Tesla Motors – Page 5 – California Lemon Law blog

An automobile plant recently close by Toyota in California will be opening up their doors again for Tesla Motors Corp. Backed by a $50 million investment by Toyota, Tesla will start making electric cars within the year, at the same plant that was shared by a Toyota/GM venture. “By working together with a venture business such as Tesla, Toyota would like to learn from the challenging spirit, quick decision-making and flexibility that Tesla has. Decades ago, Toyota was also born as a venture business,” Toyoda said in a statement.

Restarting the factory is a major achievement for California’s economic development and a rare victory for a state that many business leaders say has become uncompetitive because of more regulations and higher labor costs than other states.

But not everyone is happy. The move is a disappointment for Downey officials who had been in talks with the automaker, hoping the company would set up shop in a closed facility that had once been used to manufacture the space shuttle.

Toyota’s investment in Tesla is particularly important because the electric vehicle company will be competing against better capitalized and larger traditional manufacturers. When an established manufacturer decides to partner with newcomers it will considerably increase the probability of success by giving them manufacturing know-how and access to a distribution network

The electric car has been around for a long time. In the late 1930’s Robert Anderson (A Scottish inventor) built the first crude electric carriage. Over the years the car has been improved to a point where it could be a practical mode of transportation for many people. One of the main reasons we don’t see many on the roads is because charging a large number of electric cars will require huge upgrades to the nation’s infrastructure

SolarCity and Tesla Motors hope to change the amount of electric cars on the road by installing solar-powered car charging stations in Rabobank locations along California Route 101. These quick charging “gas stations” delivers up to 70 amps (240 volts) of electricity which would charge a Telsa Roadster in about 3.5 hours. SolarCity has also installed over 100 in home-charging stations throughout the state.

The Beautiful Earth Group, a solar and wind farms company started last year, has paired up with BMW and the mini, to build solar charging stations in the Red Hook, Brooklyn area. These stations are truly “green”. Built out of recycled shipping containers the station can provide enough energy to charge the Mini E in three hours. Lex Heslin, chief executive of Beautiful Earth, claims two firsts: He got the keys to the first electric version of the Mini Cooper in New York and his company is operating the city’s first solar E.V. charging station.

Silicon Valley based company, Coulomb Technologies, have been building charging stations around the world since 2007. Their recent partnership with Envision Solar has allowed them to integrate their ChargePoint technology into a “solar grove” at Dell headquarters in Round Rock, Tex. This system provided 131,000 kilowatt hours of electricity annually, and doubles as shade for 56 parking spaces.

With the environmental issues we face today, solar charging could become big business. Ideally, solar charging stations will be connected to the grid so they can feed electricity back when the power is not needed for car-charging. When the sun isn’t shining, cars can be charged on grid power.

A couple of months after Daimler bought a 4% share in Tesla Motors they have turned around and sold 40% of their share to Aabar Investments of Abu Dhabi. Tesla Motors located in San Carlos, California makes high performance electric cars and is the only electric car maker with vehicles that can go for long distances. Their Roadster is the first electric-battery vehicle to go more than 200 miles per charge. Tesla Motors was given $465 million in loans from the US Department of Energy to speed up in the production of fuel efficient, affordable electric vehicles.

Energy Secretary, Stephen Chu, announced during a visit to Ford’s headquarters that it will receive a loan of $8 billion, out of the $25 billion intended for loans to automakers to speed up development of more fuel-efficient vehicles. Ford will initially borrow $5.9 billion to be disbursed through 2011 for retooling 11 plants in Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri and Ohio. The loans will help in employing about 35,000 engineering and factory personnel. Ford intends to begin repaying the loans in 2012.

Ford says that the loans will help it make 13 Ford models more fuel-efficient and intends to start selling four electric vehicle models by 2012.

Nissan will receive $1.6 billion in loans to be used in overhauling its factory in Tennessee where it will start building electric vehicles which it hopes will eventually build 150,000 electric cars annually. It estimates that the project will create 1,300 new jobs.

Tesla Motors, a California company, will get $465 million in loans to make electric vehicles. Tesla is only a six-year-old company which has been concentrating on producing electric vehicles. It intends to build two plants in California one to assemble its Model S, a battery-powered sedan it intends to start selling in 2011 for about $57,000. The second plant will be used to build battery packs and electric drive trains for both its own cars and those made by other manufacturers. The two plants could create as many as 1,650 new jobs.

The bankruptcies by General Motors and Chrysler made them ineligible for this first round of loans. It is expected, however, that similar loans will be approved at a later time.

If you think the vehicle you are driving may be a lemon, in California, call the Law Offices of Delsack & Associates at 888-Ex-Lemon (888-395-3666) for a Free consultation.

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