Electric car sharing scheme underway in Paris

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Car Rental News - 03/10/2011

 

France’s capital city is now the world’s first to offer an electric car share program.

Some 60 carbon-cutting, compact cars took to the streets of Paris today for the initial two-month launch of the scheme, which includes 10 charging stations in the city. Paris officials said in addition to being the first city to offer such a program that it in the future was looking to maintain the largest fleet as well.

The Autolib program is backed by major French business figure Vincent Bollore, a friend and business partner of current French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Mr Bollore’s group said it is looking to acquire at least 80,000 subscribers once the full scale operation in place, which it says will keep it profitable and sustainable with the annual subscription fee of around 12 euros per month.

Officials said that the program would be adding a number of additional vehicles in the coming months; 250 should be operational by 5 December. Looking forward, the company aims to have a full fleet of 2,000 of the four-seat electric cars operating in some 46 Parisian municipalities by June of next year.

Annick Lepetit, Paris’ mayor said during the launch ceremony that the program would complement the city’s taxi system and public transportation network. The so-called ‘Bluecars’ utilised contain a special lithium battery developed by Bollore Group and can go about 155 miles (250kms) on a full charge.

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