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Tesla's range is either 220 or 325 miles, That's long enough for most routine drives, and enough to go from Seattle to Victoria and back, and there are superchargers along all the major highways for long-range driving (and in both Seattle and Victoria). And "having to charge up" just means pluggig in while you're doing whatever you went to Victoria to do - it takes less time to plug/unplug an EV to fill a gas tank, you just need to do something else for little while during charging, since you can safely leave your car - like eat lunch, go to the bathroom, etc. The only problem is that Superchargers keep getting faster, so now for me a charge during a long drive takes less time than breakfast/lunch/dinner. https://www.theverge.com/2019/... . The new Superchargers will get you 75 miles of range in 5 minutes, and a full charge in a half hour. Which isn't enough time for a relaxed "purge and fill" before getting back on the road.

Amusingly, in the early days gas cars had "range anxiety" because there was no such thing as a gas station people bought gasoline from random businesses that also sold gas, or carried cans of gas with them, while electricity could plug in anywhere that had power, and that was a reason that electric cars were more popular back then. https://www.greencarreports.co... . It took 50 years for gas stations to become ubiquitous. High speed EV chargers are already much more available than early gas stations, and are building out fast.

The myth that Li-ion batteries die after only a few years has been proven false so many times that it gets tired now.

https://www.engadget.com/2015/...
https://www.greencarreports.co...

The cradle to grave environmental impact of most lithium-ion batteries is small, especially if CO2 is your primary concern. See for example https://www.researchgate.net/publication/231269141_Batteries_from_Cradle_to_Grave. See also Bingbing Li, Jianyang Li, Chris Yuan's "Life Cycle Assessment of Lithium Ion Batteries with Silicon Nanowire Anode for Electric Vehicles" (which can be found easily online but which I can't link to because the Slashdot filter is unhappy with the very long URL). That's specifically for silicon nanowire anode batteries, which is a pretty common design. The numbers for most others aren't that far off. Note also that as battery recycling and reuse becomes more common, and economies of scale ramp up further, the footprints in terms of CO2 and other pollutants will continue to decline.

This also doesn't make much sense as an issue in the context of Toyota since a hybrid requires a pretty decent size battery also. While previous batteries were nickel-metal hydride for the Prius, the newer ones use a hefty lithium ion battery also. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1120320_lithium-ion-vs-nickel-metal-hydride-toyota-still-likes-both-for-its-hybrids. If one thinks that batteries are a big problem, then it isn't clear why one would think hybrid cars are a good thing.

Teslas hold their value because Tesla guaranteed the buy-back price

That program was canceled in 2016.
https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1105062_tesla-cancels-guaranteed-price-buyback-program-for-electric-cars

Tesla's competing offering, the Model X, is almost 50% more expensive

1) No, it's not. And it doesn't bundle basic tech features into a separate options package.

2) This is after Tesla eliminated the much (nearly $20k) cheaper 75D, leaving only the high margin 100D and the very high margin P100D (the difference in cell costs between a 75D and a $100D is only ~$5k or so).

3) E-Tron isn't even close to the size of Model X. The rear-seats-down internal space is literally 50% larger in the X than the E-Tron. E-Tron has less boot space than even a Model S. Its internal space is roughly a "slightly taller Model 3".

Sure, it may accelerate to 100 km/h a bit quicker

"A bit"? A 66k EUR M3P will do 0-100 in literally half the time. The slowest vehicle Tesla sells in Europe does it in 73% the time.

6,6 seconds and 200kph top speed is totally unacceptable at that price point. Particularly in Germany.

On the other hand, the Audi will probably be much more reliable, be more enjoyable to drive, have a much nicer interior

Yes, that's totally why Tesla scores several ranks 14% higher than Audi (90% vs. 76%) in consumer satisfaction, huh?

while subjective, I think most people will agree it looks a lot better too

Lol.

I am willing to bet it will go round corners faster too

Heavier & higher = Nope. Heck, it's even heavier (although not higher) than a far-larger Model X.

and I am fairly certain it doesn't share Tesla's arbitrary, remotely enforceable limit on the number of times maximum acceleration is attempted.

You're confusing Ludicrious Mode launches (P100D models only) with regular acceleration. Do you really want to compare performance to a P100D? And secondly, that limit hasn't been in place for a year and a half.

There is another way in which you are ignorant. You claim that EVs don't have sufficient range for commuting for most drivers, yet, here is a study that shows that EVs can easily meet the requirements of 95% of all trips:
https://www.greencarreports.co...

