Working in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy Chrysler Group LLC will deliver five demonstration fleet RAM 1500 plug-in hybrid electric vehicle pickup trucks to NV Energy – the utility company serving 95 percent of the state of Nevada.

The plug-in hybrid RAM 1500 vehicles are part of a national demonstration fleet of 140 vehicles that will be used during the next three years to evaluate customer usage, drive cycles, charging, thermal management, fuel economy, emissions and impact on the region’s electric grid. In addition to NV Energy, seven other partners across the U.S. are expected to receive vehicles for demonstration and testing purposes.

“Cities and states have been carefully selected to help the Chrysler Grop LLC collect a wide range of data,” explained Abdullah Bazzi, senior management of Chrysler’s advanced hybrid vehicle project. “Cities like Las Vegas and areas throughout Nevada offer a combination of suburban and rural driving, elevation changes and a wide range of temperatures that are ideal as test cycles for these vehicles.  The constant charging will allow us to measure the impact on battery life and charging efficiency.”  Other cities that have received the demonstration trucks include Boston, Houston, San Francisco and Sacramento, Charlotte, N.C., and Albany, N.Y.

The Chrysler Group LLC is also developing a similar fleet of 25 Town & Country minivans with plug-in hybrid technology for demonstration and evaluation that will be allocated to select cities later this year.