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Tesla gets government loan assistantance to the tune of $465 million.

11K views 71 replies 27 participants last post by  Cardinal 
#1 ·
#3 ·
Press Release:

Tesla Gets Loan Approval from US Department of Energy

Electric Vehicle Manufacturer Will Use Loans to Build an Assembly Plant for Model S Sedan and Another Facility to Manufacture Electric Powertrains

SAN CARLOS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Tesla Motors has received approval for about $465 million in low-interest loans from the US Department of Energy to accelerate the production of affordable, fuel-efficient electric vehicles.

Tesla will use $365 million for production engineering and assembly of the Model S, an all-electric family sedan that carries seven people and travels up to 300 miles per charge.

The Model S has an anticipated base price of $49,900 after a $7,500 US federal tax credit. It has lifetime ownership costs equivalent to a conventional car with a sticker price of $35,000, thanks to the lower cost of electricity vs. gasoline and a relative lack of service and maintenance. Tesla expects to start Model S production in late 2011 in a state-of-the-art assembly plant employing about 1,000 workers.

Tesla will use $100 million for a powertrain manufacturing plant. The facility will supply all-electric powertrain solutions to other automakers, greatly accelerating the availability of mass-market EVs. The new facility will employ about 650 people.

Tesla is in the final stages of negotiation for facilities in California.

The loans are part of the Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing Program, which provides incentives to new and established automakers to build more fuel-efficient vehicles. Created in 2007 and appropriated in September 2008, the $25 billion ATVM aims to reduce America’s dangerous dependence on foreign oil and create “green collar” jobs. The program is entirely unrelated to the stimulus package or the so-called “bailout” funds that General Motors and Chrysler have received.

“Tesla will use the ATVM loan precisely the way that Congress intended -- as the capital needed to build sustainable transport,” said Tesla CEO and Product Architect Elon Musk. “We are honored that the US government selected Tesla to be among the first companies to participate in this progressive program.”

Building on Proven Technology

The Model S sedan features exceptional performance, styling and utility, with unrivaled cargo and passenger space. Its floor-mounted powertrain is the culmination of a half-decade of engineering in the heart of California’s Silicon Valley, where Tesla developed the Roadster.

The highly acclaimed Roadster is the first production battery electric vehicle to travel more than 200 miles per charge and the first US- and EU-certified Lithium-Ion battery electric vehicle. With an estimated range of 244 miles per charge and zero tailpipe emissions, it’s the first production vehicle to offer supercar performance with a clean conscience.

Tesla has never applied for federal funds for the Roadster, an American sports car that consumes no gasoline whatsoever. Tesla expects the Roadster business unit to be profitable in the third quarter. Privately held Tesla will finance sales and marketing for the Model S through private capital.

Tesla has delivered more than 500 Roadsters to customers. Later this month, Tesla will begin delivering its second-generation Roadster and Roadster Sport, an even higher-performance vehicle.

Teslas do not require routine oil changes or exhaust system work. They have far fewer moving (and breakable) parts than internal combustion engine vehicles. They qualify for federal and state tax credits, rebates, sales tax exemptions, free parking, commuter-lane passes and other perks. The Model S costs roughly $5 to drive 230 miles – a bargain even if gasoline were less than $1 per gallon.

The Model S, which carries its charger onboard, can be recharged from any conventional outlet. Three battery pack choices will offer a range of 160, 230 or 300 miles per charge.

Tesla is taking reservations online and at its two showrooms in California. Tesla will expand its network of showrooms this summer with stores in New York, Chicago, Seattle and Miami. Tesla will open its London showroom June 25, followed by Munich and Monaco. Additional stores will be opened in Washington DC and Toronto.

About Tesla

San Carlos, Calif.-based Tesla Motors designs and manufactures electric vehicles with exceptional design, performance and efficiency, while conforming to all North American and European safety, environmental and durability standards. The Roadster, which has a 0-to-60 mph acceleration of 3.9 seconds and a base price of $101,500 after a federal tax credit, is the only highway-capable production EV for sale in North America and Europe. Tesla expects to begin Model S production in late 2011. Tesla is already taking orders for the sedan, which has an anticipated base price of $49,900 after the tax credit.
 
