victorian electric vehicle trial mid-term report - Department of Transport

Commercial negotiations and astructured consultation processwere then undertaken to informthe final trial design (DOT 2012b).The participants were announced inOctober 2010 to a backdrop of vehiclesand charging technology previouslyunseen in the Victorian market(Autoblog 2010). Additional participantshave joined the trial as the projecthas progressed – refer to Appendix A –Victorian EV Trial corporate participantsfor a full list of the 80 corporate trialparticipants including their role as ofDecember 2012.While the participants and their goodsand services provide the basic buildingblocks for the trial, the four-partconceptual model shown in Figure 7was designed to deliver the trial.The diverse range of activities beingdone as part of the trial includes:• Household vehicle roll-out: around120 households living with an EVfor three months each (referto Section 4)• Fleet vehicle roll-out: over 50corporate fleets having theopportunity to trial a number ofEVs for three months or morefor each vehicle (Section 4)• Charging infrastructure roll-out:around 200 charging outlets beinginstalled for household, fleet andpublic use (Section 5)• Economic, environmental andsocial impacts assessment: anevaluation into the triple bottomline impacts of EV technologyintroduction in Victoria (Section 6)• Education and awareness program:a wide-ranging communicationsprogram to raise awareness,understanding and acceptance of EVtechnology in Victoria (Section 7).The unifying objective ‘to makeVictoria an EV-friendly place’ is to beachieved through improved awareness,understanding and acceptance ofelectric vehicle technology.The Victorian ElectricVehicle Trial is a trailblazingstudy that providesconsumers and businesseswith a firsthand taste ofwhat will be an excitingfuture transport option;electric vehicles.The industry is looking tothis trial as the cornerstoneof future development inthis area and a lot of workhas already gone intoovercoming barriers intesting these vehicles.Australian Gas Lighting (AGL),a premier partner for the Trial,14 November 20123.2 A MARKET DEVELOPMENTMODELThe trial design and outcomes arebeing viewed in the context of themarket development model fornew technologies.New technology is adopted gradually,following an ‘S-curve’, similar tothose depicted in Figure 8 for a rangeof technologies introduced over thelast century.This process has been characterisedby Rogers (1962) and Moore (1991),and forms the basis for consideringthe status and path forwards for theVictorian electric vehicle market(Rorke and Inbakaran 2009).With reference to Figure 9, theorysuggests that around 16 per cent ofthe population form the early marketfor any new technology. These people,the ‘innovators’ and ‘early adopters’,are attracted to new technologies onaccount of the reflected symbolism,that is, what ownership of newtechnology says about them. Thisperceived benefit outweighs thecosts and risks associated withany new technology for these earlymarket participants.In contrast ‘mainstream’ marketparticipants, composed of the earlyand late majority, are primarilyfinancially-motivated and will adoptthe new technology because it makessense. The transition from earlyto mainstream market adoption iscommonly termed the ‘take-off point’.Moore (1991) identifies the difficulttransition between these two verydifferent market segments as thekey phase in the success or failureof any new technology – a challengecommonly described as ‘crossingthe chasm’.CREATING A MARKET 17