As for life of the batteries, life depends on usage (charge to 100%?), and chemistry. Actual studies on real Tesla batteries show a much longer typical life:
https://cleantechnica.com/2018...

Or how about this one:
https://www.teslarati.com/tesl...

I dare say you haven't considered all this and I'd bet you don't own an EV and have any experience with them either. But I'm the ignorant one? Yea right.

Yes, you are the ignorant one. We have not one, but two EVs in my household: a Model 3 and a Leaf.

after, say, five years, by which time all the cells will have had to be replaced at least once.

Citation needed.

Actual data collected from Tesla car owners shows that the battery packs still have over 90% capacity after 220000 km (160000 miles).

https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1110149_tesla-model-s-battery-life-what-the-data-show-so-far

Do you have some reason to think that a land-based installation will lose capacity much faster? Seems like land-based should be better than car-based as you don't need to worry about weight.

P.S. When the Prius first came out, I heard this claim that the car would be insanely expensive because the battery pack would wear out and need to be replaced at huge cost. I sure see a lot of taxi services using Prius cars, so I'm assuming that in actual use a Prius is not insanely expensive. Taxi services won't use a car that costs too much.

According to this, a Prius battery pack will last at least 10 years and isn't expensive to replace:

https://www.torquenews.com/1083/can-toyota-prius-battery-last-250000-miles

You don't manufacture the most WindBourne, why the constant lies? https://www.forbes.com/sites/b... https://www.greencarreports.co...

I've had to replace the battery in my Honda Insight 3 times in 180,000 miles (I eventually jury-rigged the car to run on 12 volt without hybrid assist). They simply are not lasting as long as promised.

> Leaf batteries have proven to be good for 350k km+.

No they have not. In fact Nissan *bought back* many Leafs due to their batteries not lasting as long as promised. I'm kinda surprised you never heard of this issue:

Note this is just article of many. I don't have time or room to list all ~100 of them: https://www.greencarreports.co...

Prius is not an electric car, you fucking idiot.

The Prius Prime (aka "Plug-in Prius") is.

It has an internal combustion back-up for long trips, but unless you do long road trips, it's pure electric.

Hasn't it been known for some time that most CO2 is produced during a vehical's manufacturing rather than during use

Except that's not correct. The average car emits six tons of carbon dioxide per year. A medium-sized car produces 17 tons of carbon dioxide in manufacturing. That is not negligible! But once you've kept your car for three years, then no, more carbon dioxide is produced in driving the car than in making the car.

and the most low carbon approach is to keep trying the same vehicle for as long as possible rather than buying a new electric car.

Maybe. This site https://www.greencarreports.co... says not, but it depends on how you analyze the numbers.

Tesla never claimed that the NHTSA gave them higher than five stars. T

LOL. Never? As in never-never? As in really-really-never?

What is this story about then?

https://www.greencarreports.co...

Why do you paid musk shills never stop lying?

They claimed that the NHTSA data shows

Which is also a lie - the NHTSA clarification says its data doesn't show what Tesla says it shows. Hence, when someone says which is a fact, they're also wrong. Or, as in your case, lying.

Tesla never claimed that the NHTSA gave them higher than five stars.

Why do you shills have to lie?

Jesus, I can't believe I'm falling for a piece of shit troll. Thanks a lot, now I'm wasting my time going through your bullshit.
Fine. FINE.
Here's a report of a Nissan Leaf catching fire.
Mitsubishi has had problems with their Lithium Ion batteries overheating, it resulted in a temporary halting of the production of the model.
Apparently the Dodge Ram had a hybrid for awhile (who knew?). They were designed to have a reverse power flow, so vehicles plugged in could power a building in the case of a power outage, but the battery packs overheated again.
GM redesigned the Chevrolet Volt to reduce the chance of fires in an accident.
There are a number of incidents with a bunch of smaller EV manufacturers outside of the US as well.

No it's true, at least it was for the last complete year (2017): https://www.greencarreports.co...

Note that passenger cars only, not including commercial vehicles like busses and trucks that BYD also makes.

It will be interesting to see what happens this year, but if you look at the historic numbers BYD is ramping up sales fast so it will probably be close.

Really.

Google has both the Hyundai Ioniq and the Kia Soul EV at 124 and 110 miles of range, or less than half of the not-yet-existing standard range Model 3, and a little over a third of the shipping for 6-months Model 3 long range.

Yeah, Hyundai has also "announced" the Kona EV with a 250 mile range, but there's exactly as many of those on the road as Model 3 standard range: zero.