#11 ·
It's just getting retarded how freely our government is printing money.

USA will soon be the United State of China
 
#14 ·
So spending money on the development of smarter more economical transportation is a sham? WTF. I hope you had more of a problem with the billions thrown into a fake war in Iraq? What I see is that Americans seem to do more complaining than doing anything else. GM built an awesome electric car in the 90s. However, they got scared (because they may have to use their brains) and literally destroyed all evidence of the program out of that in their "wisdom" created Hummer. If they had committed to some losses in the short run they would be the top manufacture by now (the long run) with the most advanced fleet of electric vehicles in the world. Instead...

I use to be employed in the racing industry from 2000-06. I quit because it just seemed like such a waste... In 07 I got together with some forward thinking Americans to start the manufacture of an electric vehicle powertrain. However, even with the illusion of plenty of cash out there back then no one was interested in investing. Currently we have shelved the motor and controller design and now sell battery electrics manufactured in... where else? China. They are way ahead of us in this area and we need to do something about it instead of sitting on our fat asses complaining. I think that it is fantastic that tesla is getting capital. It is a good investment. Substantially better than wasting it on war toys

Just my 2cents.... with all this said. I still want John's 2000 m-sport elise:D
 
#15 ·
So spending money on the development of smarter more economical transportation is a sham?
...not at all - i wager nearly everyone here enthusiastically supports the development of new and innovative transportation technologies...

...the problem is that tesla does no such thing; they're a silicon valley VC enterprise managed with all the shameless charlatanry of any given late-nineties dot-com ponzi scheme...that they've actually brought five hundred cars to market is a remarkable testament to the few people in their organisation and customer base who so desperately strive to see the idea succeed, and i absolutely hope they can reign tesla's momentum in a productive direction, but that's an awful lot of dead weight steer with precious little suspension carrying its load...

...wow, a roadster analogy, and totally unplanned at that!.. ;)
 
#17 ·
Well, thanks M I feel better now.

I guess that explains the lack of resolution to the problems they were having with the 2 speed gearbox. We were baffled how they could not see or try to solve the problem using the motor control system. I guess for them it was difficult to control torque output with their controller. Funny, we always had a gut feeling there were too many "salesmen" and not enough engineers.

Well, anyway at least some sort of program will get started in this country. Also, the money going to Ford and Tesla are Loans. We (taxpayers) did quite well with the loans made to the banks.

IMHO The bailouts are a waste. GM and Chrysler need to burn and let the ashes feed a new healthy industry. Whatever that may be.
 
#20 ·
It's a collateral-free loan granted without any personal guarantees from the owners, so it's free money. If they fail to successfully bring the Model S to market, this money is flushed down the toilet and Tesla's executives walk away. Tesla has no assets to seize, and most of the intellectual property that goes into their vehicles belongs to someone else.
 
#26 ·
Regardless of Musk, Tesla is not developing "affordable" alternatives. Their price point is well out of reach of the majority so why are we giving them a loan? Give the loan to a company that can make an affordable alternative....
 
#27 ·
Tesla has laid down some good R&D with their lightweight, fast vehicles, and they've attracted a lot of attention by proving how quick an electric vehicle can be. I'd like to see some cheap featherweight vehicles in the future...

As far as making electric cars cheaper, Lithium will be the new gold if we go the way of Tesla. It must be mined from pegmatites and granites. There's also the downside of Lithium being highly reactive and raping the environment if dumped.

I want to see cheaper NiMH or Fe based energy storage for electric vehicles. But realistically, batteries in general are either heavy, toxic, or prohibitively exotic for large scale production. Lead, Cadmium, Lithium... If battery powered electrics were to be widely produced, we'd need to use the most eco-friendly and common battery materials like iron and nickel rather than the most efficient and light (and exotic).
 
#28 ·
As far as making electric cars cheaper, Lithium will be the new gold if we go the way of Tesla. It must be mined from pegmatites and granites. There's also the downside of Lithium being highly reactive and raping the environment if dumped.
...hey, we could always go with hydrogen energy storage instead; platinum rather than lithium...
:shrug:
 
#29 · (Edited)
I think hydrogen storage is fine right now, you don't need to store it within the lattice of precious metals or R&D fuel cells. You dump it into a giant thermos and it doesn't all evaporate away for 2 weeks. you can also use direct methanol cells and slectrolyte cells to store hydrogen. Los Alamos has been doing about 30 years of R&D. The heat of combustion of hydrogen is terrible compared to giant hydrocarbon chains, but it's workable. People would rather worry about what happens when you leave your car unattended for 2 weeks in an airport parking lot than consider hydrogen though. And infrastructure changes are a bitch.

