These cars will sell like hotcakes. Are you listening, Bob Lutz? The Big Three (about to become the Big Two, if rumors are to be believed) need to sit down, pay attention, and take notes.

Fear not. Many new technologies start expensive, bought by the rich hipsters. They then become products of lust and desire for 'the masses'. When subsequent generations of product/competitors come out, they are primed to jump on the bandwagon, now that the worth and desirability have been proven, assuming, of course, that the products are in fact worthy. Some don't make it, of course, but this is a product whose time is coming very rapidly.

As someone who anticipates batteries tumbling in price and soaring in efficiency over the coming decade, I applaud Tesla's announcement. The very least it will do is alert some big players to recalculate their previous negative assumptions regarding feasibility. Current concerns about the impracticality of distance limitations will evaporate, once the range is seen to extend beyond 100 miles (already there with Tanfield electric trucks), then beyond 250 miles, then 500, then 2500. All of which is only a matter of time now that the race is on.

Ok but what about the plant it self are they planning on using solar, or wind to help make the car, have you ever seen the rooftop of a large plant. what about the plants water needs that same roof sheds alot of water when it rains. How much of the car can be reused at the end of it's life and is the company going to handle the batterys at the end of there life......ok maybe i'm thinking to much here but just asking

Isn't Governor Richardson a candidate for president?
Would that be a welcomed change or What? From The Oil President to The Sun President!

>bankrupcy for telstar, we'll see how many $100,000 and >$50,000 plug in can't take it out of state cars they sell >after the Limosine libers by 28 of them.

If your ability to construct an intelligible sentence is any indication of who's betting against Tesla, I'll put my money on Tesla.

Sullen,

You wouldn't be making a reference to the worker's paradise of East Germany and their wonderful Trabant which revolutionized the automotive world, would you?
Ever since the development of the PWM controller and regenerative braking, the issue has been batteries. Lead acid had neither adequate weight/range/performance specs nor lifecycle price specs. Now acceptable performance specs can be met, and we are "just working on the price". Anyone who prefers an ice system over electric has not had both in a comparable vehicle. Try a gasoline golf cart and an electric golf cart. No contest. Electrics were the right choice even before electronic controllers. When electric can meet the range and performance specs economically, ice will go away by vote of the marketplace.

Allen you're not asking too much there. Tesla is in the perfect position to be a truly sustainable company right from the start and they should grab this opportunity. They should be working to keep the embodied carbon as low as humanly possible and to keep reducing it as processes improve. The corporate world is reaching the point where the sustainable will thrive while the unsustainable will have to adapt or die.

Gents -

New Mexico may receive a lot of sunshine but it is also home to several nuclear labs and Sen. Pete Domenici is the #1 cheerleader for a nuclear power revival in the US.

We can discuss the merits or otherwise of nuclear-powered BEVs vs. fossil-powered ICEs, but please don't fool yourself about the prospects of a solar-powered transportation future, at least in the next couple of decades. Both PV and biofuels are inherently expensive technologies and will only ever cover a relatively small fraction of the total energy required to keep OECD countries mobile.

Anybody see how many they sold at $100,000 ?
I love the technology, just think they have an already proven bad business model.

Great to see the Electric Sedan coming to life-via Tesla. It appears that NM Governor Richardson is giving Tesla a nice incentives package to locate their factory in his state.

Unfortunately, 50 grand is too salty for this guy's checkbook, but I'm sure there are others who can afford these, and not so much as flinch. Understandbly, it has to be done this way until the technology can get better and cheaper though. I guess the rest of us have to just wait a while longer.

Does anyone else think that a 150,000 sq. ft. plant seems really small? I'm sure they will be able to build on if need be, but my company has designed some grocery stores that are almost as large as this factory. I guess I just expected one of those 1 million sq. ft. monstrocities like Toyota built in San Antonio, TX.

Is the 'mathroom' the room where Ford adds up all their losses for the year? I'm thinking it needs to be a lot bigger than 150,000 square feet.

For Tesla, 150,000 sq ft is probably enough if all they're doing is installing electric drives into Fusion shells.

Andrey, I have not seen A123 publish any calendar year numbers but they're in serious discussions with automakers and I guarantee that would not happen if their batteries became unusable after 3-5 years. Battery packs using Valence Saphion LiFePO technology can deliver 20 year float life. A123 is probably similar.

I do wonder about Tesla's battery life. They claim 125k miles (500 cycles @ 250 miles each), but they use regular li-ion. If those packs all start dieing after 3 years/36k miles there are going to be a lot of unhappy rich people.