So how is around 50% "similar" ? Or is it that they are similarly not available anywhere except a web site?

The Kona is smaller than the Leaf and Niro. The battery is much larger than the current model Leaf (40kWh, around 37kWh usable) and the M3 SR (50kWh, around 47kWh usable). It's 68kWh, with 64kWh usable

You apparently don't realize that the Kona comes in two versions: a 39,4 kWh base version and a 64 kWh upgraded version. It's important for you to know this for when you parse news about the Kona. The base version, beyond being underequipped, is also woefully underpowered - we're talking 1980s-1990s level acceleration.

So 25% larger than the M3 SR

But higher drag, since it's built on a not-nearly-as-streamlined ICE platform. Higher drag = longer charge times from a given power charging source (and it can't charge at as high powers to begin with, and most of its available chargers are low power) and shorter range. This can be seen in its WLTP range of 292 miles. WLTP range figures are about 15% more optimistic than EPA range figures (see the Leaf for an example), which corresponds to an EPA range of around 249 miles. And indeed, Hyundai is now saying that they expect it to be rated at around 250 miles.

Remember that we're talking about the large-pack upgraded Kona here, not the base Kona.

Realistic range is just shy of 300 miles

I really hate to disappoint you, but be disappointed. You want more "real-world range" than even WLTP, which is more optimistic than EPA, which is in turn more optimistic than the real world.

Hyundai EVs seem to be very efficient - the Ioniq certainly is

Because it's a small, quite streamlined sedan. It has nothing to do with any sort of internal magic tricks. The Ioniq Hybrid - aka, gasoline powered - gets 58mpg. In Europe it's rated at 4,1L/100km, vastly superior to the Kona. Now, it's a hybrid, but nonetheless, it's a very efficient car by virtue of its size and shape. Not its drivetrain. There simply is not much room for differentiation on DC motor/li-ion drivetrains by efficiency, because they're already so efficient.

Charging network obviously depends where you live. In parts of Europe it's better than the Tesla one, if there even is a Tesla network because they don't cover all EU countries

In no place where Supercharging exists (aka west of a line from Warsaw to Sarajevo) is it "better than the Tesla one". It's a mishmash of networks (some of which require membership), mostly 50kW/~43kW in practice (vs. 120kW/117kW in practice), often poorly maintained (yes, I watch people complain about dead CCS/CHAdeMO chargers frequently on our local FB EV group, and you can go through randomly selected CCS chargers around the world on Plugshare and for about 1 in 10 the last report shows it as being down), poorly spaced (high concentrations in some areas, low in others), often only one or two at a site (arrive and it's taken or blocked? Good luck!), etc, etc, etc. You seriously can't be saying with a straight face that it's comparable.

Charging speeds are rated for 100kW, the Ioniq has been seen doing around 80kW peak with a smaller battery so the Kona is actually very likely to be faster than the M3 SR which most people think will be around 70-80kW.

Where are you getting this stuff? Hyundai literally gives a charge rate on 100kW: 54 minutes to 80%. That's 220 mph. Less than half what Model 3s are getting today. But Model 3 charge rates are currently limited by the charger for the first half of the charge, not the battery pack (which is why V3 comes out later this year). Yes, the battery pack in the SR is 2/3rds that of the LR. But since the LR doesn't saturate at 120kW until 50% SoC (curve suggests a charger-unlimited max around 200kW), t

With the Tesla... There's a Supercharger site not far from the BMW dealership... It's just a couple thousand feet off the highway, and there are 8 stations. I can't tell with PlugShare how many of the chargers are occupied

You can view that within the car - Tesla unlocks real-time Supercharger occupancy data on vehicle map. Not sure how accurate it is, just got back from our first road trip in a Tesla and on the way back to Houston the Nacogdoches Supercharger showed 5 of 8 stalls in use, but only one spot was occupied - and it was ICED at that.

Maybe its just the economy 3-wheel car concept that is destined to fail though. Before Elio there was Aptera. See: https://www.greencarreports.co...

And before Aptera there was the Corbin Sparrow.

Three-wheeled vehicles are inherently stupid, because they are inherently unstable. If you lose a tire, your vehicle becomes difficult to control. If you lose a wheel, the vehicle becomes completely uncontrollable. This is something that actually happens in the really real world, so it's irresponsible not to plan for it.

