Tesla Motors' Success Gives Electric Car Market a Charge

[ScienceRocks]

Tesla Motors' Success Gives Electric Car Market a Charge
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Tesla Motors' Success Gives Electric Car Market a Charge


Workers celebrate the completion of the first Tesla Model S cars at a factory in Fremont, California.

Photograph by Paul Sakuma, AP


Josie Garthwaite

for National Geographic

Published May 21, 2013

Tesla Motors, the Silicon Valley electric carmaker, is riding high. The company reported its first ever quarterly profit this month and saw its stock price shoot upwards of $97 per share—an all-time high. At more than $10 billion, the company's market value is now greater than that of established automakers Fiat and Mitsubishi Motors.

And for icing on the cake, Tesla's first made-from-scratch car, the electric Model S sedan, has received a rare near-perfect score from Consumer Reports. Noting the difficulty of starting a successful auto company, evoltven Bill Ford, the executive chairman of Ford Motor Co., commented, "My hat's off to them."

The company is preparing to take advantage of its popularity on Wall Street by raising an estimated $648 million by selling a combination of shares and debt-like securities, to be repaid in 2018. Tesla CEO Elon Musk is set to personally purchase $100 million of shares in the offering. Tesla will curry public favor by using part of the proceeds to prepay some of the $465 million U.S. government loan that helped establish manufacturing of the Model S.

GOOD GOING TELSA MOTORS! Keep leading the way to clean electric cars!!! The loan program worked out wonderfully and the Obama admin has chosen right!

Telsa x next year should be even better. 300 miles? Pretty good. Now we just have to get that charging time down and get private corporations to build charge stations=success.

We republicans should get on board.

 

[hortysir]

http://www.usmessageboard.com/energy/278389-tesla-model-s-hits-the-roads-with-great-success.html

 

[Crackerjaxon]

Glad to see this. I can't figure out why they're so damnably expensive, though. It has to be a hell of a lot cheaper to manufacture a battery than it is to manufacture an internal combustion engine.

I expect electric cars for we peons will be coming soon enough.

 

[francoHFW]

It has supercar body, interior, and performance....I'm still pissed Pub pundits ruined the Volt and Fisker. Pub dupes!

 

[OriginalShroom]

So one success out of how many failures?

How much money has Obama wasted with this program? How much of that money has done nothing but line the pockets of his contributors?

 

[OriginalShroom]

It has supercar body, interior, and performance....I'm still pissed Pub pundits ruined the Volt and Fisker. Pub dupes!

I am sure that you have the linked articles with proof to back up your claims that it was Republicans fault that those POS cars failed?

 

[boedicca]

I just have one big question:

Considering the aging and rapidly deteriorating electric grid of California, what happens when "affordable" electric cars overwhelm the distribution capacity for electricity?

Teslas are so expensive now, that the amount is negligible.

 

[Old Rocks]

No, it is not cheaper at present. Lithuim batteries are hard to manufacture at present in the size required for automobiles.

And the cost of the Tesla S is not really any higher than many of the high end luxury sedans. Remember, you are dealing with a sedan that does 0 to 60 in under 5 seconds. And is rated higher than the high end Mercedes, BMW, and Audi by Consumer Reports.

However, the battery cost will come down, whether in steps, or a magnitude jump. How many years ago was it that a 60 in. TV cost 10's of thousands of dollars?

 

[ScienceRocks]

I just have one big question:

Considering the aging and rapidly deteriorating electric grid of California, what happens when "affordable" electric cars overwhelm the distribution capacity for electricity?

Teslas are so expensive now, that the amount is negligible.

1. Build new infrastructure.
2. The cars price will go down and the tech will move down to cheaper electric cars.

 

[Old Rocks]

I just have one big question:

Considering the aging and rapidly deteriorating electric grid of California, what happens when "affordable" electric cars overwhelm the distribution capacity for electricity?

Teslas are so expensive now, that the amount is negligible.

Photovoltaics are rapidly coming down in price. And when you can both fuel your vehicle and power your home, the payoff period for the solar cells will be considerably shorter than in the past. Especially as competition for fuel from Asia and South America drives up the price of gasoline and diesel.

 

[sfcalifornia]

So one success out of how many failures?

How much money has Obama wasted with this program? How much of that money has done nothing but line the pockets of his contributors?

Continued improvements and building new infrastructure will bring about the success of the electric car. Failures are the steps you take to reach the successes. Do you really think new inventions are perfect the first time?

