Julian Edgar, 50, has been writing about car modification and automotive technology for nearly 25 years. He has owned cars with two, three, four, five, six and eight cylinders; single turbo, twin turbo, supercharged, diesel and hybrid electric drivelines. He lists his transport interests as turbocharging, aerodynamics, suspension design and human-powered vehicles.
Tesla tests
A press release worth reading:
Limited Edition Tesla Roadster Available Spring 2009
Hi Tesla Enthusiast,
When you last contacted us we were selling our high performance, 100% electric Tesla Roadster only in the continental United States. We are now selling special limited edition Roadsters into Europe, starting in 2009. We originally planned on expanding into Europe much later, but several factors have allowed us to accelerate our expansion. Check out VP of Sales, Marketing and Service Darryl Siry’s latest blog announcing the details and our April 9th press release.
This special limited edition will sell for €99,000 for a fully loaded car, to be delivered beginning in the spring of 2009. Similar to our early customers in the US, Europeans who reserve the car early will receive a special Signature edition version of the world’s most exclusive high-performance vehicle. For details on reserving this special edition Roadster contact Tesla at eurosales@teslamotors.com or call +1 650-413-6200.
In case you missed it, the Roadster has recently been reviewed by: AUTOBILD, Car & Driver, Automobile, Motor Trend, Road & Track, and Auto Week magazines – check out the reviews by clicking on the links.
on April 12th, 2008 at 1:51 pm
The tesla could make for exciting times
I found a site in the USA that calculated the running costs of charging an electric car from photovoltaics that had been added to a home loan, the results surprised me. I did the math for my house in Australia to calculate the combined fuel and electricity repayments on photovoltaics. I should note my house is passively heated and cooled and very small, so the electricity bill is already pretty good
2007 electricity usage = 3290kwh
Average Electricity bill / month 2007 = $49
Petrol bill / month = $200 (travel 330klm/week)
Current combined fuel and electricity= $249
Tesla motors electricity requirement
110wh/klm x 330klm week x 4 weeks = 145kwh/month
kwh charge electric car x 48 working weeks = 1742.4kwh/year
kwh required per year to power home and car = 5032kwh
cost of grid connected Photo Voltaic panels on home loan capable of charging a tesla
5032 kwh in blue mountains requires 3kw grid connected PV system = $21760 after rebates
Repayments $21760 on 25 year loan @ 8.29 = $172.15 per month
$172 per month on solar compares to the current fuel and electricity bill of $249
Saving of $72/month
The cost of electricty and petrol will continue to increase. A home loan is dependent on interest rates, so the cost of repayments will alter, however I think the monthly savings over time would most likely increase as petrol costs rises.
This fits in well with the earlier blog ‘The Most Important Article of the Year’. Generally renewables are viewed as expensive, and rhetoric is thrown around that to reduce our Co2 the cost of electricty will double.
I know I have not considered the up front cost of the car, and the tesla is not available in australia, the tesla and PV’s have embodied energy from production and we should walk and bike more… but the possibility of emmision free motoring is not that distant!
figures gathered from below sites
http://www.mortgagechoice.com.au/calculators.aspx
http://www.energymatters.com.au/climate-data/grid-electricity-usage.php
http://www.aussiesolar.com.au/grid-feed-systems.html
on April 12th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
My father has just installed a grid-connected solar panel system on his house roof. I am enormously impressed with its output, total cost (with govt subsidy) and amazing amount that the South Australian government is about to pay him for his ‘feed in’ power (ie the power he contributes to the grid). As you suggest, it certainly makes you look at electric cars in a different light.
on April 14th, 2008 at 9:52 am
Hi Julian,
Please, tell us more about your father’s steup.
on April 14th, 2008 at 10:56 am
He has ten solar PV panels comprising a 2.1kW nominal system.
The commercial installation included an inverter and mains power connection (ie it was all simply added to his normal mains power system). Cost after government rebate was about AUD$15,000.
Best output for one day – 15kWh
Worst output for one day – 3 kWh
In 87 days he has generated 1063kWh and pumped back into the mains 582 kWh.
Pay-in tariff (ie for pushing power back into mains) is about to become 44 cents per kWh
Consumption tariff is 18 cents kWh
on April 15th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
I think the rebate for the installed systems is good along with the pay-in tariff. However, when I looked into the systems I wanted to get a battery system that would allow me to effectively remove myself from taking power out of the grid.
The intention was that when my batteries are fully charged, the power I’m producing in excess of my requirements would go into the grid. Apparently this is not possible as it is against the (ETSA – Elec Trust of Sth Aust) regulations.
Meaning that if you have solar power and there is a blackout you cant use it to power your house. I see that as being one of the main reasons of being on solar power. Other than the whole greenhouse gas thing of course…
Can anyone explain why this is so?
on April 15th, 2008 at 3:02 pm
You need a physical disconnect so that your system is not discharging into the grid. Reasoning being a line worker may think that the line is dead when it is not. These things are easy to acheive electronically, including fail safe, but they don’t take riskes on OHS, so will not accept anything other than a system the is either completely isolated (ie never grid connected) or always connected, there is no in between.
Not just ETSA, abut all other distributors as well.
The $440 MWh rebate is very good compared to some states, some of them are have the cheek to only give you a off set on the regular costs, so $180 MWh. Actually $440 is exceptionl as commercial value of PV is about $200 including REC rights
on January 19th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
Interesting point about feed in tariffs:- until the panel output exceeds your consumption (at any point in time) you aren’t paid a feed in tariff, ie you’re only saving 18c/kWh, not 44c/kWh. Consequently (assuming the ‘net’ type of tariff system) the feed in tariffs aren’t as beneficial until you get a larger PV system (ie more than 1kWh) or you use very little energy during the sunniest parts of the day.