Category Archives: Tesla

News and reviews of Tesla electric cars (including plug-in hybrids).

How do we jam the roads with Teslas by 2030? Just ask Norway

June 1, 2016Electric Cars, Energy and Climate Change, Model 3, News, Reviews and Comment, Oil, Sales, TeslaTrevor Larkum

Last week, I explained a dismaying reality for planet-savers everywhere: Not even mega-blowout sales for Tesla’s new Model 3 sedan are enough to substantially green and decarbonize our global transportation system. There are simply too many cars on the road and too many new cars sold each year — the vast majority of which run on gasoline, not electricity, and will for some time.

What this means is that we’re probably now at the beginning of a gradual, rather than rapid, electrification of the transportation sector. Yeah, it’ll help out when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions — especially as the electricity that powers Teslas and other electric cars also becomes greener — but it probably won’t do so fast enough to save us in the critical two decades or more when all the big decisions about the planet’s future need to be made.

So how is it possible to scale up faster? Well, one answer may come by looking at the example of a country that has already done just that: Norway, where electric vehicles were fully 18 percent of new cars sold last year.

In a new paper in Applied Energy, Måns Nilsson of the Stockholm Environment Institute and Björn Nykvist of the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm examine the policy moves that made this kind of high growth possible, using Norway and several other examples from around the world to drive their analysis.

The gist? You essentially need two things — public policies that address the current higher cost of these vehicles (through tax breaks or rebates) until those costs decline, and then other public policies that do something else: Get past people’s psychological blocks when it comes to driving electric vehicles. That’s a very big issue when people are used to pumping gas rather than charging, and so develop ‘range anxiety’ — the fear that their EV will run out of juice far from a recharging station.

“When you start to change some of the economic incentives, you get the first movers,” says Nilsson. “But then what we have seen is this norm change, that it’s like a cultural shift in certain pockets, typically certain communities, it could be certain suburbs, certain cities, where the electric car becomes the norm.”

A semi-autonomous road trip in the Tesla Model S

May 16, 2016Autonomous Driving, Electric Cars, Model S, News, Reviews and Comment, TeslaTrevor Larkum

How I learned to love Autopilot

Tesla Model S (Image: A. Souppouris/Engadget)

Perhaps the worst driving experience of my life happened in 2009 while helping a friend move. She could only afford to rent a rusty van for a single day, so I agreed to make the 14-hour round trip from London to Scotland and back again in one shot. After setting off at 9 AM, we arrived at 7 PM, some four hours behind schedule, thanks to bad traffic. I started the 450-mile home leg at around 9 PM, and the entire journey was a battle to stay awake, alert and within the confines of my lane. Plenty of coffee and roadside breaks later, I arrived home at 6 AM, 21 hours after setting off. It was the most unsafe I’ve ever felt in a car.

When Tesla offered us the opportunity to test out its semi-autonomous Autopilot feature in the Model S, my thoughts immediately went to Scotland and that traumatic journey. While I’m never going to trade my VW Golf for a car that expensive, the new Model 3 will arrive at $35,000 with many of the same capabilities. So I saw the opportunity to take an extremely early Model 3 test drive, of sorts. I wanted to know if it could make a cross-country journey on electric power, and see if the Autopilot would have made that long trip to Scotland a little less arduous.

The conceit

To test this theory, we would drive up to the north of England — Scotland just wasn’t practical given the time constraints we were under. We’d then stretch out the process with some video and photo shoots, before heading home hopefully somewhat exhausted. On the trip back to London, we’d then make use of the autonomous features — about 90 percent of the journey back could be driven by the Tesla, with limited human oversight.

My colleague Matt Brian picked up the Model S — a $120,000 (£110,250) P90D, to be precise — from Hounslow, on the outskirts of London. From there we’d take the M25 freeway, which encircles London, before setting off on the M1, the main road heading north. We chose Leeds, a city around four hours away in the north of England, as our destination. Because the Tesla is electric, though, we’d need a charger to get us there. Or at least back.

‘I Drive Electric Because I Love My Children More Than You Do’

May 15, 2016Blog, BMW, Electric Cars, Energy and Climate Change, Model 3, Nissan, Pollution, Tesla, VolkswagenTrevor Larkum

I am the CTO of a company supporting the oil and gas industry, and also the CEO of a start-up (FuelIncluded.com) promoting the adoption of electric cars. Clearly, from at least one perspective, these industries are in direct competition. However I prefer to see them as complementary: the tension between these industries is an example of the many energy transitions we are starting to experience as a society as we move from fossil fuels to renewables, and from pollution to clean air. Having a foot in each camp gives me, I think, an interesting and exciting position from which to watch things unfold, and, to an extent, to promote a much needed change.

