After Challenger explosion, space’s age of innocence ends

Likewise Marine :-)

The real test of time with be the residual value of these cars on the secondary market once the warranty expires and the batteries need replacement.

Only no German cars? What about a Japanese car?

As a fellow Volt owner, I share your observations. I console myself with having the rarely needed engine with the knowledge that I will have to get to 400,000 miles on the car before I have 100,000 miles on the engine.

I love Dan Neil but did he actually drive this car or just tour the factory?

Tesla's batteries are going to be made here, in Reno. The battery market is already a big, fast growing market and batts will be made all over the world, where it makes the most economic sense. The nice thing is that, regardless of what Tesla says, the battery market is basically a commodity market, with lots of low cost providers. Win for consumers regardless of origin.

That's not the kind of driving these cars were meant for. Drive an EV in town, rent an ICE car for road trips (or, if you're like most families with two or more cars, have your second car be ICE).

There are several reasons to criticize Tesla as a car company. Yes their high end models are brilliant, their owners claim near perfect satisfaction even though reliability measured objectively, seems low. But as a business, being able to compete at the $40K price point ought to be important, and Tesla is going to suffer for their vapor ware. What Tesla can do, GM and Volkswagen likely can do better.

Driving the car around a campus is not even close to a road test. How bad is this author??? Is he on the GM payroll?

According to the article, the battery in a Bolt weighs 960 pounds. So you need a 960-pound battery to store enough energy to move the vehicle 200 miles. That's about five pounds of battery per mile.

Or for the price of a single Tesla Model S, buy a new Corolla, new MX-5, new RAV4 and have $30k left over to invest and pay for the gas & maintenance on those vehicles for the rest of their lifespan. Problem really solved.

It would be interesting to know the economics at an annual production rate of 500,000.

"You can’t object that the Bolt is too expensive, because it won’t be;"$37,000 isn't too expensive for a small vehicle with very limited utility? Oh, that' right. The $7,500 credit is like free money.

Now, in CA, it has been unleashed, by legislative design. It is now a huge new revenue source for the big IOUs.

I'd like to respectfully point out, though, that wind chill is only a 'thing' to human beings; your car only cares about the actual temperature. Although maybe I mis-interpreted and you meant that if your Leaf left you stranded, you'd be walking in -30 deg F wind chill, which we both know is potentially deadly.

I really like my Fit EV commute mobile and this car looks like it will be even better: same price but triple the range.

Here's a suggestion: all those in favor of nineteenth century gas propulsion technology start your engines in your garage, (make sure the garage door stays closed) I will do the same with my electric car, after two hours all our problems should be resolved.

I was referring to GM generically. Maybe Volt is OK now, but who knows long term? I am sure that Cruz owners were fine with the new ignition switch.

maybe 200 mile range is great if you live in NYC. Anywhere else, and that car is seriously flawed. Kind of hard to drive to Charleston or Savannah for the weekend if you have to stop and charge for 3 hours twice along the way. Sorry.

....because airplanes are so fuel efficient

Great article, good points. I especially like the quaint phrase '

It's kind of fun watching you luddites squirm.

You are correct, the math doesn't work. Factor in low re-sale and it is even worse.

CAFE is a dumb idea. The government should let consumers decide what kind of car they want to drive. I don't want to drive a Bolt or anything similar. If the government wants to do something useful to clean up the environment, it can abolish the ethanol fuel requirements. Corn-based ethanol is an environmental disaster.

Isn't it wonderful that even our car reviewer/critic/pusher is selling climate change. No wonder more and more of us are leaving mainstream media: it panders to its elitist owners.

Hope to see this car in the upcoming local auto show even if it is only to look at and learn about.

Comes down this- do you trust GM to make something that won't crash, blow up, or fall apart?Lots of other car choices, so I will wait a few years before even considering GM for an EL car. I'll let others take the risks.

So what does it drive like?

Every time we stopped at an AFB, I realized I made a mistake joining the Marines:-)

I live overseas and want to see this car in South America but so far GM is ignoring the market. Gas has not gone down at all here and I would not care if it had. I would still buy an electric car.

-- Do you actually think $7K or so subsidy, will swing a decision to buy a $80K car? Only in a mature market would 9% make a real difference. The electric car market is far from that.

Dan Neil gets this right that the Bolt is about execution of procurement, leveraging LG not just for the batteries, but much of the other electronics as well. By building the Bolt and Volt, GM is gaining scale that will allow much of its fleet to be hybridized as the CAFE requirements ratchet up. Just look at the Malibu Hybrid - it's a Volt under the skin but with a smaller battery and bigger engine; at 45 MPG, it shows how GM will meet the CAFE standards within 10 years (which will likely be extended out beyond 2025). GM simply needs to eventually make all of its cars like the Malibu Hybrid, leveraging the learning from the Volt and purchasing scale of the batteries/drivetrain gained from the Bolt. Assuming the cost is competitive, consumers should actually like their cars becoming hybridized (just look at current consumer satisfaction for electrics & hybrids) - more torque/low-end pick-up, brakes that never need replacing, silent operation much of time and likely greater reliability.

Whatever Chevrolet does, don't mess with the Chevrolet Impala. Driving a little 200-mile distance little car on I20 or I10, from Dallas to El Paso is right next to nuts. Wonder at which speed the little cars would fly? 75? 80? Come to think of it, they might, on the no-limit Autobahn at 200km +?!

