Plug In Toyota Prius Begins Testing in France

Actually Toyota have had Gen 2 Plug In Prius cars on test for a while now in Europe - also with EDF. The new trial is with plug in Gen 3 cars and looks more interesting. This is the spin on it from UK magazine Autocar:

Autocar - Prius trials 2012 battery plans

Toyota will use a three-year trial into the usage of plug-in vehicles to help determine the number of batteries to fit to its lithium ion battery Prius before it goes on sale in 2012.
The trial, which starts at the end of the year, is part of an ongoing collaboration with energy supplier EDF and will be conducted throughout the French city of Strasbourg.
It is hoped the partnership will help evaluate the requirements needed for a wider charging infrastructure and help prepare the public for its future use.
The pilot scheme will use a plug-in version of the next generation Prius equipped with lithium ion batteries instead of nickel cells. The deal involves leasing 100 lithium ion battery hybrids to local companies to examine their usage patterns, which will then help when analysing the required range and battery capacity for the production car.
EDF and Toyota have already been conducting plug-in hybrid trials for a number of months in the UK, with EDF employees running a Toyota PHV to help test a new charging and invoicing system incorporated into the car.
The latest trials will take that technology, which has also been under test in France since 2007, to a wider audience. EDF intends to set up several hundred charging points at users’ homes, work places and public parking spaces to help familiarise people with the technology.
Funding for the project in Strasbourg has come from the French Environment and Energy Management Agency, which wants to promote low-emission vehicles.
Toyota and EDF will also trial similar schemes in Japan and the United States towards the end of the year.

 

Whenever one of these lease schemes comes up, I'm reminded of the GM EV1. The key is for companies to dare to sell their cars. It took some guts for Toyota to start selling the Prius on the open market. They need to do the same for the plug-in.

That's not to say I'd buy one. I'd have to move house! I live in the upstairs flat of a converted terrace house and there's no private parking, only residents' reserved parking bays parallel to the kerb, with no guarantee that you'll get to park outside your own house (in fact, the relative number of houses and cars on my street is low enough that I frequently have to park around the corner, which is thankfully part of the same zone). Streets like this will require the council to provide some kind of kerb-side charging infrastructure to support plug-in hybrid or battery vehicles, unless we can go to a charging station to dump-charge a few hundred miles' range (I cover nearly 35 miles per day, I'd want a few days' range just so I didn't have to visit the charger every day).

Of course, running out of petrol will probably mean a drastic reduction in private car use anyway.