Smog in New York City (Image: Public Domain/Wikipedia)

Naturally I’m a big fan of electric cars. I’ve owned one for nearly 3 years and have driven it more than 40,000 miles in that time. It charges at home either from my own solar panels or from our renewable energy supply. It charges on the motorway/freeway at Ecotricity rapid chargers which also have a renewable supply. I’m clearly sympathetic to the view that we should all be driving electric vehicles for the sake of public health and our future climate, never mind peak oil.

However, I was still shocked to receive a retweet on my Twitter feed this week that seemed to go beyond the usual debate on the pros and cons of electric cars. It showed a bumper sticker that said:

“I Drive Electric Because I Love My Children More Than You Do”

It was a bit of a shock to read so I read it again. I then moved on, meaning not to give it another thought. However, since then I’ve found myself reflecting on it. It bothered me, enough for me to want to put my thoughts on paper.

I’ve concluded that there are two issues here that caught my attention – the message itself, and the way the message was communicated.

The Message

I have a lot of sympathy with the message, …

Electric Car Registrations In The UK Hit Record High Of One Every 13 Minutes

May 10, 2016Electric Cars, Model 3, News, Reviews and Comment, Sales, TeslaTrevor Larkum

There’s never been a better time to go electric…

Tesla Model 3 at launch (Image: K. Field/CC)

Electric cars are here to stay. Don’t take our word for it though, take the word of the British public, who have since the start of 2016 been registering a new electric vehicle every 13 minutes.

Those figures come courtesy of Go Ultra Low, a government-led organisation that looks to support the growth of EVs in the UK.

Thanks to huge improvements in the UK’s electric infrastructure and advances in technology EVs are now no longer considered the choice of the early adopter.

According to Go Ultra Low this has been a record quarter for EVs in the UK with 10,496 new cars hitting UK roads since the start of this year.

How does this compare to last year? Well it’s a 23 per cent increase over last year’s performance.

With new affordable purely electric vehicles being announced such as the Tesla Model 3, the government hopes to smash those results in 2017.

The Model 3 is unsurprisingly at the forefront of this discussion thanks to the quarter of a million pre-orders that Tesla received when it unveiled the car.

That, combined with Tesla’s promise to double the number of dedicated charging points means that there should be a strong enough infrastructure in place to remove ‘range anxiety’ when the car launches early 2017.

Source: Huffington Post

Why Would You Power A Clean Electric Car With Dirty Energy?

May 1, 2016Electric Cars, Energy and Climate Change, Opinion, Pollution, Solar Power, Tesla, Wind PowerTrevor Larkum

Buying a Tesla might lead to greener choices elsewhere

Red Tesla Model S (Image: T. Larkum) — You’ll want to know how the electricity is produced, right? (Image: T. Larkum)

NEW YORK — It’s one thing to get people to care about the price of energy. It’s quite another challenge to get them to care about the source of energy and its environmental impact.

But buying an electric car — presumably, in part, to reduce one’s carbon footprint — may push people to think about where the electricity to power that vehicle comes from, according to one early investor in Tesla Motors.

“The electric vehicle is like a Trojan horse for energy literacy,”

Nancy Pfund, managing partner at the venture capital firm DBL Partners, said during a panel discussion at the Bloomberg New Energy Finance Summit in Manhattan on Monday morning.

Pfund said she noticed the possible linkage a decade ago, when DBL first invested in Tesla, which sells luxury electric cars, and its sister company, SolarCity, which markets solar power systems. Both are chaired by billionaire Elon Musk.

“In the early days of Tesla, early adopters would buy the Roadster or the Model S, and weeks later we’d see an uptick in solar adopters,” she told The Huffington Post in an interview. “They’re really examples of the connection between transportation and the green electrical grid.”

The idea is that no one wants to go greener by buying a battery-powered electric vehicle only to charge it with electricity generated from burning coal or gas.

Most Americans buy electricity from utility companies that produce energy by burning fossil fuels or generate power from water flow, wind turbines or solar panels. A small but growing number of people generate power from rooftop solar panels or backyard wind turbines and then sell any excess energy to the utility companies. To really go green, people need batteries to store their own clean energy for later use.

