Electrification Coalition Releases New Television Ad

Commercial Highlights Electrification's Potential to Change the Future

WASHINGTON, July 12 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --The Electrification Coalition (EC), a group of business leaders who came together in November 2009 to support an electrified transportation system as the solution to the threats posed by oil dependence, today launched a television advertisement entitled "Sideview Mirror." The ad will run on cable news stations as well as during Sunday news shows in the Washington, DC area, along with related print advertising in Washington newspapers. It continues a TV and print campaign begun in June that highlights the unique ability of electrification to end the ideological energy debates of the past and protect the nation.

"We cannot get hung up on the tired old arguments of the past; electrification of the nation's cars and trucks proves that energy security and environmental protection are not mutually exclusive," Robbie Diamond, President and CEO of the Electrification Coalition, said. "Democrats and Republicans in both the House and Senate are supporting electrification for a reason: at a time when oil is spilling into the Gulf and Iran is threatening the world, electrification offers the only true way to end our addiction to oil. This new ad makes it clear: There is one path forward that protects our economy, our environment, and our national security, and that is electrification."

The ad can be viewed at: http://electrificationcoalition.org/news.php.

On May 27, Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate introduced legislation designed to advance the wide-scale deployment of electric vehicles and to develop the infrastructure needed to support them. The Senate bill, entitled the "Electric Vehicle Deployment Act of 2010" was introduced by Senators Byron Dorgan (D-ND), Lamar Alexander (R-TN), and Jeff Merkley (D-OR). The House legislation, entitled the "Electric Drive Vehicle Deployment Act of 2010," was cosponsored by House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming Chairman Ed Markey (D-MA), Rep. Judy Biggert (R-IL), Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA), and Rep. Jerry McNerney (D-CA).

The legislation echoes recommendations put forward by the Electrification Coalition, a nonpartisan, not-for-profit group of business leaders committed to promoting policies and actions that facilitate the deployment of electric vehicles on a mass scale in order to combat the economic, environmental, and national security dangers caused by our nation's dependence on petroleum. The EC's Electrification Roadmap, released in November 2009, proposed a set of policies in which geographic areas would compete to be selected as electrification deployment communities: specific areas in which targeted, temporary financial incentives are employed so that all of the elements of an electrified transportation system are deployed simultaneously.

SOURCE Electrification Coalition