I used to have a Ford truck with a rear track literally inches narrower in the rear. Even that was annoying. Now imagine trying to dodge potholes with a third wheel in the center of the vehicle. GLWT!

a) Apple is one of the most valuable companies in the world.

b) Tesla's cars simply don't wear out like mechanical cars do.

https://www.greencarreports.co...

c) Stick to your horse and cart if you want. Elon Musk won't lose any sleep over it.

Nobody replaces the batteries in these cars. A Prius battery is $7500 and by the time you need to replace the battery the car is already ready for a trade in.

Why do people still think hybrid and EV batteries need frequent replacement? This isn't the junk cellphone they bought that won't last a hour after 2 years of use. Prius are frequently used as taxis with 300,000 miles on them. Consumer reports tested a 2003 215,000 mile Prius and found the battery capacity barely diminished. Even if somehow the battery is dead, Toyota MSRP for a replacement battery is $3,600 but there's a $1,300 refund for the old battery so you're really only paying $2,300. That's not bad. https://www.greencarreports.co...

Most carmakers are switching to EV and Hybrid options,

Literally every volume automaker, in fact, and many of the smaller ones.

while Toyota still thinks hydrogen is going to be the next big thing, for some reason.

Toyota, Honda, and GM are all banking on the USA MIC's adoption of hydrogen (for "clean" war machines, which are also quiet and which produce clean drinking water which is of immense value in desert warfare, hint hint) to make hydrogen viable for passenger vehicles — at least in certain specific markets which include the United States and Japan. However, as you probably know, it remains barely viable even in the primary test market, and I don't actually accept the premise (but it's what I took away from some web show, probably Autoline, where they spoke with someone from GM about the Colorado ZH2.)

Why not believe that military use of H2 will leak down (up?) to the consumer, so to speak? Because it will be made on-demand. It's not like gasoline and diesel fuel, which require massive refineries to do efficiently and relatively safely — and there are refinery failures of varying severity on a frequent basis. It can be done on basically any scale, but what it can't be is efficient when done by electrolysis. Many have claimed to have discovered ways to get water to separate more cheaply, and none of those ways have panned out. The military doesn't tend to care how much of our money they spend, and they also feel free to use nuclear reactors, so they can produce basically as much H2 as they want. The rest of us are not so lucky.

Most carmakers are switching to EV and Hybrid options,

Literally every volume automaker, in fact, and many of the smaller ones.

while Toyota still thinks hydrogen is going to be the next big thing, for some reason.

Toyota, Honda, and GM are all banking on the USA MIC's adoption of hydrogen (for "clean" war machines, which are also quiet and which produce clean drinking water which is of immense value in desert warfare, hint hint) to make hydrogen viable for passenger vehicles — at least in certain specific markets which include the United States and Japan. However, as you probably know, it remains barely viable even in the primary test market, and I don't actually accept the premise (but it's what I took away from some web show, probably Autoline, where they spoke with someone from GM about the Colorado ZH2.)

Why not believe that military use of H2 will leak down (up?) to the consumer, so to speak? Because it will be made on-demand. It's not like gasoline and diesel fuel, which require massive refineries to do efficiently and relatively safely — and there are refinery failures of varying severity on a frequent basis. It can be done on basically any scale, but what it can't be is efficient when done by electrolysis. Many have claimed to have discovered ways to get water to separate more cheaply, and none of those ways have panned out. The military doesn't tend to care how much of our money they spend, and they also feel free to use nuclear reactors, so they can produce basically as much H2 as they want. The rest of us are not so lucky.

No,you can NOT power America 100% from yellowstone. That has been shown through multiple studies.
BOTH MIT and NASA say that if develop ALL of the geo-thermal available by 2050, we could power about 1/3 to 1/2 of America. And that would be the destruction of yellowstone as well.
Here is a forbes article that you likely read, but read wrong. The problem with this is that it speaks of powering the earth twice over, but for only a short time.
And here
And here is MIT

One item missing out of BOTH NASA and MIT report, is that with magma that close, combined with heated water, it will be carrying LOTS of minerals. That is lots of minerals that can be mined. In fact, by adding various additives to the injected water, it should be possible to grab different types of minerals and then later pull them out.

Like nuclear SMRs, this is such a missed opportunity for America.

Currently they are ramping up to 2500 per week. They are shipping a whole battery assembly line from Germany to make 5000 per week happen by Q2.

https://www.greencarreports.co...

Nor is a Model S a sports car. For that you have to look at something like the Audo R8 e-tron. And that is quite a different experience from a Model S.

https://www.greencarreports.co...

