Plug-in Vehicles

By Jeff Siegel On the 30th of April, everything is going to change... Why? Because Elon Musk says so. OK, maybe he didn't actually say that, but he did recently reveal that on April 30th, he'll be making a major announcement about a new product that is NOT an electric car. Most analysts have suggested that the announcement is regarding the release of what could ultimately be a game-changer for the solar industry  a game-changer that, if it delivers the way the Tesla Model S has delivered on performance, design, and efficiency, could catapult Tesla (NASD:TSLA) into one of...

John Petersen Industrial subsidies have been an important feature of the American economic landscape since the late 19th century for one simple reason – they work. After the steam locomotive proved its ability to quickly and cheaply move people and cargo long distances, the government launched a massive effort to span the country with steel rails and bring the benefits of a rapid, safe and reliable national transportation system to all its citizens. After electric lighting proved its merit, the rush was on to build a national infrastructure and bring the benefits to all. After the internal combustion...

Part I Arthur Porcari. Ever hear of China based NASDAQ listed Kandi Technologies (KNDI)? If you haven't, you're not alone. No financial writers, no analysts, and no significant institutions or funds are interested.  But they should be.  This series will go into the reasons why. In part II, we'll look at the company's business and history : Kandi is already selling EV mini-cars by the thousands.   Kandi landed a joint venture with three multi-billion dollar Companies for quick-change battery charging, with the first stations opening in November. Owns a mortgage free modern ten...

John Petersen This Saturday marks the second anniversary of my blog, which began with an article titled Lithium-ion Batteries and Centerfolds. Over time my archive has grown to 142 articles on energy storage devices, the companies that make them and their crucial role as enabling technologies for wind and solar power, transportation and the smart grid. While cleantech bloggers usually focus on new technologies that might be game-changers, I'd rather focus on major enhancements to proven technologies from established industry leaders. The reason is simple, hot new technologies have limited investment value if the world can't produce enough...

Tom Konrad CFA Kandi Technologies Vertical Parking Garage Mock-up at 2012 Hangzhou Green Expo. Source: Kandi investor presentation. The Chinese State Council Development Research Center Enterprise Institute, “a leading policy research and consulting institution directly under” China’s State Council, just released a policy whitepaper endorsing business model innovation as the key to China’s goal of rapid electric vehicle (EV) adoption. The policy details the well-known differences between electric and conventional car technology which create barriers to rapid EV adoption: Limited range when compared to gasoline vehicles (100-150km, compared to 400-500km) High cost...

Doug Young Chinese local media were trying to accentuate the positive when they reported that China’s new energy vehicle sales rose 10-fold in the first 4 months of this year. (Chinese article) That figure caught my attention, but then I read further into the reports and saw that even after the huge jump just 10,000 new energy vehicles were sold in China in January through April, averaging a meager 2,500 per month. Adding further gloom to the picture, the vast majority of vehicles were purchased by fleet operators of taxis and buses. Within the larger figure, half of all...

Tom Konrad CFA This article was first published on the author's Forbes.com blog, Green Stocks on May 31st as "Kandi Technologies: Weighing The Evidence." I have since added a short update to the end of the article. Last year, I brought Chinese off-road vehicle and electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer Kandi Technologies (NASD:KNDI) to readers’ attention.  I like Kandi because the company was already profitable and trades for a tiny fraction of what a US-based EV maker would. The Strategy I also like Kandi’s electric vehicle strategy, which focuses on inexpensive commuter vehicles...

Doug Young Tesla cruises into China I have to give my congratulations to new energy car maker Tesla (Nasdaq: TSLA) for creating the kind of buzz and excitement this week that only names like Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) and smartphone sensation Xiaomi have typically been able to muster. In the last 2 days, the company and its charismatic founder Elon Musk were all over the Chinese headlines as Tesla delivered its first electric vehicles (EVs) in China on the sidelines of the nation’s biggest annual auto show happening this week in...

