A grand plan is emerging for Hawaii’s first electric car plant.

The price tag: $50 million.

The location: 30 acres in Kapolei, with the final West Oahu site still to be determined.

The facility: A three-acre manufacturing plant, plus a showroom, test track, warehouse, design studio and a resort complex with cottages.

This according to California architect Stan Field, who is designing the facility.

“This will definitely be a landmark building and really celebrate the idea of clean and renewable energy being used to drive these electric vehicles,” said Field, who is principal of Field Architecture in Palo Alto. “The whole project is based on the real importance of sustainability and also being part of a Native Hawaiian environment and landscape. I like to design in locations where the people love the place because architecture has to express the spirit of a place, and that’s so apparent in Hawaii. The design is of such a nature that it will be such a wonderful venue for events, concerts, seminars and special occasions.”

Field said once a location is secured, he will revisit Oahu to complete the designs and also hire a local architecture firm to carry out the next phase of construction documents and permitting.

“The CEO of CT&T, he makes decisions quickly and moves quickly, so he wants this project to be ready within the next 18 months, meaning constructed by then,” Field said. That means the Oahu plant would be up and running by December 2011.

CT&T’s Hawaii factory will start off importing fully assembled vehicles for sale in the state before importing unassembled kits that can be put together once the plant is completed, spokeswoman Hannah Lee said.

A car industry expert says CT&T’s target of producing 10,000 cars a year in Hawaii is likely higher than current demand, but that the company could find success with government fleets, rental car agencies that cater to tourists, and the military.

“The plan strikes me as kind of odd because it would seem that the inventory would be for consumption by the local population since it would be considerably expensive to ship them out to other markets. Can the state absorb that many cars a year?” said John O’Dell, senior editor of Green Car Advisor, a blog on environmental automotive trends and technologies for auto website edmunds.com. “But CT&T obviously sees a local market, and there may be a decent market, but 10,000 sounds like a lot for Hawaii to absorb. Another issue is that they’re going to have to ship materials to Hawaii for the plant because there aren’t any domestic plastics or steel industries there to make raw parts.”

There were 33,600 new vehicles sold in Hawaii in 2009, according to the Hawaii Automobile Dealers Association. That means CT&T wants its vehicles to account for about a third of the new cars sold here annually.

Still, O’Dell, who’s based in Santa Monica, Calif., says Hawaii’s geographic isolation and lower speed limits make it an attractive location for electric vehicles.
“You could drive a lot of miles in Hawaii and not strain the capabilities of most battery packs on the market today, which makes the state an ideal spot to push for this,” he said. “And Hawaii’s got tremendous costs for petroleum-based fuels, in addition to a state government that has been welcoming clean energy alternatives.”

Despite high gas prices, O’Dell noted that Hawaii consumers haven’t shown a bigger-than-usual appetite for buying fuel-efficient vehicles. For example, Toyota’s hybrid Prius, which accounts for about half the conventional hybrids sold in the U.S., sells less than 1 percent of its Priuses in Hawaii. In 2009, 646 new Prius cars were sold in Hawaii, representing less than 2 percent of new vehicles sold in the state that year.

CT&T’s plans are seen by state officials as a way to help accelerate the state’s clean energy goals, which include reducing Hawaii’s dependence on imported petroleum for transportation needs.

Gov. Linda Lingle has set a goal of reducing the state’s energy use by 30 percent within 20 years, in addition to requiring that 40 percent of Hawaii’s energy come from renewable sources such as wind and solar.

Included in the goals of the state’s Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative is a plan to encourage a full-scale network of electric vehicles in the Islands. One projection done for the state estimated that there will be 10,000 electric cars on Hawaii’s roads in the next five years and 43,000 in 2020.
While the state’s estimates are lower than CT&T’s projected output, the carmaker says it sees potential in Hawaii for its different models. The company is hoping its expanded line of vehicles, which will include shuttle buses, a sports car coupe, and a boat, will do well in Hawaii.

“The vehicle side is constrained by what the manufacturers make available … but the goal is to get off of petroleum, and to the extent that electric vehicles can help, that’s what we’re shooting for,” said Maria Tome, manager of the state’ Renewable and Transportation Energy Program within the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.

“It can help in two ways — if electric vehicles are running on electricity, there will be a drop in the use of gasoline, and second, if EVs can be charged in homes overnight, they could potentially tap into excess renewable energy sources that are generating power overnight,” Tome said. “Think of Maui’s wind farm that produces power at night when there isn’t much of a demand. If we have more renewables on the grid system and more electric vehicles making use of that power when it’s available, then we can have synergies there.”

Ted Peck, administrator of the Hawaii State Energy Office within DBEDT, said CT&T approached the state with its plans to build a plant here.
“They sought us out and were persistent, and we want them to succeed and think they have potential to do well here,” Peck said. “We haven’t gotten to the point of offering special incentives for them to be here, and they haven’t asked, frankly. There may be incentives we can put forward from the state or city level, whether it’s tax breaks or assistance with permitting.”

CT&T and the state have signed a Memorandum of Understanding in which the state commits to help the company out, but nothing specific is mentioned.