Gallery Of Glory: National Plug-In Day and "Revenge of the Electric Car" Premier

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I wanted to report on two events that we attended in October The first was the National Plug-In Day event in Orange, California and the second was a special event held by Nissan for the opening of the movie "Revenge of the Electric Car" in West Los Angeles.

National Plug-In Day
Plug-In America organizes this event each year to celebrate the growth of the electric car movement. It is an understatement to say that this year's events were the largest ever. Twenty-nine U.S. cities held Plug-In Day events, with many hundreds of EVs gathering, representing many millions of miles of emissions- free driving.

The flagship event was held in Santa Monica, where about 200 EVs paraded, two abreast down the city's avenues. Celebrities present included Ed Begley and Alexandra Paul, as well as Chris Paine, director of "Who Killed the Electric Car" and "Revenge of the Electric Car".

We attended the event in Orange, California, where over 70 EVs gathered, representing over one million miles of emissions-free driving. The event was organized by Linda Nicholes, a long time supporter of the growth of EVs and member of Plug-In America. After gathering at the Orange Library, many of the cars paraded through Orange to publicize the event. As in Santa Monica, a large proportion of the cars were LEAFs, which isn't surprising since the LEAF has already become the largest selling electric car in the US, and probably in the world. Our LEAF was joined by several original (eight years or older) Toyota RAV4s, a few Chevy Volts, some gorgeous Tesla Roadsters, an early demo by Mitsubishi of its soon to be released "i", a very interesting converted Miata, two replica Porsche Speedsters, a Chevy truck and a few other home-built EVs.

It was a great feeling to be among so many kindred spirits, and it was really fun to parade through the town together. Our Leaf was the first blue one in the parade in the video at the Orange Plug-In Day site: here

The 2012 Mitsubishi i Electric Car

A Porsche Speedster Replica EV from South Coast Electric Cars

Linda Nicholes of Plug-In America Leads the Ceremonies

"Revenge of the Electric Car" Nissan LEAF Owner Premier Event
In conjunction with the National Plug-In Day observances, Nissan hosted a special event in West Los Angeles at the offices of their advertising agency, TBWA/Chiat/Day and we were lucky enough to score an invitation with the kind help of our friend Mike Walsh. We were part of a group of about fifty LEAF owners who were welcomed for one of earliest public showings of Chris Paine's new film, the follow-up to his very influential "Who Killed the Electric Car".

We had a great time and we really thank Nissan for inviting us, and for hosting LEAF owners at the premier week of the film at the NuArt in Santa Monica. Besides hosting us, Nissan provided some food, a few LEAF souvenirs and a DC quick charger to help some of us who had the longer drives to get home.

The documentary follows three fascinating and very different CEOs, Elon Musk of Tesla, Bob Lutz of GM and Carlos Ghosn of Renault-Nissan through the decisions leading to the release of their companies' EVs, along with the story of an enterprising "outsider", Greg "Gadget" Abbott of Left Coast EVs, who is building EV conversions. The movie is fascinating on many levels, not the least of which is the human interest story of how these men, each in his own way, took great personal risk to make the bold move to produce an electric car against the tide of "common wisdom" within and outside their own companies, common wisdom which said that they were crazy to put such large resources into EV technology. We loved the film and were riveted to the screen throughout the showing.

Chiat/Day went out of their way to host us at their offices. One very special part of the evening was getting to walk around within the workspace, which is an amazingly open and interesting design, obviously built to encourage creativity in the staff. As an example, the viewing space for the film was set up on the indoor basketball court that is part of the central area of the offices!