If purchasing an electric car focuses the buyer on other ways to access cleaner energy and use it in lower quantities, that can work to improve the whole system.

“Anytime you get people to be more literate and understand where something is coming from, they have a voice,” Pfund added. “And a more engaged and vocal population will demand more energy choices.”

The Electric Car Goes Big

April 25, 2016Electric Cars, Model 3, Opinion, TeslaTrevor Larkum

[6 April] This past week was unprecedented in the history of the automobile. Tesla Motors began accepting orders on the Model 3. In three days, they took some 300,000 reservations for the car, each with a $1,000 deposit.

If they all come through, that equates to over $10 billion in sales–in three days. For perspective, the Toyota Camry, the best-selling car in the country, sold about 430,000 units for all of 2015. Thousands stood in line for hours at Tesla stores around the world, including more than a few of us at Plug In America.

Photo Credit:Leslie R in San Diego waits in hours-long line to pre-order the Tesla Model 3. Tesla Motors received more than 250,000 pre-orders within 72 hours of the vehicle’s unveiling — Photo Credit:Leslie R in San Diego waits in hours-long line to pre-order the Tesla Model 3. Tesla Motors received more than 250,000 pre-orders within 72
hours of the vehicle’s unveiling

This feat was a tremendous accomplishment for Tesla and a tribute to the enormous power of the brand that Elon Musk and his team have built. But it was also an indicator of the excitement around the electric car, the sense that it is going mainstream, and an early indicator of the market transformation that we believe is coming.

Studies have suggested that a battery range of 200 miles is about the point where most people stop worrying about range and demand moves from early adopters into the broader market. The opening of reservations for the Tesla Model 3 has been the first true test of what the demand might be for a moderately priced car with a 200 mile range. In fact, demand turns out to be vastly larger than anyone had previously imagined.

While certainly a great success for Tesla, this incredible sales event should also give comfort to Carlos Ghosn of Nissan, Mary Barra of General Motors, and other automakers who are boldly investing billions of dollars into building the new generation of 200 mile range electric vehicles–and wondering whether the demand for the cars is really there. Well, it’s there. It turns out that this is a very big sandbox and there is plenty of room for everyone to play.

The fact that Tesla uncovered such extraordinary demand for a vehicle that is still years from delivery suggests that there is plenty of room for others to succeed as well. People have diverse needs and lifestyles. Just as there are many different gasoline cars that are successful in meeting the varying needs of a variety of consumers, there is every reason to believe that there will be a number of successful electric vehicles meeting various needs in this newly developing market, driven by the biggest change in automobile technology since the Model T.

Source: Plugin America

Reserving a Tesla Model 3

April 20, 2016Blog, Electric Cars, Model 3, TeslaTrevor Larkum

3 April 2016: I love driving my Renault ZOE, even after two and a half years and forty thousand miles. However I am interested and excited by the electric car developments coming from other manufacturers – particularly Tesla.

The Tesla stand in the Touchwood shopping centre, Solihull (Image: T. Larkum)

I’ve been following the travails of Tesla, and stocking up on their shares, since early 2012. I knew that the Roadster and Model S/X were not suitable for our family, not just in terms of excessive price, but also size. However the long promised Model 3 seemed like it could fit the bill.

When I learned a few months back that there would be a reservation list for the Model 3 and that it would open on 31^st March, I marked the date in my calendar. Come the day before, last Wednesday, I rang the nearest Tesla showroom, in Solihull. I asked about reservations and understood that I just needed to call the next day from 8am.

However multiple calls first thing the next day only got as far as an answerphone. Later in the morning I got a call back from a Tesla representative to say that reservations were only being taken in store ahead of the official time of the launch (the next day in the UK).

Registering for my Tesla Model 3 (Image: T. Larkum)

To cut the story short, I was soon in the car and heading out from the Fuel Included office in Milton Keynes towards Solihull. I met up with a friend at Northampton and by mid-afternoon we were hunting for the Tesla showroom. Unlike the large out-of-town Tesla building I had previously visited in Weybridge, it turned out to be a small gallery shop in the local Touchwood shopping centre. In fact, the shop itself is still being refitted so the outlet is currently just a stand in the middle of one of the centre ‘boulevards’.

