Can GM Challenge Tesla With a Long-Range Electric Car?

cartechboy writes "GM may sell the Chevy Volt, but it's not a sexy electric car like Tesla Model S. It's a plug-in hybrid with muddled marketing (whose owners love it even though they burn gasoline sometimes). Product exec Doug Parks says GM is developing an electric car that does 200 miles on one charge, with a price around $30,000. But he wouldn't say when, falling back on the old excuse: 'Electric car batteries are really, really expensive!' Tesla's still the only maker to offer an electric car with more than 200 miles of range, so it will be interesting to see whether GM can really build a true Tesla rival. If so, the marketing must be better than the Volt's. Otherwise, it won't matter how good the car is."

Re:Nissan Leaf

[shadowrat]

And even with a 250 mile range, road trips are not feasible in the near future regardless of what Elon Musk tells you.

I saw a Tesla S with DC plates on it in Cape Cod over the 4th. While there are certainly other explanations it would appear that it was driven there.

I don't believe that GM is serious about an EV

[AnalogDiehard]

Over twenty years ago GM made the EV-1 electric car [ev1.org]. It was only available for lease. The leasees were so happy with it that they wanted to buy the car, but the cars were reclaimed and destroyed under very questionable circumstances and production lines were promptly shut down. There are GM executives who are known to be rabidly hostile to EVs. Chevron, in collusion with the automakers, ultimately bought the patent to the EV-ideal environmentally-friendly NiMh battery and refuses to license it in a format suitable for EVs.

The oil and auto industries colluded to keep EVs and any other competitive technology from eroding the profits of Big Oil. They did it before when they conspired through shell companies to acquire and destroy streetcar companies [wikipedia.org]. Streetcars were powered by electricity not fossil fuel, so by forcing consumers away from streetcars they had little choice but to buy cars. Auto makers fattened their profits, as did oil companies.

I find it hard to believe that GM is at all serious about EVs.

Re:They're just attempting to stay relevant

[Cyberax]

Wrong! Volt can get up to 100mph on electric engine alone - I know because I did exactly this (not on a public road, mind you). And for the record, right now my Volt has an unbroken streak of 1230 purely electric miles.

Re:They're just attempting to stay relevant

[Cyberax]

No.

There's no "EV mode" on Volt, because it's always in the "EV mode". And it has the same performance in pure electric mode and in range-extended mode (i.e. when the gasoline engine is active). I tried to measure acceleration using CAN bus and there's no significant difference in acceleration curves below or above 50mph.

Re:I don't believe that GM is serious about an EV

[nojayuk]

The EV-1 was an experiment, not a production car. They cost GM about $250,000 each to hand-build and they were leased only to people who already owned one or more petrol/gasoline cars as the EV-1's reliability couldn't be guaranteed and it might be recalled for upgrading or examination at any time during the lease.

At the end of the experiment they were recalled and scrapped. If they had been sold on then GM would have been liable to provide a very expensive maintenance and parts supply operation for them for ten years minimum by law.

The results were useful but proved that electric cars at that time were not quite ready for prime-time, not when gas cost less than a buck a gallon and the EV-1 had a range at full charge of about 80 miles or so. The original Ni-Cd and later Ni-MH batteries weren't up to the job but lithium tech batteries with their greater capacity, fast-charge capability and high current drain made the later development of hybrids and full-electric cars feasible.