Plug-in hybrids may be the future, but they haven't been embraced with open arms. Yet.

James Poch, the director of the Plug-In Hybrid Coalition of the Carolinas, is trying to change that in his little corner of heaven, where the group  will launch an educational campaign in both North and South Carolina this month. The idea of a regional coalition grew out of Poch's work with Plug-In Partners, a national organization based in Austin, Texas, as well as Toyota, which makes the prototype plug-in hybrid Prius that Poch drives.

The Carolinas Group's official debut will be Oct. 30 in Myrtle Beach, when Poch will address the annual meeting of the Southeastern Governmental Fleet Managers Association. This puts Poch in the face of people who make car-purchasing decisions every day. He plans to ask the meeting's participants to commit to the Plug-In Carolinas Challenge: Poch wants them to think about what it would take to make purchasing a plug-in hybrid a viable option. Price? Warranties? Return on investment?

"Our goal is to accelerate the adoption of the technology," Poch told the Charleston Regional Business Journal. "We want to get business, civic and environmental groups together to learn about the technology and then we want to ask them to set the criteria by which they would buy a hybrid. Once we outline our commitment, we’ll take those demands to the automakers."

There are already some plug-in hybrids on the road: school buses, fleet vehicles and other prototypes bought by organizations that can afford the substantial cost of converting a hybrid to a plug-in hybrid. Poch estimates the conversion cost to be between $15,000 and $24,000 for a Prius, which already carries $23,000 sticker price. The savings seem minimal: Poch expects to save $100 a month on gas, but thinks his electric bill will go up by about $20.

In his interview with the Regional Business Journal, Poch explained his group's approach to the expense issue: "We don’t expect people to buy at this price, but we wanted to get the cars on the road.... By the time we market these in mass quantity, we aim to have the premium around $1,000 to $3,000."

The organization's approach really is practical, however: By targeting fleet managers for their initial education efforts, the Plug-In Hybrid Coalition of the Carolinas is talking directly to those individuals who buy multiple cars per year. Convincing just one fleet manager to switch over to plug-in hybrids is the equivalent of going out and educating a host of individual buyers. Furthermore, if Poch can demonstrate even a small financial savings for plug-in hybrids over more traditional fleet vehicles, he should be able to get fleet managers interested in making the switch.

Photo — Plug-In Hybrid Coalition of the Carolinas