviv, developed a prototype for an electric car, using a Renault Megane with an electric [...]
We were too distracted by the war with Gaza over the last few weeks to take notice that Shai Agassi from Better Place, the Israeli electric car guru, is now working on a deal with Canada. Those Canadians love their SUVs, and trucks to plow through Canadian winters, but maybe some Torontonians and yuppies that [...]
Following the ongoing saga of Project Better Place‘s steady process of world domination, we can now add a new country to the list: Japan. The news just in is that the Japanese Environment Ministry is inviting Better Place to take part in their feasibility project for building a network of charging stations in Japan. Better [...]
BDO-I2I is looking to bring Indian-made electric cars onto the Israeli market. REVA Electric Car Company and consulting firm BDO-I2I are still finalizing the details, but there are reports imports could start before the end of January. The news comes as Shai Agassi’s Project Better Place unveiled a protoype of its battery charging station [...]
Hot off the press –– According to the AP, Hawaii has unveiled plans to be first in the nation to roll out electric car stations statewide — a move the governor hailed as a major step toward weaning the islands off oil. This news follows a recent declaration that California cities will be entering into [...]
The financial crisis is hurting Americans, but months before the hit fuel costs were already gouging into people’s pockets. Some were forced to carpool to work, others took the bus or train. While creative forms of public transportation help deal with times of fiscal uncertainty (we personally love bikes!), the long-term plan for preserving the [...]
With the aura of an evangelist, Israel’s Shai Agassi is moving full steam ahead to revolutionize the electric car market, with Project Better Place. Essentially borrowing the model from the cellular market, Agassi plans to create a new electric car paradigm, where you switch batteries and pay for the lease of the battery (like minutes [...]
The Israel cleantech world is buzzing over BrightSource and its subsidiary Luz II. The companies recently invited the press to visit the world’s first operating solar thermal field in the Negev Desert, for creating clean and efficient solar energy. The 12,000 square meter test site will generate 1.5 MW of electricity. Cheaper heliostats, no need [...]
The time is nearly here! The long awaited electric car will soon reach the masses: Project Better Place has presented its prototype electric car today. The smog may start clearing soon, we will see how quickly it catches on. Project Better Place commissioned a survey, which claimed that one in every six Israelis said that they would [...]
The public discussion of Israel’s water problems intensified last week, with Israel’s most respected newspaper, Ha’aretz, calling on water authorities to shift to regulating demand for the scarce resource. During the same week, a new study was released which suggested that a shift to electric cars could seriously impact water consumption in countries where this [...]
We’ve been a little skeptical about the electric car project proposed by Shai Agassi. Israel relies still on heavily-polluting coal power plants; and a great deal of infrastructure will need to be put in place for this scheme to work. Not to mention the fact that Israelis barely recycle. That’s quite a jump from throwing [...]
By now, many people have heard of the electric car grid project that Israeli entrepreneur Shai Agassi is launching with $200 million capital. Agassi plans to build a grid of charging stations in all parts of the country that would provide a free power charge to electric car batteries. The idea is to provide an [...]