Posted on 02/22/2014 10:02:29 AM PST by mandaladon
So far the story of Tesla Motors has been about exciting electric luxury cars and an even higher performing stock. Next week it will reveal plans for a much less sexy innovation that is more important to the company's future than either of those things: A huge new lithium battery factory dubbed the "Gigafactory" by Tesla founder Elon Musk. The plant is the key Tesla needs in order to produce an "affordable" long-range electric car in substantial enough numbers to join the ranks of the major automakers. "It's the future of the company," said Craig Irwin, analyst with Wedbush Securities. "They need to cut the cost of the battery in half in order to make a half-million cars. This is how they are going to do it." The size of the plant will be massive. Musk predicted in November that it would have a capacity equal to all factories making lithium ion batteries around the globe. That includes lithium batteries going into Teslas as well as laptops, tablets and smart phones. Panasonic (PCRFF), currently Tesla's primary battery supplier, is likely to be a partner in the plant. Tesla (TSLA) has repeatedly said that it would already be selling more cars, and growing even faster, if it wasn't constrained by the limited supply of batteries. Tesla's goal has always been to sell a mass-market car priced in the $30,000 to $40,000 range that can travel long distances on only an electric charge. The Model S, Tesla's current car, can go more than 200 miles between charges but has a starting price of $69,000. Musk said the new plant will allow the company to meet its goal of releasing the mass-market car within three years.
(Excerpt) Read more at money.cnn.com ...
long-range electric car and all unicorns live in utopia.
So how much money is that “red state” going to give them?
Are taxpayers funding any of this (directly or indirectly)?
I’ll be amazed if the EPA allows a plant that processes massive amounts of a toxi metal anywhere under the regime. But then again, electric cars are favored by American Marxists, so it will probably be allowed.
Very ironic because in the 19th century during the so-called “War of The Currents” people like Edison pushed for DC power (related to batteries) and Nicola Tesla pushed for AC power (which is what basically won).
Heck, I was thinking we all should go and PROTEST the building of THIS plant.....
You have to wonder if the environmental costs of electric cars aren’t worse than the gasoline engine. Even if you recycle these batteries there have to be results that will eventually unnerve the enviro-wackos.
Count on it in one form or another not sure the amount feds will slip to them.
We’ve already paid. Just search Tesla Motors + A123 systems.
A123 systems is the company that taxpayers paid to keep open for some 2 years in Michigan despite the fact that they didn’t produce even 1 single solitary battery.
That was a double whammy for me since bit that and federal taxes paid into it.
That being the case...the eco-dementeds should be arrested and imprisoned for financial fraud.
Until they massively upgrade the power grid, at huge expense and time, it is only a pipe dream.
Refitting and redesigning the power grid will take decades and hundreds of billions of dollars and no one has started budgeting for it or building new power plants. To the contrary they are fighting any expansion.
BTW, wind and solar will not cut it.
Its a shell game. Move to one state and soak up as much money as possible. Then declare bankruptcy, sell at a bargain and reopen somewhere else.
Current thinking is solar and wind would get a huge boost from deployment of tens of millions of EVs. Everybody would charge them up during the day with solar and wind juice. At night, your car batteries would feed power into the grid.
Of course, these analyses tend to not ask the question “Why is my car dead this morning?”
Ping
A year or so back we had a day with planned intermittent power outages. The electric company said they were testing communications between electric cars and the grid for things like payment for electricity, alerting drivers to impending battery drain, LOJACK type services etc.
I don’t know about you but I damn sure don’t want a car keeping tabs on me.
Tesla qualified for the Obama tax rebate for electrical cars, about $9,000. But that was such a small portion of the overall Tesla price ($110,000) that it probably did more to sustain competitors than to help Tesla. IOW, Tesla probably would have been better off without the Obama administration’s interference, which, unlike GM, was never part of its business plan.
Tesla qualified for the Obama tax rebate for electrical cars, about $9,000. But that was such a small portion of the overall Tesla price ($110,000) that it probably did more to sustain competitors than to help Tesla. IOW, Tesla probably would have been better off without the Obama administration’s interference, which, unlike GM, was never part of its business plan.
A123 was partners with Fisker, not Tesla.
The long-range electric car is already a fact. Tesla already could be highly profitable with its current sales of super-high-end luxury cars. The would-be profits are being used to invest in a business plan 40 times larger, however.
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