The range extender is fed by a tiny 2.4 gallon tank, so only adds a bit more than 60 miles. Realistically it'll be closer to 40-50 miles since you're not going to want to drive into the gas station on fumes. The reason for this CARB (California Air Resources Board). They set the rules for what defines an EV. For an EV to be linked to a gas engine, the engine cannot drive the wheels directly (it has to drive a generator), and it cannot have more range on gas than on battery. The original i3 had a minimum electric range of 80 miles, so the fuel tank on the i3 with range extender is sized to prevent it from exceeding that range on gasoline.

If the range extender had provided more range, CARB would classify the i3 as a PHEV - partial hybrid electric vehicle, or what's more commonly referred to as a plug-in hybrid. That eliminates it from qualifying for full ZEV credits. Since those credits were the whole reason BMW made the i3, you're stuck with a 2.4 gallon tank.

Toyota is staying with hydrogen according to the most recent article I could find on the matter (April 2017).

Maybe you are thinking of Daimler? Although you should really read the whole article I linked to, in order to understand what Daimler is saying.

I can see some short term support going to all electric cars because of Tesla worrying other car makers. But long term physical reality dictates the end game, and all car makers know it.

There will always be all-electric cars mind you, they just will not be in the majority.

But for the electric motors. https://www.greencarreports.co...

However, the fuel cell stack is very expensive. It would be much cheaper and simpler just to add some more batteries to the vehicle. Fuel cells really make no sense in a normal car.

Honda and GM have a fuel cell partnership and while GM is only doing research projects, Honda has actually brought a product to market so that they can get the experience and grow the fueling network. The primary product of this partnership is a reduced-cost fuel cell stack which Honda claims will make FCVs profitable to sell. This change is literally coming in the next generation of FCV, so expect it within a decade.

That's great compare a gas guzzling SUV to a leaf... yea that's like coming a tank to a lambo in terms of speed.

Actually, one of my other three cars is a Porsche. The last two are a Toyota and a Mitsubishi Endeavor - the SUV. All have well over 100,000 miles, and all records are meticulously kept.

I spend $80~ in gas a month, in 5 years that only $4800~ which at that point your battery would dead of very very close to it based on the miles put on a car per year, factor that I drive 30,000 in 1 year.

Assuming that you paid a minimum of $2.00 per gallon in the U.S...$2.00x40Gal=$80 so you would use 40 Gal*12 months or 480 Gal to travel 30,000 Miles. 30,000 Miles/480 Gal = 62.5MPG.Either you get at least 62.5 miles per gallon or you are a troll. I will leave the reader to determine which is true.

Electric cars are great, but pretending they can beat the same types of cars that are fuel based is stupid, they are only better in one way, off the line torque! The rest of your advantages aren't advantages to all, You can't fix your car, you can't mod your car (to do anything useful, yes running apps on the dash wow cool but not) Electric cars are more fragile in the sense that the more electrically controlled components the weaker the overall system becomes, the more and more the car has to rely on a sensors and cameras the more things can and will go wrong with it. Tesla's have not been around for 10 years yet, show me the repair bill of a Tesla after 10~ years, if you think parts don't last forever, wait until you see what electronics last for.

There is only one real drawback to owning the Leaf - range. That is being remedied by the Chevy Bolt and Tesla Model 3. There are tons of advantages besides torque. One of the best is never having to be accosted by homeless people for money while filling up at a gas station.

The Leaf is not fragile in any respect. In fact, I just threw the snow tires on, while putting the Porsche up for the winter. As someone who does my own work (just replaced the 4 O2 sensors, head gaskets, spark plugs, and ignition coils in the SUV last week for $600) I appreciate the modularity of the Leaf as well as overall minimal moving parts. It's the 480V that you need to watch out for.

As for modifications, did you just get here from the 60's? Time to put a 4 barrel Holley Carb on your cherry ride?

Ohh but your saving the environment... give me a break! How do you think these batteries are produced? How do you think they will dispose of them? And don't get me started on the electrical production alone, first it takes almost twice the energy capacity of the battery to charge the battery and I can guarantee you aren't using a 100% nuclear source of power and even if you are, how do you think they are disposing of the waste? Burying it? Yea thats good! Combine all of these and it's not better then using petrol based cars, its might even be worse depending on the effects of the waste have on the planet, but go on please tell me the benefits of owning an electric car?

Where do I start, troll? Never said a thing about the environment in my post. Straw man argument. But if you want to know, batteries are recyclable. In a worst case scenario, the energy that the car uses was generated by coal. If so, the car gets the gasoline equivalent of 50 MPG. Comparatively, combustion engines average between 20% and 40% efficiency, with the remainder lost to entropy as heat.