If someone made a hydrogen car that could go 0-60 in 3.5 seconds it would be pretty badass. But, currently, I think the fastest hydrogen expo car is a 232 HP 6L V12 that can do 0-60 in 6 seconds, and maintaining a liquid hydrogen powered V12 would be sooo easy ;)
 
#31 ·
:wallbang:

What happened to capitalism, the free market, and competition?

When the government chooses winners, we all lose.

Maybe Tesla should start making electric Trabants?

Shouldn't the government just figure out a way to tax $465million out of Elon Musk? rotfl
 
#47 ·
:wallbang:

What happened to capitalism, the free market, and competition?
Nothing... It's alive... apparently not doing as well as it was. There are these entities called banks. And they thought that doing business with a bunch of dumb-asses was a good idea... which pretty much makes them dumb-asses. And then, what happened... I'll let you know when its over.

Any unbalanced system will drive itself into a wall over and over. I'm not for a complete lack of gov't intervention... or even the opposite. I think a healthy balance can exist. I'm all for lessening the blows.

As far as I am able to witness, capitalism, the free market, and competition still exist.

Were you shocked by my comments because you don't think Tesla will pay back the loans? Or the bit about the gov't printing money we should all be taking advantage of? Pump it all back into the economy! Isn't that the point? Is the gov't even printing money?!? Or is that just what we like the say when we don't know where these "magical" loans come from?
 
#36 · (Edited)
It's supposed to be a sports car. They advertise it as a sports car always followed by what the 0-60 times are. The 60 mile range came from top gears test on the track when driven like the sports car it is advertised as. If I drove up to the mountains to drive the car like I do my Elise- I would not be making it home. If I drove it like Grandma on an EPA test cycle (I've personally driven EPA test cycles on chassis dynos- and it isn't like how you are going to drive your sports car) I still would not be making it home from the mountains (a 30-40 minute drive away- but spending some time in them even driving along at 45 mph to get any kind of range the hills are still gonna put a hurtin to the range)

Ok ditch the solar panels. A diesel electric hybrid or just a simple 50+ MPG VW TDI would be smarter and more economical. Not to mention serviceable, proven, has a dealer network, etc.

The Govt money would of been of much better benefit to the country to convert an idle big 3 plant to produce an efficient car- the Chevy Volt perhaps if that project has been idled (and something other than pure electric) and kept more Americans working, do more for the economy, etc.

What ever happened with the Chevy Volt anyway. I never thought it would actually see production in any sort of originally proposed form. Haven't heard anything on it in a while. At least if they made it they would be capable of actually getting some cars on the road. They'd put more on the road in a month for half the price than Tesla has put on the road in 5 years.
 
#38 ·
the fisker will be the "real" alternative drivetrain high end car... volt is on its way, volt car itself will be a complete failure - but the drivetrain will be good, and will be found in many cool cars to come. ...fisker - thats legit transportation technology, not a stupid little ev...
 
#39 · (Edited)
What's a few more million while the printing presses are running at full steam? 400+ million for Tesla, 400+ for the staged revolution in Iran; who cares - it costs nothing to print money.

Just a few more months now. Worst Xmas retail is decades. Hyperinflation is the only possible result of printing trillions out of thin air. Bank 'holidays.' Nationalization of same. Commercial real estate collapse. Stock market collapse. Fascist government takeovers of large private industry. More powers for the criminal private Federal Reserve cartel of foreign banks, all unaudited. All in your face now. All you have worked for is being diluted away right in your before your eyes. The banking cartels have taken it all over, including Presidency and the banker stooge cabinet appointees. Argentina, Zimbabwe type inflation. Prepare for it. Or not. Your choice. The USA as you and your parents knew it is ending.

But BEFORE it is all down the toilet .... let's party!!!!!

