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LEED Law Intersects Miracle on 34th Street

On March 18th the Tomkins County legislature enacted a new local law providing for up to a 10 year property tax abatement for construction achieving LEED certification.

Tomkins County, New York which includes the Ithaca area, was named for Daniel Tomkins. Tompkins may be best known because he was mentioned by Kris Kringle in the 1947 film Miracle on 34th Street. The onscreen line was incorrect, however, in that Kringle said Tompkins served as Vice President of the United States under John Quincy Adams when in fact he was elected on the ticket with James Monroe in 1816 (.. but you knew that).

In 2012, New York enacted NYCL RPT § 470 enabling local governments to exempt green buildings from real property taxes. For the exemption to apply, the local government must adopt an appropriate ordinance. The state statute describes new construction or improvements and that a project must meet the LEED, Green Globes, American National Standards Institute, or substantially equivalent green building certification standards.

Tomkins County, desiring “to encourage sustainable practices,” enacted Local Law A of 2014, effective on the date of enactment, providing for up to a 10 year property tax abatement for building achieving LEED certification (and the law does not include the other permissible green building rating systems). The amount of the exemption permitted varies by year and by the certification level achieved. LEED Silver, Gold and Platinum projects each are exempted from 100% of property taxes for 3 years and then taxes are re established with a sliding scale over 10 years, with the most generous tax incentives being awarded to Platinum building.

The maximum taxable value to be abated under the proposed law would be $100,000.

The local law was one of the ‘Top 22’ priority projects in the Cleaner Greener Southern Tier Plan, which was developed with input from community residents, businesses, and government to develop a regional sustainability plan to improve the economic and environmental health of the area.

The County is home to Cornell University, Ithaca College and Tomkins Cortland Community College, and these institutions have LEED buildings on campus, but there are no other LEED certified buildings in the Ithaca area.

A real property tax exemption is the most common local government incentive for Green building. In a recent survey of local government green building laws across 100 jurisdictions, overwhelmingly the most often granted incentive for a LEED certified building was an abatement of real property taxes.

Article by Stuart Kaplow, appearing courtesy Green Building Law Update.

03/24/2014 0 comment

Clean Transportation

Growing E85 Infrastructure Expands Ethanol’s Possibilities

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

According to a new report from the US Energy Information Administration, the number of gas stations offering E85 ethanol has more than doubled in the last seven years. Last year, the EIA counted a total 2,625 flex-fuel stations in the United States, up from just 1,229 in 2007. The growth in available E85 pumps means that millions of Americans who previously lacked access can now easily buy the fuel.

If you drive a car, chances are you’re already an ethanol user. Due to a federal mandate, corn-based ethanol makes up at least 10 percent of the gasoline you likely put in your vehicle on a regular basis.

Many drivers also have the option to replace even more of their car’s petroleum usage with ethanol, by driving a flexible fuel vehicle. Flex-fuel cars and trucks run on an E85 blend of ethanol and gasoline (which, as its name suggests, is 85 percent ethanol.)

According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, there were more than 15 million flex-fuel vehicles on the road in the United States at the end of 2012. That number has considerably grown in just the last year, as domestic automakers continue to make good on their pledge to incorporate the capability further in their lineups.

But according to at least one study, less than half of the drivers of flex-fuel cars and trucks are aware of the fuel or the fact that they can use it in their vehicles. Part of the reason is that for a long time E85 was hard to come by outside of the Midwest, where corn is king and ethanol is somewhat cheaper than other parts of the country.

That’s what’s so encouraging for ethanol devotees about the new EIA findings: the Midwest now accounts for just 36 percent of E85 filling stations nationwide, down from 54 percent in 2007.

Today, there are more than three dozen flex-fuel vehicle models available in the U.S., including the Buick LaCrosse (shown above). Most are from “Big Three” carmakers Ford, GM and Chrysler, who five years ago pledged to bring flex-fuel to half of their lineups by 2012.

Article by Brad Berman, appearing courtesy ebay Green Driving.

