Shai Agassi wants to make the world a better place, one electric car at a time.

As a World Economic Forum ‘Young Global Leader’ he was asked: “what could you do to make the world a better place by 2020?” His answer: take a country off of oil. To do so, he’s engineered a unique collaboration between the country of Israel, a major automaker and his company, Project Better Place. The government of Israel will supply tax incentives to consumers, Renault-Nissan will supply the electric cars and Agassi’s company will provide the batteries and the country-wide infrastructure to recharge the cars.   

It’s an interesting partnership, but the real innovation is the business model behind it.  Project Better Place is looking to change the way cars are paid for, taking a page from the playbook of mobile phone   companies, which operate cell phone towers and provide coverage to subscribers.  In a similar way Project Better Place plans to offer consumers a subscription-based ownership model for their cars, linking vehicle owners into the Electric Recharge Grid, a nationwide network of charging spots and battery-exchange systems that Agassi calls a “virtual oil field.”  Owners will pay a monthly fee for expected mileage, eliminating the uncertainty of fluctuating gas prices.  Combined with the government’s tax incentives, the goal is to make electric cars less expensive than gasoline-based cars, rolling out 100,000 of them by 2010. 

It’s a vision not only for the future of the car, but for a country.  According to Project Better Place’s website, if the rollout is successful it would position Israel as the first industrialized country to ‘end the stranglehold of oil on its economy’; Agassi describes it as “Israel’s Apollo Mission.”  He’s an evangelist to be sure, but he’s gaining converts. To spread the word about the possibilities of an oil-free transportation future, Project Better Future solicits ideas and support via registered users on its website.  Members offer suggestions about everything from design (”make the batteries open source”,” use solar film on the roof of the car”) to marketing.

At this recent talk at DLD, Agassi explained his motivation for starting Project Better Place was a finding a way to merge his two passions, climate change and peace in the Middle East.  As he sees it, if you could take Israel - a chaotic country - and create a replicable, oil-free model there, you’d have a shot at changing the world.  

I step off the plane and the first thing I think about is getting some juice. My blood sugar is fine, it’s the energy levels on my cell phone and laptop I’m worried about. As I search not-so-inconspicuously behind rows of plastic chairs, it occurs to me that I’ve turned into some sort of airport addict, wandering from gate to gate at metropolitan hubs, sniffing out electrical outlets like a crackhead looking for my next hit.  And I’m not alone: at JFK last month I saw a fistfight break out between two middle-aged suits, brawling over whose turn it was to plug in their cell phone.  

Despite all evidence to the contrary (including the fashion lovefest for Ugg boots and the inexplicable fact that there are eight full seasons of the television show Big Brother) we’re not, in fact, living in a free and democratic society. We may enjoy political freedom, but we‘re victims of a more insidious tyrant: the energy grid.  This is not some hippie/Greener rant: we’re shackled to the energy grid like a modern day Matrix.  Human beings can survive for more than a month without food and for five days without water, but the average man, it is said, can’t live more than six hours without plugging in.

Now fast forward to the future, say ten years from now.  Imagine a world in which energy is abundant, portable and ultimately, personal.  In this future electricity is disconnected from the power grid: no more sockets, no more wires. I was introduced to the concept of “personal energy” by my friend and futurist colleague Garry Golden, who loves to talk about two things: the future of energy and the Green Bay Packers.  Ok, make that one thing. ;-)  In this FringeHog podcast, Garry presents a compelling vision for the future in which “micro-packets” of electricity fuel our devices, our homes, our cars.  This week’s Friday Five takes a look at five technologies that could make an era of personal energy a reality.

Radio “free” Power

Question: how many chargers do you own for your so-called wireless devices?  If you’re like me, the ratio is about 2.4 plugs for every gadget. I have drawers full of orphaned chargers, little tangled ghosts from gadgets past.  Which makes Powercast the first in line to be My New Best (Tech) Friend.   It works like this: a transmitter plugs into your wall and sends out radio frequency signals which are picked up by receivers in a device (cell phone, iPod, etc) and converted to DC electricity - essentially, using the radio signals to power and charge your devices, sans wires. Check out this Podtech video interview with CEO John Shearer, who explains this potentially game-changing technology. 

DIY Solar Cells

The future looks bright for photovoltaics: Science Daily reports that researchers from the New Jersey Institute of Technology have developed an inexpensive solar cell that can be painted or printed on flexible plastic sheets. According to lead researcher Dr. Somenath Mitra, “Someday homeowners will even be able to print sheets of these solar cells with inexpensive home-based inkjet printers. Consumers can then slap the finished product on a wall, roof or billboard to create their own power stations.”

Human body network

Energy doesn’t get much more personal than this: in the future, your body could become its own computer network. The idea behind so-called “human body networks” is to tap into the body’s natural electrical field to carry data to personal devices, such as an iPod or cell phone.  Instead of using a cable to connect your camera to your computer, you could transfer pictures just by touching the PC while the camera is around your neck. Other useful scenarios: exchanging electronic business cards by shaking hands or swaping phone numbers just by kissing.  A handful of companies are pursuing the idea: in 2004 Microsoft was awarded a patent for a “method and apparatus for transmitting power and data using the human body.” Although the technology hasn’t hit the mainstream market, this Guardian article provides an intriguing overview of future commercial applications featuring NTT’s “Red Tacton” technology.

Flick my cell phone

Smoking may be socially taboo these days, but Bic lighters - those neon-colored plastic icons of the ‘70s - are finding a new path in a politically-correct world. Bic, the undisputed king of disposable consumer goods, is reinventing its most famous product line: the company is designing disposable cartridges for fuel cells, which can be used to recharge personal devices like cell phones and media players. This Business Week article describes the innovative marriage of a new technology and an old brand.

Dancing Fuel

As humans, every movement we make generates energy.  What if that energy could be captured and used as a clean source of electricity?  That’s the idea behind Amsterdam’s Sustainable Dance Club which features an electricity-generating dance floor. The club’s floor is designed to capture the kinetic energy of dancing people and use it power the club’s music and lights, turning it into a giant (human-powered) generator.