YouTube - Play him off - Keyboard Cat - Hall and Oates LOLZ
 
#42 ·
I was just thinking... the government SHOULD pump a load of money into Tesla. The more it goes noticed, the greater the competition. Even if you think electric is a terrible way to go (it may be), the other alternative for zero emissions is hydrogen. Pour money into zero emission car companies and watch them duke it out and make amazing advances. :D

Diesel/Bio-diesel/Natural gas is a cop-out, still outputting CO2 when we should be sequestering it, from a geologist's point of view. Although, until things get more asymptotic, there really isn't much to see on a human timescale. And geologists like rocks better than baby polar bears... oh well.

Oh, and I have zero emission Fisker Scissors in my desk drawer, they're pretty good except I expect a recall. I reached in there and almost cut my fingertip off! They're too sharp! ;)
 
#60 ·
Why grant this unsecured loan...which has a VERY long shot of being repaid at any level, to an unproven entity?

Why not treat this money as venture capital? Why not solicit proposals, large and small, from innovators to create practical technology for a fossil fuel-independent car?

Why does our government HAVE to rush this and just hand this money to an entity that has in no way demonstrated either the technological ability or business savvy to pull this off?

Didn't our government learn anything from past examples, such as Haliburton, in simply forking over ungodly sums of taxpayer money to an entity perceived to be the only game in town?

For crying out loud: HAD to have stimulus package RIGHT NOW. HAD to bail out the automakers RIGHT NOW. HAD to bail out banks RIGHT NOW. HAVE to get healthcare reform RIGHT NOW. Today, the breaking news is that the current administration is insisting on immigration reform RIGHT NOW.

We're going down a path that is new territory, and from which, if things collapse, there will be no return.

Current leadership will either be recognized in the future as a visionary, transformational leader OR the steward of the total collapse of our society and culture.
 
#61 ·
RIGHT NOW = If we (Repub administration) don't do this (RIGHT NOW), we will lose the election (oops, that didn't work)

RIGHT NOW = Dems have ability (RIGHT NOW) to pass legislation without any Repub support (not much more likely to work)

RIGHT NOW != If we don't do this (RIGHT NOW) the world will end tomorrow.
 
#68 ·
Well, if this is anything for you guys to think about...

there are 8 billion more people here today than there were in the 1800s

Simple formula of supply and demand. the more people living our life style the less stuff to go around.

SO. We need to keep africa, the middle east, and China (oops.) and most of the rest of the world living a different lifestyle

Lots more siblings at the dinner table:wave:
 
#69 ·
It seems to me that the Federal Government furnishing of loans to Tesla at this stage of the economic cycle is a perfectly reasonable fulfilment of its duties. I’m no economist but there are a great many corporations out there that will go bust because of the unavailability of working capital.
In recessions ‘The Market’ gets screwed up and that leads to pointlessly destructive instability, which governments possibly have a duty to mitigate. (Keynesian economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia).
I personally don’t believe that Mr Musk is out to screw the US Government, he’s a very rich man and #ucking with Uncle Sam usually results in a lengthy prison sentence.
He has teamed up with one of the most innovative chassis and technology manufacturers in the world (LOTUS) and his Type S uses Lotus’s VVA architecture and will benefit from all the development that Lotus did with Zap for the drivetrain. Most of Tesla’s Type S is production ready because Lotus have made it so.
The technology needed to make the Type S useable and affordable is already out there and ready for mass manufacture, why not Tesla?
In my opinion a combination of Li ion batteries and Ultra capacitors (Electric double-layer capacitor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ) and perhaps even in combination with a small fuel cell could easily give the Type S a 300mile range.
All the technologies exist but are not yet mass produced. Wasn’t $100 million of the loan for drive train production?
Mr Musk might be personably unlikeable but I reckon even I could suceed in doing what he is proposing - i.e. it's not too far fetched!
IMHO a silent luxurious family saloon that costs pennies to recharge and drives like a lotus will definitely sell 10,000 and it won't be long before he's exporting them to Germany - What a beautiful irony?
 
#70 ·
Do you have a source for that info?
AFAIK Lotus has nothing whatever to do with the "Type S" and now that Daimler has a chunk of Tesa it seems likely that components for the car will be coming out of their parts bin.
 
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