03/21/2014 0 comment

Green Building

EPDs are New and Untested but in Short Order will Dominate

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

An environmental product declaration (EPD) is a method of quantifying the environmental impacts of a product in order to provide a sound basis for making decisions about the use of that product. As explained in my recent blog post, EPDs are Among the Hottest Topics in Green Building. Most simply put, an EPD in analogous to a nutritional label on a box of cereal. But beyond that explanation nothing is simple.

As a threshold matter, EPDs have been a European construct in part to comply with the European Union Integrated Product Policy. There is no similar U.S. law. Credits in LEED v4 related to EPDs are rapidly heightening interest in the U.S.

But just as Metric measurements have not overtaken the English measurements used in the U.S., it is not clear what success those ISO based country specific varied EPDs will find in the U.S.

Among the loudest critics of the LEED v4 Materials & Resources credits related to EPDs is Perkins+Will architect Douglas Pierce, who authored a White paper, “LEED V4 Should Lead On Material Health Transparency By Accepting Only Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) That Comply With the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) Truth in Advertising Law”. Pierce highlights that EPDs and their use in LEED V4 “have a large loophole related to toxicity”. The White paper argues that toxicity must be detailed or risk violating the Federal Trade Commission Green Guides.

The White paper is legally not correct, .. but who would seek legal advice from architects (even a well respected architecture firm like Perkins+Will)? However, the White paper is useful in identifying the shortcomings of EPDs and in particular ISO based EPDs.

It is troubling that ISO 14025, specifying the procedures for developing Type III EPDs, was published in 2006, a long time ago in the realm of science and years before the current widely accepted ESEtox toxicity tool even existed.

USGBC has responded to the controversy:

USGBC believes that the coordinated use of EPDs, HPDs and raw material sourcing data – the path that’s been established in LEED v4 – generates information that can be practically acted upon in a way that USETox data reported in an EPD currently cannot be. However, the two paths are not mutually exclusive and USGBC applauds manufacturers who include USETox information as part of an EPD in addition to those that generated EPDs and HPDs.

The reliance on standards created by others, that is by a particular interest group for a limited purpose at a specific time, be it an ISO, ANSI, ASHRAE or other standard offers efficacy to a process or product, but is greatly problematic when the limitations of the standard are not appreciated.

Of note, the federal government is moving toward EPDs not based on the ISO standards, but rooted in TRACI, as described in my recent blog post.

USGBC has since the first version of LEED referenced third party standards and, on balance, it appears that LEED v4 has the bleeding edge materials disclosure ‘stuff’ just about right. And possibly of greatest import, many believe building product and material disclosure and optimization will, in short order, be a bigger business than LEED itself. Our law firm is working with a broad breadth of manufacturers and material suppliers, including their trade groups in this new era of EPDs.

Article by Stuart Kaplow, appearing courtesy Green Building Law Update.

03/20/2014 0 comment

Green Building

Environmental Product Declaration a Hot Topic in Green Building

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

An environmental product declaration (EPD) is a method of quantifying the environmental impacts of a product. It is analogous to the nutritional label on a box of cereal. In the context of green building, EPDs will provide a way describing the environmental impact of a building material or product.

EPDs articulate the conclusions of a life cycle assessment. The aim of an EPD is to facilitate the comparison of the range of environmental effects attributable to a product in order to provide a sound basis for making informed decisions.

Life cycle assessment is widely accepted to encompass 5 stages: raw material acquisition, manufacturing, transportation, use, and end of life.

U.S. EPA developed TRACI, the “Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and other environmental Impacts” that assists in impact assessment for life cycle assessment. TRACI requires consideration of the 5 stages described above. And TRACI facilitates the characterization of environmental impact categories that have potential effects, including: ozone depletion, global warming, acidification, eutrophication, photochemical oxidation (smog), ecotoxicity, human health: criteria air pollutants, human health: carcinogenics, human health: non-carcinogenics, fossil fuel depletion, land use, and water use.

In the U.S. TRACI can provide most of the information required for an EPD. Product and company information would be added.

