http://www.teslamotors.com/sites/default/files/blog_attachments/gigafactory.pdf
Panasonic may be taking up to a billion dollar stake in it.
I should have bought some stock in this company. Their share price is over $250 where same time last year was under $50.
damn. If I only didn't write them off so quickly for such ugly designed cars.
This has been going on since cars were invented. Here is an ad from 1914. 100 miles on a single charge.
I know batteries are still in the infancy stage but Michio! You kidding me? Gasoline are efficient? That's gotta be the funniest thing I every heard.
Modern gasoline engines have a maximum thermal efficiency of about 25% to 30% at the most when used to power a car. It is pretty much as good as we are going to get it. The combustion engine is one of the most inefficient/outdated, and wasteful technology used for transportation.
Gasoline is a very efficient way to store energy, even with the low efficiency of a internal combustion motor, it is way better than electricity.
Look at the size of a gasoline tank and compare it to size and weight of batteries to provide the same driving distance.
Next, look at how easy and fast it is to refill a gasoline tank, compared to a battery.
Batteries has a long way to go, before they can compare to gasoline for car usage.
The energy density of gasoline is much higher than any existing battery.
It has a high energy density, but you can’t extract a high percentage of it with an internal combustion engine. However at present its advantages of concentrated energy, portability, refill timing and cost (last 10 years not withstanding) is adequate for use as transportation fuel (and everyone is already used to it).
If batteries had the same energy density, refill timing and long term cost then no one would use gasoline, and you would get more then 3x the range of gasoline per fill. If batteries achieve 1/4 to 1/3 of gasoline’s energy density with adequate cost/density/fill time then they would be competitive with gasoline, and thats all that needs to be invented, anything above that is gravy since the public is obviously used to todays gasoline engines.
Todays li ion won’t do that, their energy density is still pathetic compared to gasoline, but their lifetime cost can be comparable at economies of scale Tesla is looking to achieve. They seem to be betting the farm on this, lets hope it doesn’t fall out from under them.
I have read about other energy storage methods that may be more likely to succeed in gasoline replacement, aluminum energy storage or li-air batteries, but they are under development still.
I thought Tesla’s approach of small incremental sales and market share growth is the way to go, but now they may be biting off more then they can chew, i hope their not, i don’t want to see them fail.
That is not a factory I would want to live even remotely close to.
1 1/2 gallons of gasoline has the same amount of energy of a brand new Tesla battery pack.
The gasoline weighs 12 lbs and goes to 0 as it is burned. The battery pack weighs 700+ lbs and weighs the same even after it is fully spent. That is a lot of dead weight.
From day 1, the battery pack will store less and less.
What about Winter driving? Heating the cabin with electricity is very costly, miles per charge wise.
What about Summer driving? Not going to be able to go very far.
Elon Musk is smart. If the factory is built, use other peoples money.
I also appreciate that he is going after the performance and luxury market. Let them pay the development costs, not the poor, naive do gooders that are just trying to do the right thing.
Michio doesn’t know about the amazing density and capacity of Ultrafire batteries.
Since Tesla will be involved in battery manufacture, I wonder if they will pursue a different battery type. I would think that it's less labor to produce the same amount of energy using fewer bigger cells, with further savings in battery pack assembly and the battery management system.
Interesting.
I think you guys are missing my point.
Fossil fuels are not a renewable resource. It is not a long term answer to our energy needs. Combusion engines were invented 100 years ago. Yes it has been updated and efficiency increased and IMO maxed out. But are you guys happy with 25-30% efficiency? I'm not. We can do better. Humans are not stupid. Humans are not a virus. We will not go extinct. Greed, big oil companies, lobbyist, some gov't officials are holding us back and putting out alot of propaganda no better than cold war days! Get out once in a while and try something new.
