Vanpooling the Green Way

"Angelenos understand traffic and care about the environment,” said Gustavo Occhiuzzo, CEO of Green Commuter.

"We offer a premium all-electric vanpool option that's affordable. Gasoline vanpool vehicles are very polluting, usually with ratings from 12 to 18 MPG in real-life driving conditions; we're the first to use only zero-emissions vehicles instead."

The Tesla Model X is the only electric vehicle (EV) rented "because the all-electric vehicle meets vanpool criteria, including seating for seven passengers and a battery capacity sufficient for long-range driving," according to the article in Auto Rental News.

Green Commuter is a portfolio company for the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator (LACI) which is "dedicated to building a cleantech economy for Los Angeles." according to its website. Other portfolio companies shown here.

"We're thrilled to mark this inauguration," said Fred Walti, president and CEO of LACI. "Green Commuter is a terrific example of an innovative social enterprise aimed at sustainable solutions for the transportation sector."

With its Aug. 2 inauguration, Green Commuter will launch an Indiegogo ([crowd funding] campaign to offer its services at discounted rates: packages start at $10 an hour and $150 per weekend rental.

Expansion to Fresno County

Green Commuter was awarded a Low Carbon Transit Operations Program grant for a pilot project in Fresno County, according to LACI. The program is a 'California climate investment' program funded from auction proceeds of the California Cap-and-Trade program. It will be partnering with the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District.

Challenges

A recent post indicated that car2go was the first car sharing company to launch an all-electric network, "but company officials decided this spring that an electric model was unsustainable and switched all of their vehicles to gas-powered in May."

The Auto Rental News article said nothing about charging the EVs. Presumably, with a 250-mile range, the vehicles won't need to be charged during work hours, but emergencies do happen. Workplace chargers can be either non-existent or oversubscribed.

According to a January 2011 New York Times article (posted here), "The percentage of workers who car-pool has dropped by almost half since 1980, the first time the Census Bureau started systematically tracking the numbers, according to new data from the bureau."