Battery Swapping Event - Live Updates

[CapitalistOppressor]

Yes, but you have to sell these credits to someone. It's not just a matter of the state of California giving you money because you created them.

But even this years AFAIK the credit revenue is expected to dry up around Q4 since there isn't anybody left at that point that will need to buy them. It will reset to 0 next year, but presumably we'll be in the same boat again around Q3 or Q4 when demand dries up. How does creating more credits help the demand issue?

Those credits still have future value when the quota's go up.

But more important, the ZEV mandate is not just the 0.79% requirement for pure ZEV's. It's 12% of all sales in 2012/2013 that Tesla needs to satisfy. Looking only at California, that is ~360,000 credits that must be fulfilled. Only ~24,000 are pure ZEV, but you still need to satisfy the rest with some mix of Prii, Volts, etc.

In theory, this makes the rest of these credits less valuable, because automakers have more flexibility. But the penalty for a missed credit is still $5,000 and a potential ban from the market. If there are not enough lessor cars to fill the requirement then the automakers need to pony up cash for superior credits.

Prius style hybrids can only satisfy the lower 50%. I'm skeptical that automakers have done that.

Plugin hybrids can only satisfy the lower 75% of the requirement (their individual requirement is 25% of the quota), but the only players there are Volt and PiP, and both are only good for 1 credit each. I somehow doubt that those cars will manage to sell the 95,000 units (in California!) required to satisfy their category, let alone contribute to the rest of the mandate. They aren't close to those numbers in their entire history, let alone 2012-2013.

Neighborhood EV's (big golf carts) can satisfy everything except the ZEV requirement, but only generate 0.3 credits per vehicle. Last I looked there were a few tens of thousands of these sold, but the multiplier is grim.

I haven't had time to analyze actual sales to date, but I am skeptical that automakers have even maxed the basic hybrid credits, which are only the lower 50% of the mandate. That means they will need to use more valuable credits from up the food chain to satisfy them, but there isn't any surplus in those categories either, beyond the Volt, Model S and Leaf.

The Volt and Leaf will each generate a surplus in their category for that company, but only Nissan seems like a lock to have an overall surplus, because they have a small quota to begin with. Toyota looks like it might break even, because their lower 50% is locked down, and they are selling both EV's and Plugin Hybrids at a good enough rate to fill the quota.

I am somewhat doubtful that anyone else is anywhere close to meeting the overall requirements, which could easily leave automakers short by tens of thousands of credits for 2012-2013. They might have a deficit even with Tesla scrounging every possible credit available.

And depending on how the carry provision works, the math just gets worse as you look at the rest of the ZEV states. By 2017 the carry provision goes away completely, so automakers need to meet the full mandate across 50% of the U.S. market.

 

[deonb]

Thanks C/O, I was hoping you would chime in.

So what is happening specifically this year that Tesla is expecting the ZEV credits to dry up in Q4?

I think there is a little bit of ambiguity there that it may not necessarily be drying up, but that Tesla is just discounting ZEV credits from the Q4 projection (but is there still a chance it may all be there?)

 

[CapitalistOppressor]

Thanks C/O, I was hoping you would chime in.

So what is happening specifically this year that Tesla is expecting the ZEV credits to dry up in Q4?

I think there is a little bit of ambiguity there that it may not necessarily be drying up, but that Tesla is just discounting ZEV credits from the Q4 projection (but is there still a chance it may all be there?)

Well, first of all, we don't know what automakers will decide to do. They are only REQUIRED to satisfy their 2012 credit balance, which at the macro level is probably somewhere around 180,000 credits, with maybe only 150,000 when you exclude the minor automakers (like Audi) who don't sell enough cars to have a quota.

So if they are only in the market for their 2012 credits, they might only buy enough from Tesla to not be in hock with California, then concentrate on trying to generate more credits of their own this year and next to catch up. But even this year I think it is safe to say that they are at a big deficit, and why would 2014 dig them out of the hole?

If they decide that they should just pony up the cash now so the pain isn't so concentrated, then maybe they just buy the credits now and be done with it. It's hard to say.

Many appear to be attempting to build 2013 cars to fulfill the 2012 requirements (ie they decided to slow walk the process, hoping the market would fail and it would all go away). You see that with compliance cars that weren't even released in 2012, despite having a full quota for that year.

