In bureaucracy, truth is often stranger than fiction. A non polluting electric car company gets slammed with fine for “non compliance” for a car that can’t produce any emissions.
That’s weird enough by itself, but even weirder is what else is in the company’s Securities and Exchange Commission report under what they cite as “risks”.
Here’s the relevant page of the report where they talk about risks, including the $275,000 fine from the EPA. Note what is highlighted under that.
They headline that with:
We are subject to substantial regulation, which is evolving, and unfavorable changes or failure by us to comply with these regulations could substantially harm our business and operating results.
That’s right, a zero emissions “green” electric car company cites this as a risk to the company’s business future:
the imposition of a carbon tax or the introduction of a cap-and-trade system on electric utilities could increase the cost of electricity;
You can see the Telsa SEC 10Q report for yourself at:
http://www.faqs.org/sec-filings/100813/TESLA-MOTORS-INC_10-Q/#ixzz0yDhK9ON3
Tesla’s crime? Failing to file for a 2009 emissions “Certificate of Conformity” from the EPA to comply with the “Clean Air Act.” until late in the year. Wait, I thought electric cars were supposed to help clean the air?
Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. It is a wonder that anybody would bother even trying to do business anymore where the minefield of bureaucracy looms even for popular and politically correct green companies in California.
h/t to autoblog.com
Sponsored IT training links:
The 642-374 study pack also includes 1Y0-A05 dumps and 350-018 practice exam so you will pass your certification exam on first try.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
What he said…but then these are Progressives, they do know better after all. :-\
Tesla Electric Motors is the competition for government owned GM
There’s no such thing as a zero-emission car, electric or otherwise. Indeed, electric cars are major “emitters” of CO2 (unless all of their charge comes solely from “green” energy). The high losses associated with the transfer of electrical energy down the main distribution lines, coupled with losses in converting AC to DC make such vehicles highly inefficient. Batteries are also major polluters, both to produce and dispose of, and have much shorter lives than fueled engines, especially deisels. Much more development is required before electrically powered vehicles become practical, realistic alternatives to petrol/deisel engines.
They failed to follow the regulations. I know the regulations are stupid in this case, but they still had to follow the regulations. Where’s the story?
@Mr Nobody: that was from a flawed CNW Marketing Research study from 2005. It has since been corrected; the corrected version shows that the Prius has less overall impact than a Hummer H3.
Quote:
That’s right, a zero emissions “green” electric car company cites this as a risk to the company’s business future:
Endquote.
How often do I have to tell everyone that electric cars are NOT ‘zero emissions’.
They merely take the emissions from the city center (exhausts), and place them in the countryside (power station chimney). So instead of breathing the emissions, you eat them instead.
If you look at the consumption figures, the average European diesel has less emissions than any electric car. Unless all your electricity is renewable, which is certainly isn’t in the US.
Look, even if the electricity has to be produced from coal, a battery-powered, flywheel or compressed-air car still produces less CO2 (and uses less energy) than a conventional petrol-engined car. Why? Because power station efficiencies are approximately twice that of automobile engines. Electrically recharged cars can also benefit from regenerative braking, which for city use can roughly halve their net consumption. So they are worth developing, irrespective of any green ideology. A competing alternative would be to develop small turbine engines that can achieve much higher efficiencies. Or if you have both you can combine them.
>>even if the electricity has to be produced from coal, a battery-powered
>>still produces less CO2 (and uses less energy) than a conventional
>>petrol-engined car. Why?
Only ıf you lıve ın the USA, where cars to 5mpg.
In Europe, my large 5-seat dıesel saloon does over 55 mpg on the motorway, whıch ıs much better than any electrıc car.
You forget that electrıc vehıcles have an extra storge and conversıon process, to get motıve power from the fuel. Plus there are huge draws on the battery for heatıng an electrıc car ın wınter, whıch the dıesel uses waste heat for.
My calculatıons show that the Dıesel wıll gıve about 45 mpg ın out of town drıvıng, and the electrıc car just 35 mpg equıvalent.
Electrıc vehıcles are only cheaper to run because they pay lıttle or no tax on theır fuel. In Europe the tax represents about 65% of the fuel costs.
Ed says:
September 1, 2010 at 1:54 pm
Tesla Electric Motors is the competition for government owned GM
Humm????
Ralph says:
September 2, 2010 at 5:21 am
>>even if the electricity has to be produced from coal, a battery-powered
>>still produces less CO2 (and uses less energy) than a conventional
>>petrol-engined car. Why?
“Only ıf you lıve ın the USA, where cars to 5mpg. In Europe, my large 5-seat dıesel saloon does over 55 mpg on the motorway, whıch ıs much better than any electrıc car.”
