By chance, I was talking to Rob Wilder on Monday, and he mentioned that
he has ordered one of these.  The metric of more interest than range,
for those of us who rarely drive more than 250 miles in a day, is one
penny per mile.  

Rob Wilder is the inventor of the WilderHill Clean Energy Index (ECO,
http://www.wildershares.com/) on which is based an investable mutual
fund (ticker PBW).  This has helped people think about how to
financially back those who are most rapidly changing the energy system
toward renewables (companies and investors; Tesla Motors is a good
example).  This fund has more than 20X the assets attracted by the green
mutual fund backed by Sierra Club, so it is having a huge impact.  More
recently, Rob has developed another index of "greening" companies, the
WilderHill Progressive Energy Index (WHPRO,
http://www.whprogressive.com/), which has a companion mutual fund
(ticker (PUW).  


Dr. Stephen R. Humphrey, Director of Academic Programs, 
School of Natural Resources and Environment, 
Box 116455, 103 Black Hall, University of Florida 
Gainesville, FL  32611-6455  USA 
Tel. 352-392-9230, Fax 352-392-9748 
http://snre.ufl.edu 


-----Original Message-----
From: Bioenergy and Sustainable Technology Society
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of ESPINOSA,GABRIEL L
Sent: Friday, April 13, 2007 11:35 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Electric supercar

Here is an article about a performance electric car based off of the
Lotus Elise.

http://www.automobilemag.com/features/news/0611_tesla_roadster/index.htm
l

The second link is to the companies website for more facts and figures
on the car, like the fact that it makes peak torque from 0rpm.

http://www.teslamotors.com/index.php?js_enabled=1

I'd like to point out a couple of specifications that really show the
Achilles heel of electric vehicles.  The equivalent mileage of the car
is ~130 miles per gallon, but the range is only about 250 miles.  This
means that the nearly 1000lbs of batteries amounts to about 2 gallons of
gas.

The energy density of gasoline allows cars with 25% efficiency to have a
greater range then an electric car with a motor efficiency of 80%.

Just some food for thought.


Best wishes,
---
Gabriel Espinosa