All of those automakers are are big trouble if sales don't pan out (which they haven't been) because they are already deep in a hole, and requirements increase in 2015, to 14% overall, and 3% for ZEV. Then in 2017 the ZEV requirement just explodes. Many of these compliance cars that are meant to last until 2017 aren't even coming close to the 0.79% requirement that is effective until 2014, let alone the 3% requirement of 2015-2017.

Toyota sells a crapton of conventional hybrids, and will be able to sell a huge surplus to other automakers. But those credits are only good for the lower 50%. The upper 50% is filled with huge gaping voids, with the bulk of the surplus that I see coming from the Model S.

 

[Mayhemm]

7.5 minute video up now on Tesla Website.

Shows more of Elon's presentation than previous user-captured videos, but the overall quality is not what I was expecting.

 

[Apoclyps]

The video can be found here:
Battery Swap | Tesla Motors

 

[deonb]

Thanks a lot!

Of course there is still going to be nay-sayers that will just disregard all income from ZEV credits.

Funny, if there was a program where the government would spend direct money on carbon sequestration, and some company like BP would create projects to do precisely that, nobody would even blink about BP showing that as revenue.

But no, create a private sector system based on credits, and suddenly it's Marxism. Go figure.

 

[KenEE]

Awesome! Thanks for posting!
Can't wait until I can "fill up" my S in less than two minutes! Admittedly it will take awhile to match the location convenience of conventional gas stations.

 

[capt601]

Amazing! As many threads have already discussed Pre-announcement, I wonder how this is going to work out in the wild. Costs? Do I get my battery pack back? Lease one? Etc... Wonder when they will release the rest of the details. This is game changing.

 

[B-Chicago]

Just got home from Teslas event at the design center to demonstrate the battery swapping capability of the Model S. Elon said that from the start the car was built to be able to swap out the battery. An incredible demonstration went off without a hitch. This incredible machine comes up from a mechanics bay under the car and completely unbolts, removes, replaces, and rebolts with a brand new battery in 90 seconds. Incredible! They showed the time for a fast gas pump to fill a car was 4 minutes. They did two Teslas in 3 minutes. It was really something to see. The model for it at Tesla stations would be "Fast or Free" meaning you can have your battery swapped out in a couple minutes and be back on your way with a full charge for about the same cost as filling up with a tank of gas or plug into a Supercharger for free and wait the 20 minutes or so it would take to charge your car. He keeps raising the bar.

Looks like it was a great party. Amazing video that Tesla sent to replay the demonstration. It was also not lost on me that the gas station car was an Audi! What a showman Elon is.

 

[AustinPowers]

... They showed the time for a fast gas pump to fill a car was 4 minutes. They did two Teslas in 3 minutes.

As impressed as I am by the superquick battery swap - which I really think is an amazing feat - the 4 minutes to fill up a gas car is laughable, especially if it is supposed to be a fast pump. Since when does filling up a gas tank take so long??? I have never experienced a full fill-up that took longer than two minutes. Granted, I pay in the shop, but the time that pump in the video took to fill up the tank seemed endless.

But as said before, the time for the battery swap is amazing.

Oh, did anyone notice when the second MS came into the bay, the rear wheel on the passenger side was "shoved" into position because the driver slightly missed the mark of the guide rails? Actually the whole car made a slight "jump" to the left. I wonder if that scratches the alloys?

 

[TXjak]

This would also seem to open up some interesting possibilities for battery leasing.

 

[78Lion]

@10 gal. per minute (EPA limit allowed) both are probably stretching it a bit. More than two minutes for gas (even a bit longer if you walk to the shop to pay) but not 4. Still longer than swapping.

I'm sure demonstration was with empty tank/battery.

 

[manitou820]

This would also seem to open up some interesting possibilities for battery leasing.

The real interest for myself, is if I can buy a smaller battery pack like a 60kw for everyday driving, and then swap out for an 85kw or maybe even larger for road trips. I would gladly pay a rental fee for the occasional road trip. I also see this as a way to get a lot more people wto buy a Model S with the 60kw knowing that the larger pack is available for rent if needed.

