Tuesday 1st July 2008

Tesla Announces Electric Saloon

New four-door electric vehicle will be built in California

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The Tesla Roadster

Tesla Motors’ next product will be an electric four-door saloon built in California, it has been revealed. The company plans to start producing the car in late 2010 and promises that it will be both high performance and practical.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said yesterday at a press conference that he was pleased production of the cra, known as the 'Model S', would stay in California. ‘Today’s announcement is incredible news for California’s economy and its environment,' he said. 'If California was a baseball team this would be like winning the first round draft pick and recruiting a player who is a perfect fit on our roster because Tesla Motors and its all-electric cars belong in California.'

Last week, the California Alternative Energy and Advanced Transportation Financing Authority approved a new program that exempts new zero emission vehicle manufacturers from paying sales and use tax on the purchase of manufacturing equipment. Tesla said that it would be highly advantageous to build manufacturing facilities in close proximity to the engineering and research and development functions in Tesla’s San Carlos headquarters.

Tesla’s battery pack is currently manufactured in California and final assembly of the Tesla Roadster is also currently in the state.

Ze’ev Drori, President and CEO of Tesla Motors, said: ‘Tesla has achieved an extraordinary accomplishment. We are the only automobile company today delivering full performance battery-electric vehicles to our customers. Make no mistake - we are not a niche player with a car only for the rich and famous.

'As our agreement with the state so clearly demonstrates, we are building a high volume zero emission vehicle, manufactured in California for mid-range family use. And we aren’t going to stop there. We will continue on and build even more affordable cars.’

[DamoLLb]

Make no mistake - we are not a niche player with a car only for the rich and famous

I think the $109,000 price tag for the roadster is a price tag reserved for the 'rich'

increase range, decrease weight, decrease price. I may come back to eat my words in 5-10 years time but electric is not the future, bring on ethanol!

[Tuna]

DamoLLb said:

increase range, decrease weight, decrease price. I may come back to eat my words in 5-10 years time but electric is not the future, bring on ethanol!

Ethanol is unlikely to go far now that a lot of groups are putting the brakes on bio-fuels. There's a lot of research going into improving batteries for this area, so electric power is likely to stay, even if it remains a niche.

I'd be interested to know if/how Lotus are involved with this, having helped with the first Tesla. VVA, perhaps? There are few companies that have the skill to produce a truly lightweight chassis needed for such a product. Lotus' technology is also targetted at making small production runs economically possible, which would make it a good match for Tesla's requirements.

[astrsxi77]

Zero emissions?

Lucky powerstations run on unicorn tears eh?!

[PhantomPH]

According to jalopnik who ran this story yesterday, the price tag for the Model S will be $60,000 - hardly a price for 'the rich'. £30-40k is a really good price for an all-electric vehicle with a 225 mile range, IMHO.

[J111]

Maybe Tesla could produce a real production car, without an unwarrantied prototype gearbox, and sell it to a genuine paying customer (ie. not a board member or Jay Leno), before making promises about "high volume" cars, eh ?

[Arklight]

When they get round the issue of charging the thing from my non-ground floor flat i might look again. even then, what are you supposed to just drape an extension lead across the pavement if you don't have a driveway?

[chris_crossley]

I have liked this car for a while. I know they need power, and it's not clean. My fuel bill this year was £3k. This would save me a bit providing my concerns where sorted.
1) How much would it actually cost in the UK
2) Would it be right hand drive
3) The government didn't put the tax on electric up.
4) It was a real production car
5) .... jesus the list goes on!!! and on

225 Miles is a good range

May be they could open up a car plant in Ireland. Get a large UK government grant. Maybe even clean some money. Oh hang on!!!

[sniff petrol]

Arklight said:

When they get round the issue of charging the thing from my non-ground floor flat i might look again. even then, what are you supposed to just drape an extension lead across the pavement if you don't have a driveway?

Charge it at work for free

[Witchfinder]

Tuna said:

Ethanol is unlikely to go far now that a lot of groups are putting the brakes on bio-fuels.

The future of biofuels is not in feed crops, but in these third generation algae based fuels. There's huge potential there.

[Steve_F]

So how does this work on a long trip? 225 miles then find somewhere to wait for it to charge then continue the trip? Or carry a spare battery? Or take the electric plane?

I do like the idea but it seems like it's only for people with garages, if I ran it down from my flat overnight I bet it wouldn't be attached to my car in the morning. Until there's a quick charge facility there are going to be problems.

Get as many of the eco warriors in the slower electric cars saving petrol and making it cheaper (like that would ever happen) for the rest of us.

