Simon Hacket and Emilis Prelgauskas at their 313-mile mark in Coober Pedy, South Australia.
(Credit: Hackett)A record for a Tesla Roadster driven on a single charge was set at 313 miles (501 km) in Australia on Tuesday.
Tesla Roadster owner Simon Hackett and his friend Emilis Prelgauskas drove his electric sports car from Alice Springs, Northern Territory, to Coober Pedy, South Australia, as part of an alternative-fuel vehicle rally called the Global Green Challenge.
The Tesla's electric-charge port door was sealed shut at the start of the 313-mile journey and the trip was filmed for a documentary, as well as monitored by contest officials. The Tesla's lithium ion battery, which the company assures owners will last over 200 miles between charges under normal driving circumstances, had 3 miles to spare when the team reached its destination in Coober Pedy, according to Hackett's chronicles of the race experience on his company blog. (Hackett happens to also be the founder and managing director of Internode, an Australian national broadband and Internet services company.)
Hackett said in his blog the achievement is actually a record for any production electric car, not just a Tesla Roadster, which is why his team was so careful to record it. To squeeze as much distance out of the Tesla's battery as they could, Hackett and Prelgauskas tried to drive at a consistent speed of 55 kph (roughly 34 mph) for a large portion of the almost 12-hour journey.
"The security seal was applied to the charge port door when we started the journey. As this is being done as part of the Global Green Challenge, we have a full set of official verifiers here who will attest to the results and to achieving the outcome. We were followed along the journey by our support crew and a documentary film crew--so we have it on film," said Hackett.
While Tesla Motors is not an official sponsor of the contest or Hackett, the company has shown support by spreading the news of Hackett's success. It's not hard to imagine why as Tesla poises for a major retail expansion.
The stunt may certainly speak to consumers who likely drive nowhere near 313 miles in a single day, but are still reluctant to hem themselves in with a car restricted to a limited number of miles between recharges.
The Tesla Roadster.
(Credit: Tesla Motors)If you love Paris and the environment, and you have a boatload of money, this could be your dream home.
A real-estate company called Welcome in France is offering a free Tesla Roadster with every purchase of one of its homes in a new ecological luxury-housing development on the outskirts of Paris, according to a report.
The development will use solar panels, geothermal energy, and its own water treatment facility, among other things, French car blog Le Blog Auto reported, but it's still under construction, and buyer interest has been slow due to the economy.
The Tesla is a new enticement to get ecologically minded (and presumably wealthy) people interested.
But with a helipad and golf course included in the development, it's hard to judge just how environmentally friendly the exclusive 40-home development could actually be.
(Credit:
Tesla Motors)
Tesla Motors has begun offering its Roadster electric vehicle for the Canadian highway, the company announced Wednesday.
Tesla said in a statement that driving a Tesla Roadster in Canada can be thought of as even more kind to the environment than in other places since the bulk of the country's electricity is generated from renewable resources.
"An EV recharged from the current Canadian grid, on average, would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 85 percent compared to an equivalent gasoline-powered vehicle. In hydro-dominant British Columbia, Quebec, and Manitoba, the reduction would be an impressive 98 percent," said the Tesla statement.
Unfortunately for Canadians, they'll still have to travel to the U.S. if they want a showroom experience.
While Tesla plans to open in Ontario, British Columbia, and Quebec, as of now, delivery for Canadian Roadster orders will come out of its Seattle and New York offices.
The slight inconvenience will have no effect on compliance with Canadian safety regulations. The Tesla Roadster made for Canada will comply with all Canadian regulations for highway vehicles, according to the company.
Given how currencies have been fluctuating so drastically this last year, you may be wondering how it will be priced. Tesla is very conservative on this answer.
"The base price for Roadsters in Canada will be set closer to the start of deliveries, and pricing will reflect exchange rates at that time. In the United States, the base price is $109,000," said a company statement on the matter.
For a company who was written off by many as dead, Tesla has had positive news in recent weeks. In February, the company announced that the Department of Energy had been granted permission to issue Tesla loans in the millions to help it build a new plant in San Jose, Calif. The new Tesla Sedan is also set to be unveiled on March 26.
You may have heard about the the 6,831 lithium ion batteries that power the all-electric Tesla Roadster. But what about the user interface from the driver's seat?
It turns out that the Roadster has a small touch screen to control battery charging. It provides people with the temperatures of different subsystems, and it gives a read of how the batteries' charge translates into range and performance.
It also lets people schedule the charging for late at night, when rates can be lower because demand on the power grid is lower--a very handy feature.
CNET News sister publication Crave U.K. talked to a Tesla representative at the British International Motor show last week for a demo. The Roadster, which just started shipping in the United States, is scheduled to come to the United Kingdom in May 2009.
- prev
- 1
- next