I'm all for innovation. Is batteries the answer? Maybe. Maybe not. Trying and failing is better than not trying at all. But going to war for oil is getting really old.
you forget the reality denyers, climate change is a myth, profits before people is not possible, taking from the poor to give to the rich is a good thing, racism and bigotry is fine as long as its in the name of religion, and propaganda is fact because the powerful are incorruptible, smarter and better then the rest of us
Let’s also not forget about developing fuel-burning technologies such as fuel cells and even highly efficient microturbines. If a large amount of electricity continues to be generated by burning fuels, then these sorts technologies could spell doom for battery electric vehicles. After all, if you can increase the efficiency at which fuel can be converted into useful work to over 50%, the whole idea of generating electricity with fossil fuels (albeit at MUCH higher efficiency than a conventional car), sending it through the power grid with some losses, and charging a battery with losses seems a whole lot less attractive. Especially when you consider such things as charging time for EVs vs refueling time for fuel burning cars. Of course, other factor such as development of better batteries and possible widespread adoption of solar power could tilt things the other way.
There are a few analysis that come to the conclusion that increased efficiency leads to increased total consumption, the amount used per unit of work is less but that leads to the unintended consequences of greater overall usage of the resource.
Battery electric may just be a gateway to other technologies, but one could argue that gasoline cars have just been a one century gateway to long term transportation, as long as Tesla shows gas can be eliminated does it really matter which renewable technology we end up with someday even if batteries are not it? What if the drivetrain stays the same but they replace the batteries with a fuel cell and aluminum metal fuel?
Some experts speculated Toyota developed the Prius not to make money on it (it lost a lot of money at its inception and for many years of production) but to have the electric drivetrain refined so that if cars went fully electric someday their R&D would be far ahead of other automakers.
Don’t forget the energy required to produce a charge for the batteries. Some folks also say you have to take into consideration the disposal of the used batteries. Anyways, good thought provoking thread. I am willing to bet that some members have enough batteries to power a small car! lol
It could be true that current battery electric cars are a gateway to other technologies. After all, if you consider the elimination of conventional cars, most anything else that would be developed would use an electric platform. Even if you went with microturbines, gas turbines just don’t work well for powering cars through a conventional drivetrain. Any car using microturbines would have to be some sort of hybrid with the turbines being used exclusively to generate electricity.
On the other hand, if a company like Tesla commits themselves exclusively to Li-Ion powered cars (and it looks like they are certainly putting all their eggs in that particular basket), then it could be VERY costly to them if they suddenly find themselves behind due to the emergence of a new technology. Of course, the degree to which this happens depends on what emerges.
Here is the thing, the efficiency of power stations is far greater then that of a car or any other engine used for transportation. Ideally we should be using LFTR for all our electrical generation needs, and also to make dimethyl ether which would then become a carbon neutral fuel for transportation.
I have to say, had I had anything to invest, I would have put money into tesla while the blatant stock manipulation was happening on the news.
Electric cars have been around just as long too.
Going purely electric or fossil fuel isn't the answer. Diversity is. It'll cost more in an ideal world, but may actually cost less since it'll provide protection against disruption in supply.
Fossil fuel powered vehicles can be much more efficient. VAG has a couple cars they claim can be put into production soon. Elio Motors has a three wheeler, although they've shown much more flash than substance, and I doubt they're actually serious about getting this car into production. Edison2 made a very efficient car that won the X Prize, but I believe their production version will be electric. There are some electric cars like the Lit Motors C1 that are exciting too, plus electric motorcycles by Brammo and one other company that I can't remember the name of.
The next few years can be very good for efficient vehicles. About the only thing that would kill that is if the political landscape changes enough to much more greatly favor entrenched big businesses instead of new businesses and most citizens. The big old businesses can adapt. Look at GE did with its Evolution locomotives when they were forced to improve emissions. It made them produce the best locomotives in the world that railroads around the world buy because its efficiency pays for the higher purchase price.
Most of that efficiency is gained with additional energy capture devices, but those gains would be mostly or more than wiped out in a vehicle, although it might be possible if there was an unlimited budget.