ISO 14025 (produced by the International Organization for Standards, the world’s largest developer of voluntary standards) describes an “environmental declaration”, as quantified environmental data for a product with pre set categories of parameters based on the ISO 14040 series of standards, but not excluding additional environmental information. The ISO standard establishes the principles and specifies the procedures for developing a Type III environmental declaration. Type III environmental declarations “are primarily intended for use in business-to-business communication, but their use in business-to-consumer communication under certain conditions is not precluded.”

In contrast to TRACI that was created specifically for the U.S. using input parameters consistent with U.S. locations, ISO 14025 was created to play a role in “regional eco-label programmes, such as the European Union Integrated Product Policy”. That observed, ISO 14025 is becoming the early benchmark for EPDs (possibly because Europe is ahead of the U.S. in this arena?).

This post is about Type III EPDs, which require an independent agency to oversee the EPD process, Of note, Type I environmental labels are multi criteria third party programs that award environmental labels to products meeting a set of predetermined requirements. And Type II environmental labels specify requirements for self declared environmental claims made by manufacturers, importers, distributors, retailers or anyone else likely to benefit from such claims.

All of this is new, in particular in the U.S. where EPDs are soon to be crucial in green building because LEED v4 and Green Globes both recognize EPDs. The new versions of IgCC 2015 and ASHRAE 189.1-2015 are each considering the use of EPDs. And while EPDs most directly contribute to LEED v4 point in the MRc1 and MRc2, they potentially have some role to play in 21 different LEED credits.

Not only are EPDs key in LEED v4, but EPDs are among the hottest topics in green building.

Article by Stuart Kaplow, appearing courtesy Green Building Law Update.

03/17/2014 1 comment

Clean Transportation

The Five Most Energy-Efficient Electric Vehicles

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

By now, most car shoppers have become well acquainted with the concept of fuel economy. For each vehicle model, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency provides official highway and city miles per gallon (mpg) ratings, which are displayed on window stickers at the dealership. But if you walk over to a plug-in electric vehicle you’ll see a different rating on its window sticker: MPGe, or miles per gallon gasoline equivalent.

Just like gas-powered cars, some electric vehicles are more efficient than others, except instead of using less gasoline, these cars require less electricity to run. The EPA calculates this by substituting the equivalent electrical energy contained in one gallon of gasoline (roughly 34 kilowatt-hours) into the standard efficiency tests it does on all cars.

Since all electric vehicles run much more efficiently than internal combustion cars, an EV like the Nissan Leaf can travel 114 miles on the equivalent energy of just one gallon of gasoline.

It’s no surpise that the smallest, most urban-friendly vehicles tend to get the highest efficiency among electrics. Factors affecting MPGe include weight, aerodynamics and powertrain design. Just as with gas cars, the more powerful the drivetrain, the less efficient a car is likely to be. This explains why the luxurious high- performance Tesla Model S has the lowest MPGe of any electric sedan.

But for EV shoppers most interested in saving fuel—and the greenhouse gas emissions that result from burning it—high MPGe could be a more attractive feature than 0-60 time. Among compact EVs, several models are as much as 15 to 20 percent more efficient than the pack. Here are the five best performers:

Chevy Spark EV (119 MPGe): The Chevy Spark EV (pictured above) debuted last year with the highest MPGe of any plug-in and hasn’t relinquished its title yet. Available only in California and Oregon, the Spark EV can be leased for as low as $199 per month at some Chevy dealerships.

Honda Fit EV (118 MPGe): Coming in a close second, the Honda Fit EV’s 118 MPGe helps it to handily best other compact electrics with a range of 82 miles per charge. Honda will soon end production on the Fit EV, so interested shoppers will have to get on a waiting list soon in order to have a chance at landing one.

Fiat 500e (116 MPGe): Fiat’s stylish little electric city car can only be purchased in California, where state incentives bring its price tag down to just north of $20,500.

Nissan Leaf (115 MPGe): As a mid-size sedan, the EV is roomier than any of the other vehicles on this list but still manages an impressive 115 MPGe thanks to range-adding improvements Nissan added to the car last year. The Leaf can be purchased in all 50 states.

