This isn’t the first McDonald’s to add a charging station, but the last one to appear was more than a decade ago in Phoenix. Likely, the Cary McDonald’s charging station will sit unused until 2011, when the first plug-ins begin to go on sale. Even then, the usefulness of charging a battery during a 30-minute fast-food meal is pretty questionable.
Forgive me for being a stickler, but adding a charging station to a McDonald’s is kind of like a lumber company planting a tomato garden and calling it even. McDonald’s practically invented the factory food system to distribute beef cheaply and efficiently across the country, a process that racks up massive amounts of greenhouse gas emissions. Plus, think of all those idling cars in drive-thru lanes. While a patina of “green” may be the chic thing to do from a marketing perspective, it doesn’t change the fundamental nature of McDonald’s business model.
McDonald’s Deploys Plug-in Car Charging Station (HybridCars.com)
