WinnipegFord5.com

Turn the key; push a button; step on the accelerator.

The Ford Escape is slow off the mark as it leaves the garage at Burlington Hydro Inc. - for safety reasons its torque has been governed to 40 per cent of maximum. Once in motion, though, it's a quiet pleasure-even on the QEW.

But performance is only part of what counts for this vehicle.

A Vancouver company, Rapid Electric Vehicles, replaced its gasoline motor and drivetrain with 20-kilowatt-hours worth of batteries, an electric motor and controls.

Burlington Hydro, which serves the suburban city at the west end of Lake Ontario, is using it to test how well electric propulsion would serve in fleet use and also how battery-powered vehicles might connect to a "smart" electricity grid for billing and management.

"It's the first all-electric light duty SUV for use in a North American commercial fleet," says REV CEO Jay Giroud.

"We're very proud of the project," says Dan Guatto, Hydro's vice-president of engineering and operations.

The utility took delivery of the Escape in February, but didn't put it on the road until its official unveiling late last month.

It makes sense for fleet use, Guatto says. At Hydro, engineers and supervisors average 50 to 60 kilometres a day in this type of vehicle. That puts it well inside the range of the set-up installed by REV, which provides 160 kilometres between charges.

It's also driven mainly on city streets, where stop-and-go driving allows regenerative braking to partially recharge the battery.

And electricity is cheaper than gasoline.

The conversion costs about $75,000, although that should drop 35 per cent as REV goes into full production, Giraud says.

Fleet operators can expect to save $90,000 to $100,000 over 10 years on each vehicle, he says.

They'll also avoid about 120 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions.

For now, the overnight plug-in is on a regular 240-volt outlet. The smart grid part of the test can begin once Canada approves a new international standard electric-vehicle plug.

Then, Hydro will use charging stations developed by Coulomb Technologies and Eaton Corporation, capable of two-way communication between car and grid.
There are plenty of electric vehicles around, Giraud says.

But they're not enabled to use the smart grid, which can control when they're charged - for example, the process might be interrupted during periods of heavy demand - as well as how much and by what payment method to bill for purchases.

Customers can punch in their own preferences.

It would also let utilities draw electricity from cars when it's needed for the grid. Guatto, though, assumes this would occur infrequently, and only briefly, since moving electricity from car to grid would be slow and shorten battery life.

"It will be the exception rather than the rule," he says.

For REV, the project is key to building its conversion business. Ford vehicles - mainly Escapes and F-150 pickup trucks - comprise about 45 per cent of North America's fleets, Giraud says.

By the middle of next year, he hopes to have hundreds outfitted.

For Burlington Hydro, the aim is to not only improve its fleet performance but also to make its entire grid more efficient.

It has other projects on the go as part of that effort.

"All the technology is there to do it," Guatto says.

"We just haven't done it yet."

He wonders whether utilities could lease batteries to car owners. When beyond peak performance, they could serve as stationary power sources, perhaps eliminating the need to keep trucks idling when Hydro employees are working high up in "cherry picker" buckets.

This is about just one vehicle at a mid-size utility. But it's how change happens.

Illustration: Burlington Hydro is trying out a converted Ford Escape to test its all-electric drive and efficiency for future use in fleet vehicles. COURTESY OF BURLINGTON HYDRO