What do you want me to say?

Additional Cites...

As a start, let's just look at what it means to take care of your battery. This means don't charge it to more than ~80% of capacity and don't discharge below 20%.
- This takes the 73 mile range down to 73 X 80% X 80% or 46.7 miles
Next, let's assume that after 7 years, the capacity is expected to be down to 80% of the new, maximum.
- This takes the 46.7 miles down to 46.7 X 80% or 37.4 miles for 'battery-kindness"

http://www.plugincars.com/real...

"Nine bars equates to about 70 percent of remaining capacity--meaning that the effective range of a 2011 Nissan Leaf, originally rated at 73 miles, could be down to something like 50 miles."

http://www.greencarreports.com...

In theory, the range of my Leaf is 83 miles when fully charged. In practice, however, that varies widely depending on where you're going and who is driving. My wife, for example, tends to drive more aggressively than I do and she has experienced somewhat shorter range. Similarly, range drops off significantly when you go on the highway or crank the AC.

https://www.treehugger.com/car...

This is a problem with all new technologies: people with no experience with it create worst-case scenarios in their mind and inflate them, while making little of the problems of the technologies they're replacing.

Yes, you can make your occasional trips, using the sort of break times that you're supposed to take when driving on long trips (regardless of whether you actually take them or not). But that's not your everyday life. EVs start every day with a full charge and you never need to randomly detour from your life to go to a gas station. Now, in your mind, the "taking breaks on trips" thing is huge (because it's unfamiliar), while the "detouring to go to gas stations" thing is little (because it's familiar). But for people who own EVs, that situation rapidly becomes reversed. They get totally used to the luxury of having a full charge every day, and whenever they for whatever reason (maintainance, accident, etc) are forced to use a gasoline car, they end up griping bitterly about the inconvenience of going to gas stations. I've seen it time and time and time again.

And unlike you, they all have experience with both owning gasoline and electric cars. But the conveniences of electric cars become a second-nature expectation very quickly.

Another issue that quickly becomes annoying about gasoline cars can be well summed up by this article: Our Tractor Keeps Shaking Violently & Has A Sore Throat. That's not a one-off, that's an extremely common experience for people once they start driving electric. EV owner surveys have extremely high rates of satisfaction with EVs in general. This translates to brand loyalty as well - Tesla generally blows away all other competitors on brand loyalty - most recently with 91% "would buy again", vs. the next highest (Porsche) at 84%.

Again, though, you haven't ever owned an EV, so you have no experience with this. So your mind makes any perceived downside into an insurmountable wall, while making excuses for what you have to endure for your ICE vehicle and playing them down as if they're nothing.

given the numerous complaints about awful conditions for the workers.

All coming from the union that's trying to unionize them, and a tiny number of workers supporting the unionization. Funny that.

Where's your actual statistics that Tesla's rate of accidents is higher than average? Because Tesla cites OSHA data saying that their accident rate is a little over 2/3rds that of the industry average.

Anyone? Okay, fine, I will.

"We have received calls from multiple journalists at different publications, all around the same time," the company wrote on Sunday, "with similar allegations from seemingly similar sources about safety in the Tesla factory."

"Safety is an issue the UAW frequently raises in campaigns it runs against companies, and a topic its organizers have been promoting on social media about Tesla."

Tesla went on to says that such reports ignore safety data from 2017, which it outlined in a handful of data points.

Those points proclaim a 52-percent reduction in “lost time incidents” and 30-percent reduction in “recordable incidents” during the first quarter.

Additionally, the automaker's “total recordable incident rate,” a workplace-safety metric tracked by OSHA, sits at 4.6, while the industry average hovers around 6.7.

Hours worked per employee also fell, according to Tesla's data, with a 60-percent reduction in overtime.

And, concerning pay:

To counter that claim, Musk told employees in a leaked memo that production workers actually earn far more in total compensation—when the value of stock options are included—compared to other automakers.

He pegged that difference at $70,000 to $100,000 per year.

Tesla stock prices are now close to all-time highs, and the company's market capitalization now exceeds those of GM and Ford.

Both sides claims should of course be taken with a big grain of salt. For example, Tesla's argument of stock options is great, and yes, the workers could end up quite well off if Tesla does well. But they don't pay the rent until they vest, and UAW is right that local housing prices are killer. On the other hand, UAW doesn't bother to mention in their overwork claims that during crunch times Musk has been known to sleep in a sleeping bag at the factory, and has pledged (and at least so far, upheld) to work on any line where any employee gets injured.

