Thanks to mis-appropriated government spending in the state of California… we have tons of these. And, virtually all of them go unused. About the only cars that can use them are non-mainstream. The Volt is designed to be charged at home, but it’s the first car that could have the potential to quickly recharge from these stations as well.
And, it appears that the Volt will be able to. The press release confirms that it supports 240v charging, the same grade of the charging stations. It’s not clear if Chevy will throw in the necessary adapter (the charging stations use a weird, paddle-style charging connector).
Best news of all? The Volt can charge at home in eight hours. At one of these stations, it will be able to fully charge in three hours.
I could see a backlash though. Those that invested/wasted money on so-called zipcars will be quite angered when all the stations are taken up with Volts… loaded with gasoline in their tanks as a range extender. One thing’s for sure… I won’t let someone call my Volt a standard hybrid. I plan on parking at these whenever reasonable to do so.