Mitsubishi i-MiEV (112 MPGe): Mitsubishi cut the price tag of the 2014 i-MiEV to less than $15,500 last year and added a host of new standard features.

Article by Brad Berman, appearing courtesy ebay Green Driving.

03/14/2014 0 comment

Renewable Energy

Deutsche Bank Sold First Securities Backed by PACE Bonds

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

Deutsche Bank AG (DBK) sold the first securities backed by bonds tied to U.S. energy-saving projects in a deal that follows a federal agency’s objections to the underlying homeowner borrowing.

The Western Riverside Council of Governments in California issued the underlying notes, according to a presale report by Kroll Bond Rating Agency, which planned to grant AA grades to the securities sold today. The offering totaled $103.8 million and carried a 4.75 percent coupon, according to a person with knowledge of the sale, who asked not to be named because the information wasn’t public.

The debt is backed by liens on homes created as consumers are given funds for work such as weather sealing, insulation upgrades or solar-panel installations, called Property Assessed Clean Energy assessments. The notes might incur losses if the overseer of government-backed mortgage guarantors Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac decides to challenge the priority status of the liens in federal court, Kroll said.

The credit grader “views this risk as remote,” analysts Brian Ford, Lenny Giltman, Anthony Nocera and Andrew Giudici wrote in the Feb. 27 report.

Pace programs, which cover the initial costs of the improvements, started in 2008, while legislation enabling their use was passed in 31 states by 2013, according to PACENow, a Pleasantville, New York-based advocacy group.

Challenge Defeated

With the liens that are similar to tax assessments said to rank more senior than mortgages, giving them a greater right to foreclosure proceeds, the Federal Housing Finance Agency told Fannie Mae (FNMA) and Freddie Mac in 2010 to avoid guaranteeing new loans on properties with them. Last year, after facing opposition from California’s attorney general, the FHFA defeated a court challenge to the directive.

Investor protections in today’s securitization include more assessments serving as collateral than the amount of notes sold, a reserve fund and interest rates on the underlying bonds that exceed those of the securities by almost 3 percentage points, according to Kroll’s report.

Renovate America Inc. Chief Financial Officer Thomas Hemmings said last week that the Western Riverside Council would decline to comment until the deal settled. Renovate America provides Pace services to the council. Denise Dunckel, an FHFA spokeswoman, declined to comment this week and Oksana Poltavets, a spokeswoman for Deutsche Bank, said today that she couldn’t immediately comment.

Pace financing can also be used for commercial properties. Simon Property Group Inc. (SPG), the largest U.S. shopping-mall owner, and Prologis Inc. the world’s biggest warehouse owner, have been among borrowers under the programs, which can also be funded by municipalities’ direct sales of bonds to investors, Bloomberg News reported last year.

Article by Jody Shenn, originally appeared in Bloomberg News, appearing courtesy PaceNow.

03/10/2014 1 comment

Energy Efficiency

How Much Money Can You Save by Switching to Energy-Efficient Light Bulbs?

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

Incandescent light bulbs had a good run, but with the Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007 now in its final phase, you’ll probably begin to notice that it’s getting harder and harder to find traditional incandescent light bulbs in stores.

In a nutshell, EISA has taken a three year approach to converting the United States to energy-efficient lights by prohibiting the manufacturing or importing of non-compliant incandescent light bulbs.

January 2012 – 100-watt bulbs banned

January 2013 – 75-watt bulbs banned

January 2014 – by year end this year 60- and 40-watt bulbs will be banned

You might still see some of these bulbs on store shelves as it isn’t illegal to sell current or leftover inventory, but over time they will all disappear. But that’s not a bad thing. In fact, it will help American save a lot of energy and money.

How much can you save by switching your household to energy-efficient bulbs? Well, let’s take a look. We need three things to determine the cost of light usage and the potential for savings when switching to energy-efficient lighting:

Amount of electricity used

Cost of the electricity

Time the lights are turned on

Amount of Electricity Used

We’ll need to begin with the amount of light bulbs in a home. According to a recent survey, the average American household uses 47 light bulbs.

