Union City Council voted unanimously earlier this month in favor of a project that would provide and deploy plug-in vehicle charging stations in Union. The stations would enable motorists with environmentally-friendly electric cars traveling through our area to charge the batteries that power their vehicles.
The project brings the city together with Plug-In Carolina, a nonprofit organization that, in partnership with the South Carolina Energy Office, has secured a grant through the Department of Energy’s Clean Cities program which would pay for the installation of the charging stations. The city’s only expense would be the $1-$2 per car it would cost to provide power to the stations.
If this sounds familiar it should as it is just the latest effort by the city to go green. Several years ago the city entered into a partnership with Verde Bio Fuels to make biodiesel and ethanol available to the public through the Exxon station at the intersection of US 176 and SC 49. The city has also been gradually replacing its old exclusively gasoline-powered vehicles with flex-fuel ones.
The plug-in vehicle charging stations are the next logical step in this process and one that positions the city to take advantage of and to promote changes in the automotive industry. Jim Poch, executive director of Plug-In Carolina, points out that by the end of the year several major automakers like Chevrolet and Nissan will be marketing plug-in electric vehicles and within three years all automakers will be marketing plug-ins. While the primary recharging stations for plug-ins will be the homes of their owners, Poch says the 10-18 stations planned for Union will help promote ownership of plug-ins by making recharging more convenient.
Poch pointed out the switch from fossil fuel-powered vehicles to plug-ins can have enormous environmental, economic and national security benefits. The environmental benefits include less air pollution as the plug-ins produce no emissions. It also includes less need to drill for oil and risk the kind of disaster continuing to unfold in the Gulf of Mexico.
The economic benefits begin in Union where the money paid by motorists to recharge their cars — either at home or at the stations — will stay here rather than ending up overseas. Your money will go to the City of Union Utility Department, not to Saudi Arabia.
The recharging stations could also help bring the businesses of Union County new customers. Signs will be placed on the interstate telling motorists the stations are in Union. Most of the possible locations for the stations are in and around Union just minutes away from our grocery, convenience and other stores; restaurants; motels; pharmacies; and movie theater. It’s quite possible that motorists stopping to recharge their plug-ins might also avail themselves of these and other services we have to offer and provide a welcome boost to the local economy.
Then there’s the benefits to our national security as reduced demand for fossil fuel lessens the strategic importance of the oil reserves of the Middle East. As the Middle East declines in importance, the need for the United States to maintain a large military presence there will also decline. We may finally be able to bring the boys and girls home from the region and never send them back again.
Also, with the oil money drying up, the governments of the Middle East will have less money to finance terrorism and the development of nuclear weapons. This will further enhance our security and that of the world.
Seems like a lot to expect from a few recharging stations in and around Union, doesn’t it? Yet where the environment is concerned what we do locally has national and even global ramifications. Just as our insatiable thirst for oil set the stage for the disaster in Gulf of Mexico and many other environmental problems, turning away from fossil fuels to embrace green alternatives like plug-in electric cars can help us clean up the mess we’ve made. In cleaning up the environmental mess, we will also help clean up the economic and national security messes caused by our addiction to oil.
Union City Council’s decision to join forces with Plug-In Carolina is a step in that cleaning process. It is now up to each and everyone of us as citizens and consumers to put our money where our mouth is and move that process along to where, one day, environmental disasters like that in Gulf of Mexico and military interventions in the Middle East are a thing of the past.
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