Tom Konrad CFA On September 17th, the Chinese Ministry of Finance announced the long anticipated renewal of China’s New Energy Vehicle (i.e. electric vehicle or EV) subsidies.  The new subsidies for cars were in-line with market expectations, but will be reduced to 10% below the current levels next year, and 20% below the current levels in 2015.  Subsidies for buses fell short of expectations. Conventional gasoline-electric hybrid models were not included in the subsidies, but some plug-in hybrid (PHEV) were.  The subsidies amount to 60,000 ($9,802) yuan for pure electric autos with a range over 250 km (155 miles),...

By Jeff Siegel Oh my God! Oh my God! Saudi Arabia cut oil prices and crude fell all the way to $75.84 today. Sell it, dump it, run for the hills! How far will it go? No one knows. But hold on to your asses, because things are going to get crazy! We're awash in oil, demand is waning, the Saudi plan to wipe out the U.S. shale market is underway. Gas prices will fall back to $2.00 a gallon, everyone will be happy, gas-guzzlers will make a comeback, and electric cars are...

John Petersen A comment from maxkilmachina recently drew my attention to an article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences titled Valuation of plug-in vehicle life-cycle air emissions and oil displacement benefits. While it costs $10 to download the article and supporting documentation, I believe it's worthwhile for all serious energy storage and electric vehicle investors because the underlying study is the first comprehensive total cost of ownership analysis I've seen that includes both direct end-user costs and identifiable externalities like emissions, military and other indirect costs arising from oil consumption in the US. While all...

John Petersen I was recently invited to prepare a memorandum on the battery industry for the electric mobility working group of the World Energy Council, a global thought leadership forum established in 1923 that includes 93 national committees representing over 3,000 member organizations including governments, businesses and research institutions. Since my memorandum integrated several themes from this blog and tied them all together, I've decided to publish a lightly edited version for readers. To set the stage for the substantive discussion that follows, I’ll start with an 1883 quote from Thomas Edison: “The storage battery is one...

John Petersen The last few weeks have been a media and political circus in the US as a pair of high-profile Department of Energy loan guarantees wound up in bankruptcy court. In the first case, solar power innovator Solyndra filed two years after closing a $535 million loan for a factory that never quite made it into production. In the second case, flywheel storage innovator Beacon Power (BCONQ.PK) filed about a year after scoring a $43 million loan for a 20 MW frequency regulation plant that was commissioned in June. Both are black eyes for the Obama administration’s...

John Petersen The hardest part of blogging on subjects like energy storage and vehicle electrification is synthesizing the mass of data that's generated every year. While I'm not an engineer and don't have any special technical expertise beyond the lessons I learned as a director and officer of a small battery technology developer, my training as a lawyer and accountant stand me in pretty good stead when it comes to reviewing statistical forecasts and comparing the current version of a forecast with earlier versions of the same forecast. Every year the US Energy Information Administration, a unit...

John Petersen While the broader market focuses on trivial issues like Asia, the Eurozone and an upcoming presidential election, a small but extremely vocal segment of the car shopping public is breathlessly awaiting the dawn of a new age with the first deliveries Tesla Model S electric cars to customers on June 22nd. The excitement among fervent Tesla Motors (TSLA) acolytes is palpable, but I have to at least ask whether their view of the company's risk-reward profile is rational. Is Tesla a great investment opportunity, or are we witnessing a weird form of transference that...

Doug Young BYD e6 - Electric Taxi in Shenzhen, China. Photo by Brücke-Osteuropa If struggling car maker BYD (HKEx: 1211; Shenzhen: 002594; Pink:BYDDF) ultimately fails in its dream to become a leader in new energy vehicles, at least it will have lots of global assets to leave as a record of its efforts. Perhaps I'm sounding a bit too cynical in my latest musings on this company, since I really am starting to become more convinced that perhaps BYD's electric dreams could actually someday become a...