In order to get more information on different solutions of clean vehicles application, the delegation visited different companies, cities and research organizations in France to investigate on the situation of electric vehicles implementation, including Renault, Peugeot-Citroen.

　　The delegation mainly visited two representative cities-Bordeaux and La Rochelle to understand the experience of electric vehicle and trolley applications. In these two cities, the delegation visited institution for battery, battery control system and EV test, such as the University of Bordeaux and the General Department of Technical Directions of the City Community of La Rochelle. In Bordeaux, the delegation visited Electric vehicle for the disable, and the electric boat developed by Bordeaux EV Association. After riding in an EV, the delegation visited public recharging stations and a post office with a 16 EV fleet in Bordeaux. There are more than 200 EVs and 250 recharging stations. There are also recharging stations for other EVs. There is a total of 3000 m2 station area and can simultaneously recharge 14 Electric trucks, 20 electric cars and 20 batteries. The delegation was very impressed by its simplicity and usefulness. In La Rochelle, delegation members met with the Mayor and the major people in-charge. They toured the testing system of LISELEC and were invited to take the electric cars in LISELEC system as ordinary real life users. They also visited the system of Elcidis (delivery in town on electric vans) and took electric boat rides which impressed them very much.

　　3.1 Renault

　　The delegation visited Renault on Dec. 8, 2003. Renault pay much attention to all kinds of environment protection measures, including optimization of the diesel engine vehicles, development of electric vehicles and hybrid vehicles, utilization of telemetric and navigation systems, encouragement of car-sharing and providing intranet transportation information. Their ultimate goal is to realize sustainable development of economy and environment.

　　3.2 Peugeot-Citroen

　　Focus on Peugeot research level concept car: H2O Electric (fuel cell) Fire Truck. It is an electric car using Ni-metal battery of 20 Kwh with a range of 100 km. With the additional fuel cell of 5 Kwh, it will be able to drive up to 300-315 km. The H2 is stored in borohydride in a tank making H2 non-flammable. H2 becomes gaseous state from a hydrogen supply unit. The truck carries all the fire equipment, including the ladder, water pump, water pipes, etc. as a usual fire truck driving in a narrow street. The weight of the battery is 200kg, the weight of fuel cell is 20-50 kg. The two high-pressure vessels for oxygen serve both the firemen and the fuel cell.

　　3.3 La Poste

　　La Poste uses 500 electric vans to deliver mails in downtown areas in order to reduce the exhaust emission in city area. Each electric van has a capacity of 3 m3 or 500 kg. The advantages of electric van include less driving fatigue due to no gear shifting, low noise, low emission. It also has the attraction of strong sense of environment protection. The operating cost is higher than ordinary vans. But the future French law will require the companies like La Poste to have 20% clean vehicles in their new vehicle purchase.

　　3.4 EDF

　　EDF's involvement in electric transportation, including trains, metro, tramways, city deliveries, electric buses, individual transport, scooters, bicycles, etc. Ground fed power supply tram eliminates the classical overhead supply lines. EDF provides ZEBRA batteries and the service for electric buses. ZEBRA battery's energy density is around 125 Wh/kg. The cost should fall to 250$/kwh. EDF provides know-how and proposes a battery service for city center delivery trucks and waste collecting trucks. EDF is now researching into the lithium polymer battery with potential low cost(200 $/kW/h), high energy density(150 Wh/kg), well adapted to all temperatures(thermal control), optimized packaging, technology based on cheap plastics and thin films. It is developed with Bollore Technology in subsidiary company BATSCAP.

　　3.5 RATP

　　Paris city encourage people to use mass transport tools. Therefore, Paris is using environment friendly vehicles in the city area such as electric buses, electric waste collection trucks, electric mail delivery vans, electric boats, electric goods delivery vans.

　　RATP, the public transportation company of Paris is running 12 EV bus lines.

　　Batteries: 87 NiCd blocks, 6 V, 136 Ah, mounted on the roof of the bus, operating 70 km/bus/day

　　1 million passengers are transported by electric buses each year (30% tourists).

　　Life expectancy of the battery: 60000 km

　　Operating and maintenance cost is 3 times of that of the traditional diesel bus

　　3.6 Urban Community of Bordeaux

　　The delegation and the Bordeaux officials talked about plans of Bordeaux City' development of mass transit, economic way of transportation and the using of electric vehicles and tramways to reduce noise and other emissions.

　　Item of Interest Learned:

　　National policy and local policy have to be coordinated to each other. In order to realize sustainable development of environment in the cities, close cooperation between city planning department, public transport companies, vehicle manufacturers and research institutes is essential.

　　3.7 City Community of La Rochelle

　　The delegation are transferred by electric bus to visit the goods delivery center outside the city area. Commodities are brought in by diesel trucks and then delivered into the city by electric vans.
Ites of Interests Learned:

　　■ Cities can take a variety of measures to reduce the pollution, such as using electric mini bus, electric cars, electric vans for goods and mail delivery, electric boats, etc.

　　■ The testing on electric vehicles is still focusing on the test of batteries. Apart from the Nickel metal batteries, the high-energy density lithium batteries are the focus of many research organizations and companies.