Now, these bulbs might have varying wattages from 100 watts down to 25, but for the sake of easy math and comparisons, let’s assume that we are using all 60 watt bulbs.

Total Light Wattage = 47 bulbs X 60 watts = 2,820 watts

That’s a lot of wattage! Now let’s take a look at the wattage if all 47 lights are CFL bulbs or LED bulbs at the equivalent brightness of 60 watt incandescent bulbs.

*All bulbs deliver equivalent brightness*	Single bulb wattage	Wattage used for whole house
Incandescent bulbs	60 watts	2,820 watts
CFL bulbs	14 watts	658 watts
LED bulbs	9.5 watts	446.5 watts

As you can see, there is quite a difference in the wattage between energy efficient bulbs and incandescent bulbs. In other words, switching to CFL or LED bulbs would save A LOT of energy. And as I’m about to show you, this will, in turn, save a lot of money!

Cost of Electricity

The average cost of electricity in the United States is currently 11.88 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) (for a more accurate cost, you can check your last billing statement for your cost per kWh), meaning if you used 1,000 watts of electricity for an hour, it costs you 11.41 cents.

Time that Lights are Turned On

The amount of time the lights are being used can vary quite a bit from home-to-home, but let’s pretend, for the sake of this example, that each of us use our lights for 5 hours a day. That’s 30 days in a month (on average), for 5 hours a day.

5 hours X 30 days = 150 hours

Now that we have all of the necessary factors, we can calculate the difference in cost of using traditional incandescent light bulbs versus energy-efficient CFL and LED light bulbs. The formula for this is below:

kW used X (Cost per kWh) X Hours Used = Monthly Lighting Costs

Remember, a kilowatt (kW) is 1,000 watts, so we divide our wattage by 1,000 for this formula.

Monthly Cost of Using Incandescent Light Bulbs

2.820 X $0.1188 X 150 hours = $50.25

Monthly Cost of Using CFL Bulbs

0.658 X $0.1188 X 150 hours = $11.73

Monthly Cost of Using LED Bulbs

0.447 X $0.1188 X 150 hours = $7.97

If, in this scenario, I switched 47 incandescent light bulbs to LEDs, I could save around $42.28 each month. That really adds up over the course of a year, and the savings continue to grow over many years.

Article appearing courtesy Xcel Energy Blog.

03/10/2014 0 comment

Renewable Energy

The Wild West of Solar Renewable Energy Credits

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

The closing of the doors last week at a mid-Atlantic states solar installer highlights the uncertainty of the photovoltaic market and brings to the fore the vagrancies of renewable energy credits (RECs) and in particular solar renewable energy credits (SRECs).

Renewable energy credits are tradable, non-tangible energy commodities that have value and are creatures of state law. Given that this most recent failed solar installer was based in Maryland, one of thirty states that created a RECs market, Maryland law is a good place to start.

Maryland’s Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard law, originally enacted in 2004 and revised almost every year since, requires all electricity utilities use renewable energy sources to generate a minimum portion of their sales. Currently being phased in, the law requires that 2% of the energy come from solar-photovoltaic by 2020.

Under Maryland law, an SREC represents the generation attributes of 1 megawatt-hour (MWh) of electricity generation from a solar installation. Electricity suppliers must purchase and retire SRECs in order to meet their compliance obligations under the law, or pay a Solar Alternative Compliance Payment (SACP) for any shortfalls in SREC purchases. The SACP operates as a theoretical ceiling on the price that a supplier would pay for SRECs to fulfill their obligations. (In Maryland the SACP is set at $400 per MWh though 2014.)

All net metered utility customers and solar on site generators in Maryland own SRECs produced by installations unless or until they choose to sell or otherwise transfer SRECs to another party. A Maryland SREC has a three year lifetime during which it is valid for compliance. SRECs represent a significant source of revenue for owners of solar installations, with a value determined by demand in the trading market.

