Chelsea Sexton

Chelsea Sexton (born August 14, 1975) is an electric car advocate and advisor. She is most notable for her role in the documentary Who Killed the Electric Car. Sexton frequently writes articles and blog posts about electric cars and her views on obtaining mass adoption of the technology by the car industry and drivers. She lives in California with her husband Bob Sexton, a former EV1 service technician who was also employed by Tesla. They have one child.

EV1

Sexton entered the automotive industry at the age of 17 after buying her first Saturn. She wanted to put herself through college by working at Saturn, but she ended up finding that she loved the cars more than what she was studying, so when General Motors announced the EV1 electric vehicle program three years later, she jumped on it. Focusing on building a market for alternate-fuel vehicles through partnerships with corporate and non-profit stakeholders, shaping public policy and incentives, developing marketing strategies, and working directly with the drivers themselves, Sexton became well known as an advocate for clean, efficient transportation.

Advocacy

Sexton was laid off from General Motors at the end of 2001 when the company closed its EV1 assembly line. She then became a consultant to auto manufacturers and clean energy providers, helping to bring alternate fuel vehicles to market as well as increasingly clean ways to power them. In 2005, Sexton joined the X PRIZE Foundation and led the creation of a prize effort, which to deal with both energy and automobiles. In 2006, she managed an alternative fuel division for the Santa Monica, California based start-up Zag.com (now TrueCar and until recently served as the Executive Director of Plug In America, a coalition of individuals and organizations that advocates for the preservation and manufacture of plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) and electric vehicles.

In 2008, she become the founder of the Lightning Rod Foundation, an advocacy organization.^[1]

She is one of the key individuals interviewed in the 2006 documentary film Who Killed the Electric Car?. Sexton was a Consulting Producer^[2] on the 2011 follow-up documentary Revenge of the Electric Car. She is a frequent guest on the Transport Evolved podcast and has been a guest on many other podcasts such as What Drives Us and The Geekcast.^[3][4][5]

In 2011 she published a review of the Yokohama HER-02 EV Sports Concept car for Wired Magazine.^[6]

On October 8, 2013 Sexton was announced^[7] as one of thirteen bloggers for the Popular Science Blogger Network. Her blog Rotorhead will focus on the green rebirth of the automobile and other forms of transportation.

References

External links

• Official blog
• Myspace page
• Exclusive Q&A with Chelsea Sexton about the EV1, why the Prius gets a 'C, and who really killed the electric car (2006)
• Mother Jones Power Q&A: Chelsea Sexton (2008)
• Reviving the electric car: An interview with Chelsea Sexton (2009)
• Chelsea Sexton weighs in on EVs/PHEVs and solar (2010)
• The Geekcast #207 – Chelsea Sexton Interview
• The Geekcast #309 – Chelsea Sexton Talks EVs