Tesla Model 3 (Image: Green Car Reports)

The reservation process itself was simple – I entered my contact details, then payment details, into a web browser, clicked a button, and an acknowledgement came up a moment later to say I had a reservation for a Model 3. That was it; a few minutes later we were heading home, having become two of the couple of hundred thousand new Tesla customers.

US Update: Report from the Tesla Model 3 trenches: lines, camaraderie, deposits

Tesla Motors’ Elon Musk just killed the petrol car

April 16, 2016Electric Cars, Model 3, Opinion, Sales, TeslaTrevor Larkum

“Adios gas-powered cars.”

[4 April 2016] That was the reaction of Barclays analyst Brian Johnston over the weekend to news that Tesla Motors had received orders for nearly 200,000 of its Model 3 electric vehicle in less than two days.

By nightfall on Saturday, that order tally had jumped to 276,000. That’s more than $US280 million in zero-cost capital to Tesla, from the $US1,000, $A1,500 and €1,000 deposits, and total orders for more than $A13 billion of electric vehicles.

It is – by a long shot – the fastest growing customer order book in the history of the automobile industry. And for a car that will not even enter production for 18 months, and has a price tag of $US35,000.

Barclay’s Johnston says the huge order numbers – more than the monthly sales of General Motors – suggests the tide is turning away from the internal combustion engine. Other analysts agreed.

“Tesla has changed the game again,”

said Andrea James, an analyst with Dougherty & Co. Alliance Bernstein’s Mark Jones also called it a “game changer”, and so too did Evercore ISI analyst George Galliers.

“To us the vehicle is ‘the game changer’ and will likely play a critical role in Elon Musk’s desire to expedite the auto industry’s transition from internal combustion engine to electric,”

Galliers wrote in a client’s note.

It’s hard not to agree with Johnston and the other analysts. There could have been no greater demonstration of the latent demand for electric vehicles than the response to the Model 3.

This is not just a Tesla thing, as alluring as the brand might be. It is a sign, noted Johnston and the other analysts, that the days of the internal combustion engine are numbered. Some say it may be over by 2025.

Musk has not played a lone hand in this. The German automaker VW managed to kill the future of the diesel car when it was forced to admit that its emissions claims were completely bogus – a development that forced it and other car makers to throw all their efforts into electric vehicles.

Tesla unveils Model 3

April 10, 2016Electric Cars, Model 3, News, Reviews and Comment, TeslaTrevor Larkum

Tesla has unveiled its highly anticipated Model 3 at a launch event in California overnight, with the new entry level model set to start at $35,000 (£24,000) when it goes on sale at the end of 2017.

The affordable model 3 is expected to shake up the established compact executive market

Pitched against the likes of BMW’s 3 Series, the Audi A4, Jaguar’s XE and the Mercedes C Class, Tesla’s most affordable model is predicted to shake up the market when it arrives next year.

One of the most important elements of the Model 3 is its range, with the all-electric model quoted at offering a minimum 215 miles per charge thanks to Tesla’s use of advanced lithium ion batteries. Performance is expected to be brisk with a 0-60mph time of less than six seconds – slow for a Tesla but faster than most cars on the road, which is testament to Tesla’s quickly established reputation for speed.

The Tesla Model 3 arrives with 215 miles of range

And Tesla claims there are 115,000 preorders, which is madness.

After a long wait, Tesla has finally unveiled the Model 3. It’s what we were expecting (and hoping for) – a less-expensive, versatile, attractive five-seater with decent range and a low price. It rounds out Tesla’s revised Secret Master Plan, as Elon Musk cheekily called it, that started with the Roadster, progressed to the Model S, and grew to encompass the Model X.

That’s all fine, but did you catch how many preorders Musk said the company had received for the Model 3 by this evening? 115,000 – a staggering number. If you’ll remember, each reservation to purchase a Model 3 requires a $1,000 (refundable) deposit.

Here’s the other stuff you should really know about Tesla’s entry-level electric vehicle. For one, Musk promises it’ll ace every safety test category. All will be standard with Autopilot hardware (autonomous driving functionality) and Supercharging (very fast recharging) capability.

It’ll also seat five real adults in comfort, as Tesla has squashed the instrument panel a bit and moved the front seats forward to clear rear legroom. To give a sense of airiness to the cabin, and also to gain some extra headroom, it’ll have a roof made of two large panes of glass, with the windshield meeting the backlight just above the A-pillar. Neat. In case you surf, it’ll swallow a 7-foot surfboard, apparently.