Daily Archives: June 16, 2017

Electric Cars Are the Story Now, but Battery Power Is the Future for Tesla Inc.

June 16, 2017Electric Cars, Opinion, TeslaJo

You know Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) as a builder of electric cars. But that’s not necessarily what the company is about in the long run.

The electric car thing has become a temporary stop on a longer and much more ambitious journey, as Tesla’s mission has since expanded beyond just sustainable transportation. Tesla CEO Elon Musk wants to change the world, and that includes getting people used to replacing gas-powered vehicles with electric cars.

The Model X car is a good example of Tesla’s public image so far. .

Secrets and speculation?

This is not speculation on my part, or even a closely guarded secret. Musk laid out his master plan in some detail 11 years ago, and doubled down on the same theme last year.

In short, Tesla was always meant to develop and promote sustainable energy sources for everyone and everything. The expensive Tesla Roadster sports car only aimed at raining the capital to develop more affordable electric cars for a larger mass-market demographic — and even the Tesla Model S and Model X are just cash-generating stepping stones on the road to a clean-energy revolution.

Along the way, Musk is using Tesla’s capital platform and wide-ranging media reach to introduce and popularize other technologies for the good of humanity. Self-driving cars will make the road a safer place, while saving even more energy. Taking emotions and human error out of the driving experience can do both of those things.

Tesla’s early forays into electric vehicles and self-driving cars got the ball rolling. Now, Detroit and Japan are falling all over themselves to beat Tesla at its own game.

Consumer Reports Runs The Numbers On Tesla’s Solar Roof

June 16, 2017Energy and Climate Change, News, Reviews and Comment, Solar Power, TeslaJo

Consumer Reports, which six months ago was skeptical about the viability of Tesla’s Solar Roof product, has once again “done the math” using newly announced pricing estimations.

Tesla Solar Roof in Slate, Due for Release in 2018

According to CR, it’s not easy to weigh value of the offer, as company’s online calculator

“relies upon some important assumptions and predictions that delve deep into the economy of residential solar power in the U.S.”

In its first analysis, CR said that costs need to be below $24.50 per square foot to match costs of conventional roofs (including the cost of Powerwall batteries, but excluding solar incentives or rebates). A 3,000-square-foot Solar Roof would then cost $73,500.

Tesla announced an estimated cost at $21.85 per square foot, which would be $65,550 for the same example house.

After using Tesla calculator for example homes in New York, Texas and California and a 30 years period, CR found out that in some cases Tesla offers a good savings opportunity, although in other cases, it doesn’t look so good.

However, even if one’s first calculations seem tempting, CR advises to answer some questions before placing deposit.

Air pollution kills more people in the UK than in Sweden, US and Mexico

June 16, 2017UncategorizedJo

WHO figures show people in Britain are more likely to die from dirty air than those living in some other comparable countries

People in the UK are 64 times as likely to die of air pollution as those in Sweden and twice as likely as those in the US, figures from the World Health Organisation reveal.

Car exhaust pollution (Image: Wikipedia)

Britain, which has a mortality rate for air pollution of 25.7 for every 100,000 people, was also beaten by Brazil and Mexico – and it trailed far behind Sweden, the cleanest nation in the EU, with a rate of 0.4.

The US rate was 12.1 for every 100,000, Brazil’s was 15.8 and Mexico’s was 23.5, while Argentina was at 24.6.

The figures are revealed in the WHO World Health Statistics 2017 report, published on Wednesday, which says substantially reducing the number of deaths globally from air pollution is a key target.

The report reveals outdoor air pollution caused an estimated 3 million deaths worldwide, most of these in low- and middle-income countries.

Wealthy European nations had high levels of air pollution from fine particulate matter. The UK had an average of 12.4 micrograms of fine particulate pollutants (PM 2.5) for each cubic metre of air, which includes pollution from traffic, industry, oil and wood burning and power plants in urban areas. This is higher than the pollutant levels of 5.9 in Sweden, 9.9 in Spain and 12.6 in France. Germany had higher levels of particulate pollution than the UK at 14.4 and Poland’s was 25.4.

Dr Penny Woods, chief executive of the British Lung Foundation, said the report confirmed that deaths from air pollution were higher in the UK than many other comparable countries.

She said:

“It is deeply tragic that around 3 million lives are cut short worldwide because the air we breathe is dirty and polluted. In the UK, air pollution is a public health crisis hitting our most vulnerable the hardest – our children, people with a lung condition and the elderly.

“Yet, we are in the fortunate position of having the technology and resources to fix this problem. It’s time to use what we have to sort this problem out as a matter of urgency and clean up our filthy, poisonous air. The next government needs to bring in a new Clean Air Act to protect the nation’s lung health.”