Conservation Hawai‘i

Electric Vehicles in Hawaii: An Escape From Escalating Gas Prices

As gas prices continue to rise, will the demand for electric cars follow?  Perhaps.  And Hawaii is already preparing to meet that demand.

A federal stimulus “EV Ready Grant” of $2.6 million will be used to build electric vehicle (EV) charging stations throughout the islands.  According to Pacific Business News, AeroVironment will partner with Hawaiian Electric Co. (HECO) to construct up to 320 public and semi-private charging stations at places such as hotels, rental car facilities, shopping centers, and high rise buildings.  Through these efforts, over the next year AeroVironment and others such as Better Place, will be creating one of the country’s first charging dock networks.  The accessibility of the charging docks should help to alleviate consumers’ hesitations about purchasing EVs out of fear that they will be stranded when they run out of power.  In an interview with Star Advertiser, the Hawaii manager of California-based Better Place, Brian Goldstein, said that to “help encourage adoption” of EVs, Better Place is going a step further and offering free charging at their stations for the first year.

But potential EV buyers are asking: What will it cost to charge your EV after the first year, at another charging station, or at your home?  And how long will it take?

The rates vary from island to island, with the current cost on Oahu at 21.9 cents per kilowatt-hour and neighbor island rates ranging from seven to ten cents lower.  HECO has been giving Oahu customers a discount of six cents per kilowatt-hour for the electricity used for charging their EVs, between 9 p.m. and 7 a.m., at home charging stations.  Drivers can expect a full charge – that will allow them to travel approximately 100 miles -  after four to six hours at a charging dock.  In an interview with KHON2, Dan Davids of Plug in America stated that “Probably about an hour on the Nissan Leaf it will give you about an extra ten miles of range”.  And he added, in the near future,  “The car’s capability is going to be increased… to where each hour will give you twenty (miles)”.  On the mainland, the time it takes you to get your groceries may not be enough to recharge your EV sufficiently, but here in Hawaii where most people drive just 30 miles per day, that extra 10 or 20 miles is likely to be enough to get you home.

The Nissan Leaf is already being sold here in the islands, and EVs by Mitsubishi and Chevy will be arriving towards the end of the year.  The city and county of Honolulu will receive $400,000 of the EV Ready Grant to purchase electric cars and build charging stations in public lots.  And on Kauai, the county will use $267,000 of the EV Ready Grant to buy five cars and construct five charging stations.

Residents and businesses are also encouraged to make the switch to EV for personal and company cars.  They may take advantage of the “EV Ready Rebate Program”, an initiative offering a $4,500 rebate to consumers for the purchase of an EV and a $500 rebate for a home charging station.

Due to its small size and enormous dependency on foreign fuel, Hawaii is an ideal place for EVs.  But what about the increased use of electricity the cars will be creating?  Are we simply shifting our dependency?  The hope is that as Hawaii pursues alternative clean energy sources, the electricity used to power EVs will come from the wind, water, and sunshine that are naturally so abundant here in our great state.