What a fun time we had at EV Summit ’13! The event was held on August 24, 2013 at the Google Campus in Mountain View. Thanks to the generosity of Google and a major effort by Rolf Schreiber, we enjoyed the pleasant surroundings of the outdoor dining area and the parking lots on campus. In addition, Google provided approximately 50-Level 2 charging stations at this location and an additional 20 were available nearby. If that wasn’t enough, AAA brought their mobile Quick Charger for demonstration and charging. The adjacent parking lots were also full of activities with ride and drives in many kinds of EVs including… electric bathtubs. Thanks to Marina Cerin-Stith and Maddi Hausmann Sojourner who spearheaded the event for the SF BayLEAFs, and Paul Stith and Tom Sidle of the Silicon Valley EAA who co-hosted the Summit. Jeannie Lam, local Nissan NA representative, helped to make the summit a success – thank you.
The ride and drive area, complete with green-shirted EV Summit volunteers vamping the AAA charging truck. Photo courtesy of Rolf Schreiber.
There were over 290 registered attendees for the EV Summit, which included SF BayLEAFs members, family and friends, as well as Electric Auto Association members from chapters all over Northern California. Besides the local attendees, we enjoyed the company of Terry Hershner who is famous for his cross-country treks on his electric motorcycle. This time he brought a guest from Australia, Rachel McCarthy, who just recently completed a 44-day trip across country as part of a team that included a Nissan LEAF and electric two-wheelers: motorcycles and a motor scooters. Also attending was an EV icon, Paul Scott, who made the journey from Southern California to join us and connect with long-time Bay Area EV pioneers. Ed Marek, who has driven 730 miles roundtrip from Shasta County in his LEAF, holds the record for the longest distance traveled by a summit attendee in an EV. We also had a last-minute visit by Kelly Carmichael and his companion who journeyed 14 hours by Prius from Vancouver, Canada to make the event.
Yes, the EV Summit was certainly an international event, with executives from Nissan Japan (see photo below) joining us. We were very pleased to welcome Kadota-san (Chief Vehicle Engineer for the LEAF), Yamamoto-san (Program Director Zero Emission Vehicles), Abe-san (Chief Product Specialist), and Sasaki-san (Director Electrical & Electronics Engineering, Nissan’s Michigan Office) to the Summit. This was Kadota-san’s second visit to an SF BayLEAFs event. We first met him on Dec. 3, 2011, coincidentally also at Google! This was a memorable meeting for new 2011 LEAF owners to share our suggestions and experiences directly with Nissan. Nissan listened, and many of the upgrades and improvements to the 2013 LEAF are acknowledged to be due to our input at the first meeting with Kadota-san and his Nissan colleagues.
We were fortunate to have Nissan North America, Bay Area Air Quality Management District, Pacific Gas & Electric and ChargePoint as the Lead Sponsors for EV Summit ’13. AAA of Northern California, Nevada & Utah, Brammo, Schneider Electric, Bayshore Electric, AeroVironment, Clipper Creek, Capitol Fiat/DGDG, Sungevity, NRG/eVgo, VIA Motors and EV Grid were event partners.
There were a variety of BBQ meat dishes, salads, and sides, as well as vegetarian entrees, along with water and fruit drinks for attendees to enjoy. The dessert was 4 types of Marianne’s Ice Cream with many toppings, and may have been the highlight of the meal judging from the positive response.
Numerous electric vehicles were on display or for test drives; these include the Nissan LEAF, Chevy Volt and Spark EV, Fiat 500e, Tesla Model S, Toyota RAV4 EV, BMW ActiveE, Sparrow, Renault Twizy, VIA VTrux and Brammo motorcycles. All in all, there were about 100 electric vehicles present. As anticipated, the Nissan LEAF constituted about half of the fleet, thanks to a strong showing of owners from the Bay Area and beyond. There was a sizable contingent of Tesla Model S and Volt owners as well, closely followed by 1st and 2nd generation RAV4 EV owners.
Attendees had an opportunity to win some great raffle prizes: home EV charging stations from Clipper Creek, Schneider Electric and AeroVironment, an HP Tablet computer, and several gift cards for movies, P.F. Chang’s restaurant, Marianne’s ice cream and Amazon. In addition, Nissan, Via Motors and Brammo shirts and caps were given to EV trivia contest winners.
Both the future generation of EV drivers and old timers were treated to test drives on clean electric bathtubs. Anyone interested in an EV convertible should try one of these. A comprehensive collection of photos from the event can be found at http://bit.ly/evsummit2013photos" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; so check them out!