[Tuna]

Witchfinder said:

Tuna said:

Ethanol is unlikely to go far now that a lot of groups are putting the brakes on bio-fuels.

The future of biofuels is not in feed crops, but in these third generation algae based fuels. There's huge potential there.

Huge potential, yes, but so far from what I've read it's all a bit theoretical. I doubt we'll see any significant algae based fuel production for a few years yet.

[Mr Gear]

Once upon a time 225-mile range electric cars were just "theoretical" and before that, a 100mph petrol car was just theoretical.

I am open-minded about what alternative fuel source will power the vehicles of the future, but one thing is for sure and that is petrol is on its last legs.

[jlanng]

I wonder how long it takes to charge the batteries?

[kevin ritson]

Steve_F said:

So how does this work on a long trip? 225 miles then find somewhere to wait for it to charge then continue the trip? Or carry a spare battery? Or take the electric plane?

I do like the idea but it seems like it's only for people with garages, if I ran it down from my flat overnight I bet it wouldn't be attached to my car in the morning. Until there's a quick charge facility there are going to be problems.

Get as many of the eco warriors in the slower electric cars saving petrol and making it cheaper (like that would ever happen) for the rest of us.

If you could back in time to the late 19th Century, go and tell the masses that the petrol car will work, despite having to visit a chemist every 20 miles for some petrol.

Then, when they've stopped laughing, tell them that you have a vision for shops all over the country where you can pick up a pipe and pump gallons of the flammable and toxic stuff into a hot car.

Electric car range? Simple. Pull up a fuel station and swap your discharged batteries for fresh ones, charged at the station this morning. You pay for the electricity and a handling charge, say 1%.

[c_seven]

Although IMHO Tesla are barking up the wrong tree with electric cars in the long run, however i think it is great that they have designed a car with the petrolhead in mind not just the airhead lip service environmentalists that buy prius's. The Tesla proves that fun and being environmentally sensitive are not mutually exclusive concepts. It being a small sports car also addresses the range issue laterally as the vast, vast majority of cars of this ilk are never driven any real distance without a return to base. However with the introduction of a more everyman model on the horizon i will be interested to see a. how they combat the range issue and b. how they dress up the lifetime impact of the number of batteries they will need to use as being environmentally friendly.

[tridave]

quote :-Tesla’s battery pack is currently manufactured in California and final assembly of the Tesla Roadster is also currently in the state.


Complete vehicle manufacture in the uk then the battery pack put in in the us.

[Gingerbread Man]

The Tesla was at Le Mans. Looked good, something to do with Lotus?

Although when it burned off down the straight it sounded (is that the right word?) no existant.

[annodomini2]

Tuna said:

DamoLLb said:

increase range, decrease weight, decrease price. I may come back to eat my words in 5-10 years time but electric is not the future, bring on ethanol!

Ethanol is unlikely to go far now that a lot of groups are putting the brakes on bio-fuels. There's a lot of research going into improving batteries for this area, so electric power is likely to stay, even if it remains a niche.

I'd be interested to know if/how Lotus are involved with this, having helped with the first Tesla. VVA, perhaps? There are few companies that have the skill to produce a truly lightweight chassis needed for such a product. Lotus' technology is also targetted at making small production runs economically possible, which would make it a good match for Tesla's requirements.

Bio-fuels are not completely dead, the problem with them are plant based biofuels requiring land used for food crops, but there are other methods, such as certain weeds or genetically engineered weeds that will grow where other food crops will not.

And baterial and algae based production methods which run off food waste.

The only upcoming technology to make an electric vehicle a realistic proposition are EEStor and their supposedly very low leakage ultracapacitor, but they keep delaying release so we will see if it lives up to specification.

Tesla may a few problems with the use of VVA as Zap (another EV company) are using VVA for there Electric C Sector car (also using EEStor).

[Apache]

Mr Gear said:

I am open-minded about what alternative fuel source will power the vehicles of the future, but one thing is for sure and that is petrol is on its last legs.

what makes you so sure as a matter of interest?

[motormania]

Apache said:

Mr Gear said:

I am open-minded about what alternative fuel source will power the vehicles of the future, but one thing is for sure and that is petrol is on its last legs.

what makes you so sure as a matter of interest?

The one stat which is bounded around alot, and it's one that my gut feeling is correct - over and above all the other eco ste around today is that crude oil has a life span of less than 50 years now on this earth. There after there will be very little and what is left will cost so much to extract that no company would even begin to try.

So within our life time petrol will be gone.

What we now need are some openminded free radicals - bleeding edge technical gurus who are not stuck in the past and who can come up with a radical new source of fuel...