Investors are starting to ask why Elon Musk hasn't been fired yet. Every model of car he has promised is severely behind schedule and under sales counts.

The Nissan Leaf is launching a new model in Sept, announced two days ago, and Musk is always trying to override other companies' announcements. Let's forget that a leaf is $14,000 after rebates for a 120 mile range. By 2018, six major car manufacturers will have 200+ mile range EVs.

Outlook isn't so good for tesla if bolt is selling around 1000 per month.
http://www.greencarreports.com...

You must have checked a loooooong time ago.

Electric-car battery costs: Tesla $190 per kwh for pack, GM $145 for cells.

That's still $125,400 in batteries if we use Tesla's prices but it's nearly four times less than you thought.

Your suspicion is logical, but unfounded.

My DNA is in oil patch, but I have evolved to despise it.

It's a filthy source of energy and killed my dad with cancers in the brain, liver, pancreas, stomach and lungs.

My post was not an advocacy for fossil fuels, it was a strategy to exploit it, if we're going to let that pussy-grabbing son of a bitch destroy us, we should flameout with dollars in our hands.

I litigated tobacco and it was a bitch to get those mother fuckers to stop killing us, and it still is.

At least with fossil, we have a replacement to use as a weapon.

I'm please to see the progress we're making with renewables and the persistence of manufacturers to continue rolling it out.

This kind of chickenshit short-sighted legislation will spread like cancer and the only way to stop it is pressure from buyers:

The new Wyoming bill would forbid utilities from using solar or wind sources for their electricity by 2019, according to Inside Climate News.

The bill's nine sponsors—two state senators and seven representatives—mostly come from Wyoming's top coal-producing counties, and some have denied the scientific validity of climate change, according to the website.

So, to really compare apples to apples, you've got to also factor in maintenance costs of your ICE vs maintenance costs of the EV.

Yes, you do. And there are so many possible failures for either vehicle type that the only reasonable analysis is based on "all things being equal". That is, all four wheels could fall off your normal car and you have to pay to fix that at a bundle of money, but so could all four wheels fall off the EV.

Then instead of inflating your numbers by rounding up to $6000

From here, "It's a surprisingly low $5,499 (after a $1,000 credit for turning in the old pack, which is required), plus installation fees and tax. The installation is estimated at roughly 3 hours of labor." So, $5500 plus tax and labor (3 hours) plus the $1000 trade-in. That's more that $6500, so I think it is fair to round to $6000 as the true cost.

then subtract the maintenance and repair costs of a Nissan Leaf, and you'll have $1694 in the bank.

It's interesting that you subtract an amount that is LESS than the cost of the battery replacement. You've forgotten to add in all the incidental costs of operating the EV in your analysis.

and you get 9.13 years of driving before you need to replace the battery.

You managed to lower the TBO by about 9% by adding in a lot of incidental costs to the normal car and ignoring the total cost of the battery replacement and ALL of the incidental costs for the EV. And you still wind up past the warranty for the battery.

As for the charge of "fear mongering" that the OP made -- don't be silly. I am not trying to make you afraid of anything. I'm simply questioning, with supporting numbers, the surface level cost analysis you did that leaves you claiming that it saves you money.

Between $12,500 and $35,000 per car in ZEV credits - forced subsidies by other manufacturers. In 2012 ZEV credits were at least $119 million in the first half of the year. That's not insignificant income. And Tesla STILL loses money with that kind of credit.

As far as the Federal (and State, at least in CA) buyer's credit goes - why does Tesla advertise the subsidized price? Because it's easier to list as "starts at under $70,000" when you add in the credit on a $75,000 car.

Gasoline on the road versus coal/natural gas/etc... in a power plant, then transferred at a slight loss through the electric grid, transferred at a loss to charge batteries, then transferred at a loss again into mechanical energy. That is ignoring the additional problems with the complex chemistry, manufacture, and eventual disposal of batteries versus steel and aluminum engines. Almost certainly not better when everything is accounted for.

Ok; lets pick that apart, only this time with actual knowledge instead of your "intuition".

First, Gasoline engines are around 20% efficient. That means you burn 5 gallons of gas and get 1 gallon of gas worth of actual travel. Plus, Gasoline cars do not have regenerative breaking (we'll get to that later).

