Its not some big conspiracy, its that every single person uses battery operated devices every day and we all know that they suck balls. I dont care what people say about "lithium ion batteries not having memory" or whatever it is they say, because both my cell phone and laptop use that type of battery and both get maybe a little more than half the battery life they originally did.

With all the batteries that the Tesla has, and for $80,000, did anyone else notice that the "250 Mile Range" is "by EPA highway driving cycle"? That means that theres no air resistance (they test on a dynamometer), they dont use air conditioning, theres no stop and go traffic, it never goes faster than 60mph, and is tested at an average highway speed of 48mph. If the car had a realistic range of 180 miles I would be pleasantly surprised. And then you have to charge it.

Which is besides that the electrical grids are rarely well built enough to support our air conditioning needs, i dont want to think about what would happen if everyone started fueling their cars off the grid too. You also cant ignore that in most places, grid electricity is made from coal, which actually burns significantly dirtier than gasoline.

The bottom line is that for electric cars to be fully adopted we would need billions of dollars in new electrical infrastructure, tens of billions of dollars of investment into renewable or nuclear energy sources to power that infrastructure, and then unless there has been some major breakthrough in battery technology by then, hydrogen might still be better because a car would never lose range because the batteries are crapping out, it would probably have a longer range, and refilling the tanks would take minutes instead of hours to recharge batteries.

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I spend some time in the UK and I think Brits are even far less likely than Americans to have access to an outlet to plug in their cars at night. That itself is a major limitation that EV fans always seem to ignore.

Nonetheless I don't think EV cars would be much a strain on the electrical infrastructure, considering they'd typically be charged at night and at best they'd only very gradually be rolled out. Think, hybrids are in about their 6th year and won't sell 150k vehicles this year out of an annual US market of nearly 17 million cars, I think. That's not much. The change at most would be very gradual, and FAR less a strain on utilities than plasma TVs. That concern is overrated.

HOWEVER, also a moot point. So long as EV's take several hours to fill up, people aren't going to buy them -- even if they do have a 200+ mile range.

That's just too wildly impractical, except perhaps as some small niche for rich people seeking attention. The market demands a car than can be refueled quickly and conveniently. That is a basic criterium for a car to be useful, and I don't understand why a lot of people don't get that. All market attempts so far utterly prove this; it's the Achilles heel of EVs.

Only answer I see is plug-in hybrids, which is not a bad answer.

BTW did you know a lot of Brits assume Ford is a UK company and have no idea it's American?

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The Tesla roadster is going to piggy back on developments in battery technologies from the laptop industry. The range may suck now, but battery performance is predicted to increase 100% in the next 2 years. Change that 250 mile range to a 500 mile range and we are talking about a car that a lot of people are going to want. I don't think it'll happen overnight, but in the next 10 years I predict that electric cars and plug in hybrids are going to start making up a much bigger share of the cars on the road.

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Tesla car is impresive. With my charger it could go to the moon and back umtin times.

If interedted? My eMail: josephjoev@aol.com

I am proud that I am of same oregin as Tesla.

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Wow! It just goes to show you that with a good PR department and gullible media writers, you can rule the world and rewrite history. Where does Ford get off saying that there was no interest for EVs? At the time Ford killed off the THiNK!, there was a 2+ month waitlist for them.

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What tesla and other ev's lack, that some backyard enthusiasts have managed, is a trailerable generator for extened trips.

I'd buy a telsa tomorrow if:
It cost 40K instead of 100K
If I could get to my weekend home 180 miles away without worring about making it.

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Coal burning is not significantly dirtier than gasoline. Power plants are far better equipped to handle particulate emissions than are our small gas engines. It's very efficient to have one large multi-million dollar installation producing power. It's done at much higher efficiencies, over 60%, than our gas engines which are only 15-20% efficient. Check out well to wheel emmissions for coal versus gasoline. Those take into account everything from mining coal to the wheel of the electric car, or pumping the oil to the wheel of the gas car. Electric cars spew far fewer particulates and CO2 than do gasoline cars. Think there's room or budget for a multi-million dollar smoke stack scrubber in a Toyota Camry? don't think so.

The more obvious answer is that elecricity production can and is being done by more cleaner methods; bio-mass, natural gas and even better, nuclear, hydro, wind, solar and geo-thermal. Gas is gas. It will always burn dirty and produce CO2. Electricity production will only evolve through innovation.

On hydrogen, that needs electricity to produce. So we still need to innovate with our powerplants.

I don't see why charging times are a problem with an electric car. Coming straight home and plugging in would take far less time (30 seconds) than getting off and on the freeway to fill up. Charging times and range will only improve. I'd love to avoid stopping at a gas station during the week. more time at home.

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I don't think it matters at all if an electric car has a range of 150 miles or 500 miles. The fact is that even an electric car with 60 miles of range can meet the needs of most American drivers for more than 90% of their needs.

The average commuter in California commutes less than 40 miles per day. If you plug the car in at night you have enough juice to last you for your daily driving needs and still account for the odd side trip. Since most of us have multiple cars in our household then we don't really need a second or commuting car that can drive across the country. It's these short daily trips in stop and go traffic that accounts for most of our gasoline use and pollution... not the long freeway trip.

Then again, seeing the number of households with multiple SUVs I would have to assume that a lot of people don't take a critical look at their real transportation needs.

I agree that Tesla is overstating the range of their new car. Of more concern is their statements about the reliability of their technology. Granted, electronics have come a long way since the EV1 was designed, but even GM had a lot of problems with that car and they had billions of dollars spent in development of the vehicle. GM also had a large and well-trained service network (Saturn dealers) in the states in which the cars were leased. I've heard nothing about how Tesla plans to offer their warranty service.

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