While doing some background research on new low carbon business opportunities for The Green Executive, I came across a demonstration video for Better Place’s automatic electric vehicle battery swap technology. The idea is that instead of having to wait a long time to charge your batteries, you simply swap your depleted battery pack for a charged one. This condenses recharge hours into a couple of minutes (it’s slightly sped up in the video).

The business model will mean EV owners don’t actually own the batteries, rather that they purchase a power service instead – a neat example of a product service system. It is exactly this sort of innovation which will thrive in a low carbon economy.