Electrified vehicle manufacturing
Tesla Model three charging excitement for electrical cars
By Kevin Smith, San Gabriel Valley Tribune
Posted: 03/31/16, 6:57 PM PDT | Updated: on 04/01/2016
Tesla Motors unveiled its fresh Model three electrified car on Thursday, a more affordable design than its pricier EVs that could fuel the construction of more charging stations across Southern California.
The Model three will sell for $35,000 — less than half the price of Tesla’s previous cars — and it’s expected to have a range of at least two hundred miles when fully charged.
Tesla’s Model S sedan starts at $71,000 and its Model X SUV starts around $80,000. The Model Trio’s price will drop even lower when combined with state and federal incentives that are available to EV buyers.
Those rebates could amount to as much as $Ten,000, bumping the price down to around $25,000. That price looks particularly attractive in light of the fact that the two thousand fifteen Fiat 500e sells for $32,780 and a two thousand fifteen Ford C-MAX Energi goes for $32,645.
If there were any doubts that Tesla’s fresh car would appeal to consumers, they were dispelled early Thursday when more than three hundred people lined up at the company’s dealership in Pasadena to put down $1,000 deposits for the Model Trio. Another three hundred people queued up at the company’s Westfield Topanga mall location in Canoga Park. The vehicles won’t be available for purchase until late 2017.
Walter Anderson, 57, of South Pasadena arrived at the Pasadena dealership bright and early.
“We got here about six a.m.,” Anderson said. “Tesla has been making a lot of versions of the electrical car successfully, but now they are coming in the regular consumer market, not the market for the super rich.”
Anderson said the price and travel range of the Model three will resonate with lots of people.
“At about two hundred miles, it becomes pretty feasible to not have to stop your car and structure your excursion around charging and things like that,” he said. “Some of the other brands of EVs like BMW have a range of around seventy miles, which is a hefty difference. That doesn’t represent a convenience that I think consumers are ready to support.”
Patrick Min, a senior analyst with the car buying site TrueCar.com, said Tesla’s fresh design is going to wiggle things up in the automotive market.
“The Model three is going to be a pivotal model for Tesla,” Min said.
Elon Musk, Tesla’s co-founder and CEO, was pleased by Thursday’s turnout.
“Exceptionally inspired by the interest in Model Trio,” he tweeted early Thursday. “You won’t be disappointed. Also, a puny token of appreciation coming for those who lined up.”
Paul Neuhausen, a chapter leader with the Electrical Auto Association of Los Angeles, said Tesla’s Model three will spark enhanced use of EVs both here in California and across the nation. California, he said, will become the engine that drives the expansion of electrical vehicles.
“Battery range is the only thing holding back EVs from taking over the American roads,” he said. “Tesla is shooting for a more conventional market of people who want to buy EVs and are enthusiastic, but are not your six-figure incomes. It’s basically middle-class families.”
The thought of climbing into an electrified vehicle and avoiding high gasoline prices holds strong appeal for Southland motorists. But the region’s network of charging stations remains a source of concern. But that’s beginning to switch.
Southern California Edison announced earlier this year that state regulators approved its pilot project to support installation of as many as 1,500 electric-vehicle charging stations across its 50,000-square-mile service area.
If that goes well, the utility hopes to expand the program to 30,000 charging stations. The chargers would work for both electric-only vehicles and plug-in electrical vehicles or PEVs, which also have gasoline-powered engines. Both must be plugged in to be recharged.
“We believe that would represent about thirty percent of the total request for charging stations when we get out to the one million electrified vehicles that are anticipated by two thousand twenty and beyond,” said Gary Stern, SCE’s director of energy policy. “We hope it will assist the state in meeting its greenhouse gas reduction and air quality goals. As the number of EVs grows, it would make sense to have about 100,000 charging stations. So 30,000 would be a major step in that direction.”
“People are obsessed with cars but not the infrastructure,” he said. “Cars are more arousing. But if you can’t charge them because there’s not a charger around it becomes a kind of albatross. You need to be able to charge a car quickly and effectively, but if the infrastructure isn’t in place, it ain’t gonna’ happen.”
Michael Frausto, 33, of Montebello also demonstrated up at the Pasadena dealership on Thursday to put a $1,000 deposit down for a Model Trio.
“Tesla has disrupted the traditional automotive model,” he said. “I’m very excited with what they have done in a brief amount of time. And price is a definite factor because $35,000 makes it more affordable for everybody.”
California is the largest plug-in car market in the nation, with more than 200,000 plug-in EVs registered by March 2016, signifying forty seven percent of all plug-in cars sold in the American market since 2008, according to HybridCars.com.
And those 200,000 EVs reduce gasoline consumption by fifty six million gallons a year. That’s equivalent to 7,000 tanker trucks, according to the Union of Worried Scientists, which recently conducted an analysis of relevant sales and registration data. They also cut 425,000 metric tons of heat-trapping carbon dioxide emissions, which translates to Two,300 railcars worth of coal.