Electrification and Shared Mobility

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Benoît Robert of Communauto and France Lampron of Hydro-Québec with an electric Communauto vehicle in Montreal.


An article published two weeks ago in The Globe and Mail discussed the use of electric and hydrogen vehicles by car-share companies in Canada and the issues involved in their adoption. Three car-share operations in Canada—Communauto, car2go/Share Now, and Modo—all report that users are reluctant to use their electric vehicles, despite expressing interest in them. Between the time needed to charge, the difficulty in finding charging stations, and the risk of running out of battery, logistical concerns seem to win out for most users unfamiliar with electric vehicles.


Car share and rideshare are frequently portrayed as part of a green future, but that is not actually the case as long as they depend on fossil fuels. This article suggests that the process of ending this dependence—whether through electrification or adoption of even less familiar hydrogen vehicles—may actually prove to be quite difficult to implement for these businesses. This is especially likely to be an issue for ride-share, something not discussed in the article; while car-share vehicles can remain at a charging station for a few hours between users, limited range would be an obstacle for rideshare drivers who would likely be driving for longer hours and distances than those driving themselves.

On the other hand, it is clear that car-share companies, at least, have an interest in electrifying their fleets. The Canandian companies in the Globe and Mail article had all introduced electric vehicles, though generally only a few. Closer to home, however, Gig Car Share recently began operating in Sacramento with a fully-electric fleet of 260 vehicles. Many of the Canadian companies cited expense as a barrier to their further adoption of electric vehicles; Gig’s own vehicle acquisition was subsidized by the city of Sacramento using settlement money from Volkswagen over Dieselgate. However, while many car-share companies have so far found electrification to be difficult or infeasible, they may yet play an active role in expanding the infrastructure for and availability of electric vehicles.

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