Retailer Kohl’s Department Stores plans to test electric vehicle charging technologies from ECOtality and Coulomb Technologies at 33 stores nationwide. It actually has published a list of those stores, which are in the following states:
- Arizona
- California
- Florida
- Maryland
- Michigan
- New York
- Oregon
- Tennessee
- Texas
- Virginia
- Washington
Kohl’s said it doesn’t plan to charge shoppers for the charging services, and there will be anywhere from one to four parking spots reserved for electric vehicle drivers. (It should be interesting to see if people honor those spot when the parking lot is full.) Drivers will need to activate the charging mechanism with either a radio frequency identification (RFID) card that they get at the Kohl’s customer service desk or via a phone number that is on the charging station itself.
Kohl’s will split up the installations between ECOtality, which is part of The EV Project, and Coulomb, which has created the ChargePoint Network.
ECOtality’s Blink Pedestal EV charging stations will be installed at 14 locations in Arizona, California, Oregon, Tennessee and Washington. The Coulomb ChargePoint technologies will in 19 other locations in California, Florida, Maryland, Michigan, New York, Texas, Virginia and Washington.
Both sets of installations are being made possible (at least in part) by grant money made possible by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).
“Not only are these stations an added shopped convenience, they also encourage environmental responsibility among our shoppers,” said John Worthington, Kohl’s chief administrative officer. “We will continue to explore additional locations to pilot charging stations at our stores nationwide.”
Kohl’s plans to give the technology installed under The EV Project initiative about a year in the field; it will decide whether to continue or expand the effort by Dec. 31, 2012. The Coulomb trial phase will last a little longer, through October 2013.
Heather Clancy is an award-winning business journalist with a passion for green technology and corporate sustainability issues.
Disclosure
Heather Clancy
Writing publicly about what the high-tech industry is actually doing to help itself and the world get greener or more sustainable is one way I figure I can contribute more meaningfully to said effort. I am also a big OMG-kind-of-fan of smart leadership, which is why the goodly folks who publish this blog let me go on about this topic and why I am always on the hunt for forward-looking business management ideas.
My daily writing is focused on looking for topics for my blogs, GreenTech Pastures and Business Brains. I also write often about emerging technology trends such as mobile computing, unified communications and cloud computing. Occasionally, I will pop up at an industry conference in some sort of speaking capacity. In cases where a speaking engagement involves a sponsor that may be covered in this blog, that fact will be disclosed in coverage as appropriate.
My corporate writing work usually consists of crafting research white papers about some aspect of technology. In the event that my commentary (in written, audio or video form) mentions a company for which I have provided consulting advice, I will disclose that fact. However, there is no connection between these projects and the topics that I am covering in my blog.
Biography
Heather Clancy
Heather Clancy is an award-winning business journalist with a passion for green technology and corporate sustainability issues. Her articles have appeared in Entrepreneur, Fortune Small Business, The International Herald Tribune and The New York Times. In a past corporate life, Heather was editor of Computer Reseller News, where she was a featured speaker about everything from software as a service to IT security to mobile computing.
Heather started her journalism life as a business writer with United Press International in New York. She holds a B.A. in English literature from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, and has a thing for Lewis Carroll.