Second, Electricity production using Natural Gas has 35% efficiency. So for that equivalent 5 gallons of gas, you get 1.666 gallons of gas worth of travel, but you have to add charging efficiency, battery to wheel efficiency and of course transmission line efficiency. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to look those up, but For rough numbers, the battery to road efficiency is about 87%, the transmission line efficiency is about 50%, and the charging efficiency is about 85%. There are some other minor factors, but the big ones above are the main items. So, you take and multiply all of the efficiencies number to get the final efficiency. With electric vehicles, that efficiency is about 13% all told.

So! now we know that gas engines really are more efficient! Not so fast, heres where that regenerative breaking I mentioned above comes into play. There is no known way to convert mechanical energy back into gasoline, but with an electric vehicle, the circuits to take mechanical energy and put it back into the battery when breaking are very trivial to make. That means that the amount of energy it takes to make an electric car with regen breaking go 1 mile is far far less than it is to make a gasoline car go the same distance when all other factors are included. This number is typically 1/4 of the energy on average. That means that of that original 5 gallons of gas worth of energy, the electric car only got .64 gallons, but that will take the car 2.58 gallons of gas worth of distance while the gasoline car only got a gallon of gas worth of distance. Regen breaking is the key folks, always has been. With electric vehicles, regen is almost automatically included. With all other types of propulsion, it is a nasty and complex problem that is usually solved by ---- you guessed it---- adding a battery and electric motor...

It's catchy to slide in Tesla in unrelated articles but just because it uses batteries doesn't mean they are prone to fires.

The one that famously caught fire and torched a supercharger in Europe was caused by a genuine one-off assembly line defect.
The one that caught fire in France during a test drive was found to have a a faulty electrical connection.
The one that crashed on autopilot and "battery caught fire" actually didn't burned down: it smashed into a tree separating the front of the vehicle from the cabine, tearing the battery apart where a small number of cells separated from the rest and autopilot tesla crash fire caught fire, away from the vehicle and the rest of the battery pack. Driver dies of impact.
Another one caught fire due to hitting debris where car alerted driver to pull aside.

Complete list of EV fires exonerate batteries for the most part, as most EVs (Tesla and Chevy Volt) have liquid-cooled battery packs, unlike consumer electronics (esp. handheld devices).

Still waiting on infrastructure. GM isn't investing, and CCS chargers generally seem to have much lower availability than Tesla charging stations. By the looks of that map I could drive from Toronto to Montreal hopping between superchargers; I can't do that with a Bolt and CCS, it's a complete dead zone between here and there.

Electric still seems kind of niche unless it's a second car or you never leave the city, in any case.

"Second car that never leaves the city" that's probably most second cars, and there's a lot of them.

Still waiting on infrastructure. GM isn't investing, and CCS chargers generally seem to have much lower availability than Tesla charging stations. By the looks of that map I could drive from Toronto to Montreal hopping between superchargers; I can't do that with a Bolt and CCS, it's a complete dead zone between here and there.

Electric still seems kind of niche unless it's a second car or you never leave the city, in any case.

In other words, you wants a locomotive.
Seriously, though, you're kinda describing the Volt: battery car, with on-board ICE charger (i.e., "range extender"). BMW has one too in the i3. Now, if they could only make 'em with better interiors (the Chevy) or better exteriors (the BMW).

Consumer Reports found that the Model S has "too many problems to recommend". Green Car Reports estimates that two-thirds of early Model S drivetrains will have to be replaced before 100000 km. While that may not necessarily be representive, of current production, the ongoing problems with the Model X are.

Since Tesla plans to ramp up production at an unprecedented rate in the coming years and Tesla's culture is much more focused on rapid change and pushing deadlines than on the engineering and long-term testing cycle the rest of the car industry works by, it will be very hard to improve this. Some analysts think that this will actually be their biggest problem while they are trying to gain foothold in the mass market.

The older study is of hybrid cars, not battery EVs. Hybrid cars have an IC engine and only marginal electric use.
More relevant studies of BEVs vs ICE shows a slight increase in manufacturing CO2 (15-45% depending on model) which is quickly eliminated by electric efficiency and reduced CO2. Electric cars emit about half the CO2 over their lifetime compared to an ICE car.
http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-ve...
http://www.greencarreports.com...

Uber has a standing order for 500,000 autonomous Teslas in 2020.

http://www.greencarreports.com...

Well, no. I'm a fanboy of Musk too, but honestly, the Model X is years behind schedule (see this. Costs have not been what they were originally expected to be. The cars themselves are awesome, and he gets it done, but he's been late.