A battery-only electric car at this stage of battery development , is a brainless technology that makes no sense whatsoever, economically or otherwise. The main reason Tesla is not building an
e-rev is quite simple - they don’t have the know-how or resources. They can only put together simple electric cars that aren’t any more advanced in any significant fashion from the electric cars built before WWI.  When consumers finally get wise and realize that a battery-only has batteries that are being totally discharged, which shortens their life dramatically, and those batteries cost between $20,000 and $30,000 and last only 5 years, you won’t be able to give those cars away.  An electric car without a practical battery is an oxymoorn. You can put all the lipstick you want to on that vehicle to con the gulible younger generation of conspiracy-addled morons, but the technology with those obsolete 1st generation li ion batteries (a fact conveniently
not mentioned by Musk, nor known by the author of this blog)  is an oxymoron, with the emphasis on moron.  Happy electric motoring.

musk is just a guy with tons of cash to burn…my bet is tesla motors gives up in about 2 years and musk moves on to rocketry

@ kerry:

I’ll tell that to my (100% wind-powered) daily driver li-ion battery-only (current technology) electric vehicle I use to commute to work. Oh, and I’m an economist.

some general thoughts on your comments:

More choices is always good for consumers. Who says an e-rev is the only meaningful mode of transportation, that one vehicle has to do it all, or that families have to have only one vehicle? When I go an long trips (a couple of times a year) or need to haul big stuff, I just rent a hybrid, easy.

Auto manufacturers are facing increasing market saturation and uncertain regulation changes to emissions and efficiency requirements. They better start coming out with more drive train/application diversity (it means they don’t have to compete as directly, either) if they want to be around another 100 years. Your description of Tesla’s target buyers tells me you know little about consumer markets. Sure, all the variants are different, with costs showing up at different timing. As you note, the consumer will figure out what works best for them and they’ll express their preferences in boatloads of dollars. Being able to pop in an new, upgraded, higher performance energy carrier every several years, ultimately, as I plan to with my vehicle, sounds like a benefit to me, not something that will drive folks away.

What matters for functioning markets in this case is matching up new supplies with burgeoning demands, brainless or not. Or do you not want new American companies to create new jobs and make profits?

Finally, your description of battery management tells me you don’t understand how these things work. Battery management systems to optimize battery life is a fundamental part of every electric vehicle design I know.

Happy electric motoring, indeed. I’ll think of you as I do it again tomorrow.

Kerry,

What you say is true. In fact ,calendar life may even fry lightly used battery packs in less than 4 or 5 years. After all, the Tesla battery packs use off-the-shelf laptop/cellphone battery cells that are low in cycle life (~ 500 cycles) and calendar life that are quite suited to the product life of laptops and cellphones. However, the Telsa market is not the mainstream car market.

A Tesla Roadster buyer gets high end performance with a green cachet. The $100K + price tag is moderated by the savings in gas and more importantly in maintenance - no need for a live-in mechanic. Furthermore, the resale value of the Tesla should be quite high. A $20K battery refurbishment (cell replacement ) should not impact the resale price that much, especially since the “new” battery pack should provide superior performance than the original pack.

Anecdotes are poor evidence, but for your consideration here’s another fellow who has several years’ experience with commercially-made EVs:
http://www.evnut.com/

So Tesla and Musk will miss the mark again.  An expensive all-electric car, with limited range, requiring electric charge stations (that don’t exist) to go on a weekend trip.  Their sports car made a point that EV could be sexy.  With the battery technology not being there yet they are now targeting another niche market.  A reasonably priced REV could have much more impact.  Hard to know how to get there if you don’t know where you’re going.  Wake-up Tesla!  Economist my hind end!  The GM Volt REV is a much better idea, much better long term planning, ...unless you have access to breakthrough battery technology.

There is no “secret” to the Volt system.  It is called a series hybrid and has powered just about every submarine made and well as many other naval vessels, countless cars, etc. for well over 100 years.

Learn how to convert your current car into an electric car for less than the cost of buying new.  See your local electric vehicle association. http://www.eaaev.org

MDS, It’s apparent you don’t care about gas consumption if you go on long weekend trips every weekend.  You ARE not a candidate for an electric car.  I, on the other hand, drive at most 60 miles per day.  That is a lot of driving.  More than I care for.  If I want to go on a long trip, I either fly, or rent a car.  That is simple.
kerry bradshaw, I’ve seen several of your posts on many sites, and it’s always amazing how you bash the EV with the same vigor and thoughtless rants.  Batteries cast $20,000 if you buy the most expensive one.  There are much less expensive versions out there, but never mention that fact.  Tesla know what they are doing, and will offer an appropriately priced batter and car when the time is right.  The Volt only goes 40 miles with a less energy dense battery.

Which car goes further, an all electric charged by wind or solar, or a gas vehicle without any gas, and no option of even putting in biodiesel or 100% ethanol? Electricity can be made from so many sources it is an ideal intermediary for powering essential devices, so insulating the owner to a greater or lesser extent from the vagaries of the petrochemical market.  I’m not surprised that Tesla backed off from a full hybrid. I would think a safe cost to develop a hybrid drive system from scratch, engineered to fit their vehicle, would be about $250 million, and they don’t have that much - even from Google.