In order to begin producing SRECs, a solar installation owner must apply for a one time certification from the Maryland Public Service Commission. In general, a photovoltaic installation must be connected to the distribution grid serving Maryland in order to meet a utility’s obligation. Owners of photovoltaic systems of 10 kilowatts or smaller (Level 1 solar facilities) may use an approved engineering estimate in lieu of metering and providing annual generation data.

Unique to Maryland, solar generators in Maryland are required to offer SRECs for sale to Maryland electricity suppliers prior to offering them for sale to any other buyer. In order to help generators comply with this requirement, the PSC operates a web site where generators can post SREC offers. Since October 1, 2010, SREC purchase contracts directly between a solar generator and a Level 1 solar facilities, must take the form of a single, up-front payment arrived at by calculating the net present value of SRECs over the life of the contract using a standard SREC value of 80% of the SACP and federal secondary credit interest rate in effect as of January 1 of that year as the discount rate.

But that is it. There are few, if any other laws in Maryland or elsewhere about SRECs, including the sale of SRECs by third party marketers. There is no national registry of RECs issued. This law firm has given opinions on RECs transactions that RECs are properly accounted for and no double counting has taken place, but it is the Wild West out there.

As government increasing seeks to implement energy policy by requiring utilities purchase more renewable energy and with the ASHRAE Standard 189.1 requirement that every building be designed to be ‘renewable energy ready’ coupled with that standard’s prescriptive energy path requiring on-site renewable energy, photovoltaic installations will become significantly more common.

Article by Stuart Kaplow, appearing courtesy Green Building Law Update.

03/05/2014 0 comment

Green Building

Why More Companies Should Follow The Chevrolet Campus Clean Energy Model

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

Automobiles are among the biggest sources of air pollution in the world. According to a report by the Environment Protection Agency, roughly 75% of carbon monoxide emissions in the USA today come from automobiles. Overall, cars and other on-road vehicles today contribute anywhere between 50-90% of air pollution in the urban areas. Given this massive contribution to pollution from this one sector, any minor change here could have a dramatic cascading effect on the overall pollution levels in the world.

The arrival of Tesla as a popular car brand is great news. Although Tesla did not pioneer the EV concept, their rise has also meant other mainstream car manufacturers today have been investing heavily on the EV segment. The Fiat 500 and Chevy Volt are some rival models that are not only energy friendly but also offer a driving experience that people have come to known with gasoline powered cars. Besides manufacturing great electric vehicles, the need of the hour is also to mobilize the population towards shifting towards a clean energy future. The Chevrolet Campus Clean Energy campaign is one such initiative towards this.

General Motors launched the Chevrolet Campus Clean Energy Campaign last year to promote clean energy technology across educational institutions in the United States. The idea is simple – US Colleges and Universities that rely on energy derived from organic sources are encouraged to invest in alternate clean energy sources like solar energy or wind energy. Using an accredited formula, the carbon energy saved by this investment is calculated and the universities are awarded the commensurate energy credits. Chevrolet has promised to buy these carbon credits from the institutions which shall then be retired; thus financially incentivizing universities to move towards clean energy.

Chevrolet claims that the financial incentives offered by their company can alone contribute to as much as 25% of the incremental capital needed by universities to deliver clean energy. As on date, the company claims that more than 3.4 million metric tons of Carbon-dioxide emissions have been saved due to this initiative. They report a target of 8 million metric tons in a five year period.

Chevrolet’s project is a great model for other businesses to follow. One major reason is that the migration of consumers from gasoline powered automobiles to electric technology will take time. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the number of electric vehicles as a percenage of the total automobiles on road is expected to rise from 0.02% today to 2% by 2020. This means in six years from now, electric vehicles are still expected to constitute an extremely small chunk of the overall automobile.

One way to mobilize the population to adopt clean technology faster is by building greater awareness among the student community today. By targeting colleges and universities with an clean energy incentive program, Chevrolet is doing the right thing in building awareness of clean technology among the youth. Also, by retiring the carbon credits and not trading them, we may ensure that the carbon energy is actually saved and is not being used as a commodity to monetize in the lucrative carbon trading market.

