Here in Motor City, it is clear that Detroit is looking to possibilities offered by a new generation of electric cars. An electric-car infrastructure, including battery manufacture, could revive this city’s industrial fortunes.

To that end, a broad array of stake-holders have gathered in Detroit this week for a major conference, billed as the Business of Plugging In. Sponsored by the University of Michigan’s Center for Automotive Research, the conference now underway includes car manufacturers, battery makers, companies that build charging stations, the U.S. military, local and national politicians, and companies planning to get into the business in the near future.

Some observers have said that the competition between alternative fuels looks a lot like the competition between gas, steam, and electric cars in the early 20th century. But even within the electric-car advocacy movement, competing factions disagree on what the future should look like. Some are pushing for pure battery-electric vehicles. Others say that until a public car-charging network is built, electrics will need an on-board power-generating capacity. That’s where the plug-in hybrid comes in.

Electric cars’ biggest obstacle is that the current generation of battery technology is too expensive to gain wide acceptance in the market. Several competing ideas for how to reduce the cost to the consumer are under debate.

Concepts under discussion include

• Marketing electric cars by simply promoting their lower operating costs.
• Leasing the cars.
• Having utility companies buy the batteries and lease them back to consumers.
• Establishing specialized service companies that would own the batteries and swap them in and out of consumers’ cars. 

Will any of those ideas catch on? That’s what industry leaders in Detroit are trying to figure out this week. We’ll be sure to keep you posted on their insights.

—Eric Evarts