 

[Kraken]

The real problem here, after thinking about it, is that tesla has said the superchargers will be about every 150 miles. This means, unless you are driving really slow, you won't be able to skip a supercharger/swapper and hit the next one. If you are doing a longer roadtrip that requires multiple swaps, this really makes it such that you are only getting 150 miles/swap. Using the suggested price of around $75 per swap, that's $0.50 per mile. Comparing to a 20 mpg car, that's about $10/gallon.

Tesla doesn't need one of these on every street corner, like gas stations are, because people just driving around town are just recharging at home. To really make this more economically similar to filling up a gas car, you have to be able to get full use of the battery (drive to empty), which will mean that these need to be every 25-50 miles, not every 150 miles. The emptier the car is at the swapping point, the more economical this becomes to the consumer. Until those distances get shorter, it is still more expensive than a gas car, but not horrendous, and a good option to have.

 

[deonb]

The real problem here, after thinking about it, is that tesla has said the superchargers will be about every 150 miles. This means, unless you are driving really slow, you won't be able to skip a supercharger/swapper and hit the next one. If you are doing a longer roadtrip that requires multiple swaps, this really makes it such that you are only getting 150 miles/swap. Using the suggested price of around $75 per swap, that's $0.50 per mile. Comparing to a 20 mpg car, that's about $10/gallon.

Tesla doesn't need one of these on every street corner, like gas stations are, because people just driving around town are just recharging at home. To really make this more economically similar to filling up a gas car, you have to be able to get full use of the battery (drive to empty), which will mean that these need to be every 25-50 miles, not every 150 miles. The emptier the car is at the swapping point, the more economical this becomes to the consumer. Until those distances get shorter, it is still more expensive than a gas car, but not horrendous, and a good option to have.

On the corridors they're starting off with (I5 and I95) the Tesla Stations are closer to 100 miles apart.

 

[mitch672]

On the corridors they're starting off with (I5 and I95) the Tesla Stations are closer to 100 miles apart.

Darien, CT ("the John Broder Memorial SC", being completed currently), and Milford, CT are only 30 miles apart, I expect only 1 of them will have a swapper. They are also adding a SuperCharger on the CT/RI border, that's about 75 miles from Milford, 100 from Darien. My bet, Darien gets the swapper.

 

[J in MN]

Since when does filling up a gas tank take so long???

Next time you need to fill up with 23 gallons, use a stopwatch to time yourself. Just remember not to cheat, i.e. start the stopwatch as soon as you stop the car, and stop the stopwatch only once you start driving away.

 

[Rifleman]

The real problem here, after thinking about it, is that tesla has said the superchargers will be about every 150 miles. This means, unless you are driving really slow, you won't be able to skip a supercharger/swapper and hit the next one. If you are doing a longer roadtrip that requires multiple swaps, this really makes it such that you are only getting 150 miles/swap. Using the suggested price of around $75 per swap, that's $0.50 per mile. Comparing to a 20 mpg car, that's about $10/gallon.

Tesla doesn't need one of these on every street corner, like gas stations are, because people just driving around town are just recharging at home. To really make this more economically similar to filling up a gas car, you have to be able to get full use of the battery (drive to empty), which will mean that these need to be every 25-50 miles, not every 150 miles. The emptier the car is at the swapping point, the more economical this becomes to the consumer. Until those distances get shorter, it is still more expensive than a gas car, but not horrendous, and a good option to have.

I would think that the average person road tripping and using the swappers, they would probably alternate, swapping once, then super charging once. After driving 300+ miles, they will most likely to be ready to get out of the car for a little bit, and the 45 minute break while super charging would fit that need. Where swapping will be really useful is that occasional time constrained road trip that is out of one charges range, but cannot sit around for 45 minutes charging due to time constraints. The swapper will be a limited market, and I would anticipate that they will only be installed on routes were only 1 recharge is needed to go from one city to another city.

 

[Teriyaki88]

Ummm...you guys missed the point. The time starts when you arrive at the pump. It takes time to get out of the car, take out your credit card, put in your authorization code/zip or whatever, then pick regular or premium, then finally pump the gas. And some stations add 20-30 seconds to decline the damn car wash questions. It TAKES THAT LONG (at least in CA).

 

[treehugger350]

Always enjoy watching Tesla events but the music is generally, and last night especially, horrendous. I know they have a brand image to keep up but the funky disco beats on repeat just sounded so obnoxious I could hardly watch.

Tesla - get a new DJ!