 

[Old Rocks]

I just have one big question:

Considering the aging and rapidly deteriorating electric grid of California, what happens when "affordable" electric cars overwhelm the distribution capacity for electricity?

Teslas are so expensive now, that the amount is negligible.

1. Build new infrastructure.
2. The cars price will go down and the tech will move down to cheaper electric cars.

That infrastructure is already being built. At Portland State University they have a bunch of plugins in parking spaces for the EV's. Saw my first Tesla S there. Volts, Leafs, and a cute little car, the Think, are there are a daily basis.

Elon Musk is also building his own charging network. And soon, restaurant owners are going to realize that having such a charging station, or stations, will bring them a lot more business.

As far as the grid goes, we need to replace it in any case. It is ancient, wastes too much energy, and vulnable to hostile acts.

 

[Old Rocks]

I just have one big question:

Considering the aging and rapidly deteriorating electric grid of California, what happens when "affordable" electric cars overwhelm the distribution capacity for electricity?

Teslas are so expensive now, that the amount is negligible.

Yes, considering most vehicles have runs of hundreds of thousands or millions. Yet, Tesla has announced that they will build 21,000 this year, and are actually making a profit right now.

 

[Lakhota]

I salute Tesla Motors!

 

[Cowman]

So one success out of how many failures?

How much money has Obama wasted with this program? How much of that money has done nothing but line the pockets of his contributors?

Must be pretty shitty living the life of a conservative, never trying because they equate failure with failure, ignoring the fact that if you never fail, you will never succeed, and that there is no success without failure.

If we followed the conservative mindset, avoid failure at all costs, we'd have never had any innovation or discovery at all.

"If at first you don't succeed, quit and never try it again."

 

[sfcalifornia]

I just have one big question:

Considering the aging and rapidly deteriorating electric grid of California, what happens when "affordable" electric cars overwhelm the distribution capacity for electricity?

Teslas are so expensive now, that the amount is negligible.

1. Build new infrastructure.
2. The cars price will go down and the tech will move down to cheaper electric cars.

That infrastructure is already being built. At Portland State University they have a bunch of plugins in parking spaces for the EV's. Saw my first Tesla S there. Volts, Leafs, and a cute little car, the Think, are there are a daily basis.

Elon Musk is also building his own charging network. And soon, restaurant owners are going to realize that having such a charging station, or stations, will bring them a lot more business.

As far as the grid goes, we need to replace it in any case. It is ancient, wastes too much energy, and vulnable to hostile acts.

Plugin parking spaces are popping up around San Fran as well.

I heard the answer to the charging issue is eventually to drive into a station and just swap out batteries. That's a long time coming, no doubt.

 

[francoHFW]

It has supercar body, interior, and performance....I'm still pissed Pub pundits ruined the Volt and Fisker. Pub dupes!

I am sure that you have the linked articles with proof to back up your claims that it was Republicans fault that those POS cars failed?

You're a natural at playing dumb, dupe. Matthew is the only dupe I've ever seen who would buy one, QED. Volt was MT Car of the Year. A-hole. lol

 

[ScienceRocks]

1. Build new infrastructure.
2. The cars price will go down and the tech will move down to cheaper electric cars.

That infrastructure is already being built. At Portland State University they have a bunch of plugins in parking spaces for the EV's. Saw my first Tesla S there. Volts, Leafs, and a cute little car, the Think, are there are a daily basis.

Elon Musk is also building his own charging network. And soon, restaurant owners are going to realize that having such a charging station, or stations, will bring them a lot more business.

As far as the grid goes, we need to replace it in any case. It is ancient, wastes too much energy, and vulnable to hostile acts.

Plugin parking spaces are popping up around San Fran as well.

I heard the answer to the charging issue is eventually to drive into a station and just swap out batteries. That's a long time coming, no doubt.

Why not build a couple of charging stations at each gas station?

 

[tyroneweaver]

So one success out of how many failures?

How much money has Obama wasted with this program? How much of that money has done nothing but line the pockets of his contributors?

Must be pretty shitty living the life of a conservative, never trying because they equate failure with failure, ignoring the fact that if you never fail, you will never succeed, and that there is no success without failure.

If we followed the conservative mindset, avoid failure at all costs, we'd have never had any innovation or discovery at all.

"If at first you don't succeed, quit and never try it again."

when are you going to learn that steers can't reproduce

 

[tyroneweaver]

It has supercar body, interior, and performance....I'm still pissed Pub pundits ruined the Volt and Fisker. Pub dupes!

ya dang pubs refused to buy a piece of shit car