This line is either a joke or a flat-out lie: "you can’t say it doesn’t have enough range, because it certainly will". Maybe for a limited number of people who have relatively short commutes and then never drive anywhere for family trips, medical necessity, or pure pleasure 200 miles is plenty of range. I will wait until the range is similar to what I get in my gas powered vehicles and the refill time is minutes instead of hours.

The tow companies up on Donner Pass absolutely love these things. Anyone attempting to get over the pass in an electric car is a guaranteed customer. It's a long and expensive tow to the nearest charger.

Climate change is a hoax. Electric cars belong on the golf course. If only GM had spent the time and resources on fixing the Ignition Condition, instead of trying to build a better crossbow. Naturally, the new emission standards were part of the bailout. Obama, lying as always, did not "save" the car industry; he accelerated the ruination of cars for consumers. Much like he did with health care. Obama should take a slow electric car to China and learn what real pollution is.

It sure is ugly!

I;m all for Hydrogen but doesn't it cost a ton to produce? Kind of like ethanol that takes more energy to produce than it yields?

1. A who saw the blast that killed a ton of National Guardsman who were "protecting your freedoms" for cheap and steady oil supplies

I think Tesla's are ugly cars, rather have a MB or BMW or maybe even a Maserati.

Guy is awful.

I'm just continually surprised at the series of incremental leaps, which spread over a five year timespan look to be gigantic. Reflects the American spirit.

A 200 mile range might be OK, but how long does it take to recharge the batteries? If you want to drive somewhere 400 miles distant, you must include at least one charging break in your trip. My house can draw 20 kW off the electric grid, and if all that power were redirected to the Volt, it would charge in 3 hours. Perhaps commercial charging stations could do it more quickly, but I suspect that an appreciable time would be required. Ultimately, the speed of charging would be limited by heating in the batteries. Ignoring the charge time effectively limits the Volt to a special purpose vehicle of limited usefulness.

But a high-mileage gasoline-powered car needs only 25 or 30 pounds of fuel to go that far.

I actually read it three times to really understand it. It actually is quite factual. The standards are spiraling upward so why fight it?Plus he didn't support climate change. (Ftr, I'm a skeptic. Both sides have too much $$ at stake). He called it the politics of climate change.

You ever notice that detractors will say "I never see any cars using those charging stations!" Then if they are used, they say, "There are never enough charging stations"

With gas at $1.50 gallon, electric cars are an endangered species. Hope you sold your TSLA.

Trying to wade through this article for useful information. Reading Dan Neil is all about Dan Neil.

Statements like this"It was and is wise public policy, regardless of the current price of oil. Fuel economy/emissions standards are spiraling upward around the industrialized world as governments turn to face the challenge and politics of climate change. "Shows such a lack of sense that it makes everything else written by the author questionable, at best.

With gasoline headed toward $1/gallon, how much appeal will expensive electric cars have? Doesn't seem to be addressed in this article.

The $7500 tax credit is over 4 times higher than the average taxpayer saves with the mortgage interest deduction.

If I'm not mistaken electricity is produced from natural gas and coal fired plants. Wouldn't a vehicle running on natural gas be more efficient as it removes one of the production steps? I know the subsidies make billionaires like Tesla happy but it seems more sensible to push for natural gas powered vehicles.

Which vehicle would you take on a road trip? Neither you would take a gasoline powered car.

Still no economics to these vehicles, you never recover your initial capital cost. That's why EV's/Hybrids are stuck at about 3% of the market and sold to people who want to make a "green" fashion statement.

If the mortgage interest deduction was eliminated, home prices would adjust down and then stabilize.

MPGe. Look it up.

A legit reason for YOU to buy a Volt. But the rest of us do not fly MD-80s. So WE run very short on reasons to buy one...lack of practicality, enormous total cost per mile among reasons we avoid them.

"[CAFE 54.5mpg] was and is wise public policy, regardless of the current price of oil." - I disagree - utilize Milton Friedman's third party effect if you must, and tax gas commensurate with the quantitative effect of emissions - and use the money to offset emissions - that is the real, principled, way to address CO2 emissions. To pick a number out of the air - 54.5mpg in this case, is governmental nonsense, and it is silly to consider it "wise", as so little real science or economic analysis went into it. Completely unprincipled.

Great pointThe only option is nuclear which they hate even more than coal

Is there some technological reason that it has to look like a miniature Pontiac Aztek, one of the ugliest cars of all time?!?!

I rely on poor people like you to help me live well. That's why I incorporated my business in Ireland and structured my company to pay royalties there. It's all legal and I thank you for your support

C'mon...everybody feeds at the govt trough in one way or another. Get off your high horse.

Thanks for pointing out the wind chill implications of my statement. My reference to wind chill was not for the car. It was for me. Running the heater in the Leaf REALLY uses power, so if I get in out of the wind (especially with my little 3 year old in his unheated car seat) I am more inclined to turn on the heater and consume miles in the form of warm air. Otherwise I cycle the heater on and off to clear windows and take the chill off, while relying on the seat heaters and heated steering wheel to make my journey tolerable. Cold weather will be a challenge for any EV. And you are right about the risk of having to walk for help in -30F wind chill. Living in St. Paul you might find enough charging stations around to make an EV very practical. Good luck if you give one a try.

Very convincing article. Per state, and I believe there will be a large variation, what is the cost of power procured from the outlet at home to give the 60kwh battery a full charge? Compare that to a hybrid getting 45mpg and a new gasoline engine that gets 35mpg to gasoline being $1.45-2.25 a gallon. I would be very curious. Because pie in the sky aside, the economics need to make sense for scalability. And how rock solid are the 1) emissions legislation and 2) the tax credit program? Thank you to anyone responding.