No, wherever you live. This is a question of the basic thermodynamic cycle efficiencies. Diesel engines are better than petrol engines, but for the compression ratios used in road vehicles the improvement is not great. Much of the difference in mpg (~15-20%) is down to diesel’s greater density (12%). There are additional inefficiencies arising from the use of internal combustion engines on cars, in the transmission, gearing, cooling systems and so forth, which electric cars can more easily avoid. The physical distribution of fuel by road tanker also tends to be less efficient (uses a greater fraction of the energy) than electricity distribution. Even in Europe, conventional cars do not use energy efficiently. Compared to the humble milk float they’re positively atrocious. From consideration of rolling resistance and aerodynamic drag, improvements of at least an order of magnitude are possible.
“”” Paul Birch says:
September 2, 2010 at 3:18 am
Look, even if the electricity has to be produced from coal, a battery-powered, flywheel or compressed-air car still produces less CO2 (and uses less energy) than a conventional petrol-engined car. Why? Because power station efficiencies are approximately twice that of automobile engines. Electrically recharged cars can also benefit from regenerative braking, which for city use can roughly halve their net consumption. “””
Well Paul, realistically; without the regenerative braking; electric cars would be even further behind the eight ball, as far as battery capacity goes. Better batteries; as far as energy pre unit weight or per unit volume come at the expense of being more chemically obnoxious as well as downright dangerous. Gasoline is about as safe as any equivalent density energy storage mechanism. Well your Diesel would seem to be even better.
Rather impressive performance there Paul; Europeans seem to be ahead of the wave in clean diesel.
EPA enables bedbug epidemic.
George E. Smith says:
September 2, 2010 at 9:36 am
“Well Paul, realistically; without the regenerative braking; electric cars would be even further behind the eight ball, as far as battery capacity goes. ”
This is a question of performance rather than efficiency. I’d agree that this (and cost) is why electric vehicles haven’t taken off yet (so to speak). It’s also, in part, why I favour the compressed air route (the energy density is much lower than petrol, but there are ways around this).
Btw, if you get further behind the eight ball, doesn’t that make things easier not harder? If I’m understanding the metaphor right, the worst position is directly behind it.
“Europeans seem to be ahead of the wave in clean diesel.”
European and Japanese cars are better than American ones generally (at least, to our taste). American cars seem excessively large, clunky and heavy (but not safer – US road casualties are a lot worse than in the UK, even though we drive faster and have narrower roads). However, you should remember that American gallons are smaller than Imperial gallons, so the American mpg figures look worse than they really are.
” Also beyond me: why the US is not building nuclear power plants as fast as possible, instead of dicking around with wind and solar. Nice to have but if the greenies want less carbon nothing can deliver like a nuke. ”
My son is a mechanical/nuclear engineering student at Penn State. This summer he was an intern working on the design of a nuclear plant in the South. There are 26 reactors now in development in the US. Most of them, including his project are the Westinghouse AP 1000. Go to their site. It is very interesting reading especially since the Chinese have four plants of these plants under construction.
Here are the pathetic numbers for the USA and nuclear plants, as of August 1, 2010, from:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/reactors.html
Operating: 104
Under construction: 1
On order/planned: 9
Proposed: 22
And China:
Operating: 12
Under construction: 24
On order/planned: 33
Proposed: 120
And India:
Operating: 19
Under construction: 4
On order/planned: 20
Proposed: 40
France is in decent shape, and Japan seems to have ambitious yet sensible plans. But the remaining developed world – England and the USA in particular – seem to have embarked on a course of societal suicide.
Personally I despise politics and all politicians, but at some point the West’s political leadership will have to emerge from their collective coma and vastly increase the number of nuclear plants actually being built – and I mean not just “proposed”, but ordered and underway. The current course is a very dangerous one for the next generation.
Garry says:
September 3, 2010 at 6:27 am
“Personally I despise politics and all politicians, but at some point the West’s political leadership will have to emerge from their collective coma and vastly increase the number of nuclear plants actually being built – and I mean not just “proposed”, but ordered and underway. ”
I agree that they ought to do this, but it’s not clear why you think they “will have to”. However they decide, it will not have any positive real effect until after the next election (or perhaps several after that), so the current government will not benefit by it. The same will be true for every subsequent government. Even if the lights are going out and people are rioting in the streets, promising to build power plants is as good as actually doing it! Of course, that’s stupid, but I’m not sure how or whether we can expect to break out of this dynamic; politicians have foolishly brought their societies to utter disaster before now, so there’s no law that says they have to come to their sense some day.
Paul Birch says September 3, 2010 at 8:32 am
“but it’s not clear why you think they “will have to”.”
Really I’m just referring to increasing global demand for petroleum, and that it would make sense to have other energy sources available (NOT the misnamed “renewables”).
But I’m being an alarmist, of course! 😉