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From: bm...@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Tom Turner)
Newsgroups: ieee.announce
Subject: ELECTRIC VEHICLE INFRASTRUCTURE PLANNING AND DESIGN 
COMPETITION
Date: 6 Dec 1992 00:23:20 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
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ELECTRIC VEHICLE INFRASTRUCTURE PLANNING AND DESIGN COMPETITION

Electric vehicles will be widely used on American roads by the
end of the decade and two Detroit-area companies are helping
ensure they will be as convenient as gasoline powered vehicles.

GM Electric Vehicles and Detroit Edison are among several
organizations sponsoring "The Electric Vehicle and the American
Community: A National Planning and Design Competition" to design
infrastructure to make American communities "user friendly" to
electric vehicles. The announcement was made jointly by John E.
Lobbia, chairman and chief executive officer of Detroit Edison,
and Kenneth R. Baker, manager of GM Electric Vehicles.

The competition invites teams of multi-disciplinary professionals,
such as architects, land planners and engineers, to envision the
future of electric vehicles in their own communities. Teams will
address challenges such as designing convenient recharging methods,
linking energy and transportation policies, and shaping land and
energy use.

Detroit Edison and General Motors have been in the forefront of
electric-vehicle research and development. Detroit Edison was one
of the first U.S. utilities to conduct on-the-road evaluations of
electric vehicles. It operated two vehicle demonstration programs
in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Energy, giving the
company more than 700,000 miles of electric-vehicle experience.

"Customers in southeastern Michigan are ready for good-performing
cars which, while moving us around, also help protect the
environment and cost less to operate," Lobbia said. "When electric
vehicles roll off the assembly lines, our community infrastructures,
including electric-vehicle charging facilities, have to be ready."

General Motors' electric-vehicle prototype, "Impact," was so popular
among customers at auto shows around the country that it will be
mass produced in the mid-199Os.  It will be the first mass-production
electric vehicle to be built from the ground up in North America.

According to Baker, the electric vehicle presents an exciting new
technology that will create jobs and improve the environment. "We
have the technology to make a dependable, practical, environmentally
sound electric vehicle," he said. "The challenge now is to prepare
our infrastructure to support it.  This competition will help bring
government and industry together to develop an infrastructure that is
as exciting and elegant as electric vehicles themselves."

Teams competing in the infrastructure competition will receive
detailed competition criteria on Jan. 15, 1993, and entries will be

due on April 13, 1993.  A jury of acknowledged experts will judge
entries on creativity and practicality and winners will be announced
on May 11, 1993.

Winning teams in various categories will share $100,000 in prizes.
Additional sponsors include Hughes Power Control Systems, Electronic
Data Systems, the Edison Electric Institute, the U.S. Department of
Energy, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison
Company, Arizona Public Service Company, Boston Edison Company, Los
Angeles Department of Water and Power, Sacramento Municipal Utility
District and Salt River Project.

For further information call: Wendy Makowski of Eisbrenner & Co. at
313-641-1446 for GM Electric Vehicles; or Vanessa Waters of Detroit
Edison at 313-237-7255.