NEW YORK – If you're among the tens of thousands of people waiting for a Chevrolet Volt or Nissan Leaf, Hertz might be able to get you some seat time in one before the dealers can. The world's largest auto-rental outfit said New York will be the first market in its global initiative to bring plug-in hybrids and battery electric vehicles to the Connect by Hertz global car-sharing operation.

Hertz is getting behind cars with cords in a big way, offering them to customers in New York on Dec. 15 and in San Francisco before long. More will be added through 2011. Although Enterprise also plans to roll out some electrics, Hertz claims it is the first to put such cars into rental and car-sharing programs.

"Hertz is the first to provide consumers with electric-vehicle access on a global scale," Mark P. Frissora, chairman and CEO, said as the company made its announcement in Times Square. "By introducing EVs in New York, Washington and San Francisco, we're the first to make tomorrow's driving experience available to consumers today and we look forward to continue building out our EV platform, making electric mobility a reality for consumers worldwide."

If you're not familiar with Connect by Hertz, it’s essentially the rental-car juggernaut’s answer to Zipcar, Flexcar and other car-sharing services. Users pay a fee, either monthly or annually, for access to a fleet of urban runabouts they can borrow for as little as $8.50 an hour. Using a car with a cord won't cost you any more than the gasoline models.

Rental and car-sharing locations will serve as home base for the vehicles and their charging stations, and will tap into Hertz's fleet-management tools, customer navi systems and other tech to help form an EV network and charging infrastructure.

Beyond working with the likes of Nissan and General Motors – both of which begin delivering the Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt this month – and reaching out to startups like Coda Automotive, Hertz is teaming up with charging station providers, city governments and others to make this plan work.

Hertz says it has ordered "hundreds of vehicles" from Nissan, GM, Toyota, Smart USA and Mitsubishi. (Toyota, Smart and Mitsu all promise electrics by 2013.) It is working closely with Texas energy giant NRG, which plans to blanket Houston with public charging stations.

We know what you’re thinking, and, no, people will not be running extension cords from their hotel rooms to the parking lot. Hertz tells us that people expected to rack up a lot of miles on their rentals will get a conventional car or, when inventory allows, a plug-in hybrid like the Chevrolet Volt. The electrics will be for car-sharing or short hops.

By tapping its network of 200 car-sharing and 8,500 car-rental sites in 146 countries, Hertz can put a whole lot of EVs on the road in very little time. That will provide a market for the cars – spurring automakers to build more of them – and let the public see and experience them. It also creates further incentive for companies like NRG, Ecotality and Coulomb Technologies to roll out more charging infrastructure.

Photo of a Nissan Leaf being ogled during the Hertz announcement in Times Square: Hertz

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