03/04/2014 0 comment

Clean Transportation

Kia Electrifies Popular Soul Hatchback

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

At the recent 2014 Chicago Auto Show, Kia unveiled its first electric vehicle destined for the United States. The 2015 Kia Soul EV is based on one of Kia’s signature models, the funky and sporty Kia Soul hatchback, which has won a fast cult following among consumers since its introduction to the American market four years ago. Despite its compact dimensions and bold styling, the Soul has become one of Kia’s most popular vehicles in recent years.

With a somewhat larger-than-average 27-kilowatt-hour battery pack, the Soul EV should surpass the driving ranges of other recently introduced compact EVs on the market like the Honda Fit EV (82 miles), the Chevy Spark EV (82 miles), Smart ED (84 miles) and Fiat 500e (87 miles). Kia says the “optimal” range for the Soul EV is roughly 124 miles, but in everyday conditions the Soul will likely receive an EPA rating closer to about 90 miles of range.

The car will provide 109 horsepower and a top speed of 90 mph. Charging will take about five hours using a standard home charging station, but with its fast-charging capability the Soul EV should be able to reach an 80-percent charge level in roughly a half hour at special public charging stations.

The Soul’s built-in popularity among urban drivers both young and old could be its greatest advantage. The hatchback was introduced to the U.S. four years ago in a series of commercials featuring a crew of stylish hamsters cruising down urban thoroughfares blasting music from hip, contemporary artists. The ads won multiple awards and contributed to building the Soul’s image as a fun, cool and urban-friendly vehicle.

The Soul received a full revamping for 2014, modernizing its already unique boxy styling and adding more high-quality materials and roominess to the interior. Many critics noted the surprising amount of cargo space the Soul offers compared to other compacts, as well as an impressive cadre of standard features.

The Soul EV will receive its own styling flourishes, including a solid grill (which opens to reveal the car’s EV charge port) and sleek aerodynamic wheels.

So how many fans will end up taking the plunge into an electric vehicle for the first time because it’s a Soul? The answer will be based on how many of the vehicles Kia makes—the company hasn’t announced planned production figures for the car. Pricing is also yet to be announced, but leases for other limited-production small EVs have recently been slashed to as low as $200 per month.

Beginning this fall, the small plug-in hatchback will become available to drivers in five states: California, New York, New Jersey, Oregon and Maryland.

Article by Brad Berman, appearing courtesy ebay Green Driving.

03/03/2014 0 comment

Energy Efficiency

The Golden Age of Gas, Possibly: Interview with the IEA

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

The potential for a golden age of gas comes along with a big “if” regarding environmental and social impact. The International Energy Agency (IEA)—the “global energy authority”–believes that this age of gas can be golden, and that unconventional gas can be produced in an environmentally acceptable way.

02/11/2014 0 comment

Renewable Energy

EPA Seeks Comment on Ecolabels and Product Environmental Performance Standards

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

Against a backdrop in early 2014 where by many measures environmental progress in business appears to have plateaued, Environmental Product Declarations are among the hottest topics in sustainability. This blog post is the first of several over the coming weeks about EPDs.

01/27/2014 0 comment

Clean Transportation

Could China Get left Behind in Electrification Trends?

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

Is China getting left behind in electrification trends by focusing on plug-in hybrid and battery electric vehicles? Is it ignoring alternatives that would achieve its goals of cutting emissions and reducing dependency on imported oil more quickly than full-on electrification? Paul Rivera, director of the global product group for hybrids and electrical

12/18/2013 0 comment

Clean Transportation

Saab Eyes China EV and ICE Markets. Come On, Get Real

written by CleanTechies.com Contributor

Have you seen the news that the Swedish auto brand Saab isn’t dead? It has been re-born as a Swedish-Chinese company that will produce electric vehicles, mainly for the China market. Sound like a fantasy? It is, sort of. It seems the Saab’s new owner is counting on his connections in China to create a market for not only a gasoline-powered car by a

12/10/2013 0 comment

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