Tesla's Elon Musk Gunning for Sub-$30,000 Electric Car in Less Than 4 Years

Tesla's Elon Musk Gunning for Sub-$30,000 Electric Car in Less Than 4 Years

Elon Musk, chairman of Tesla Motors, the only company in the United States currently producing an all-electric automobile, gives Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria an earful in the magazine's July 21 issue. Here are a few excerpts from the must-read interview :

"As a rough rule of thumb, when you increase the production quantity by a factor of 10, you can reduce the price by a factor of two. In the early 20th century, cars were initially something for wealthy people. It took quite some time for the cost to be optimized and become accessible to a broader population. It's the same thing here -- we'll see the traditional technology learning curve. We're trying to push it as fast as we possibly can, and we think we could either directly or in partnership with a major auto company actually get to a car that is under $30,000 in four years."

"We spent a lot of time last year looking at plug-in hybrids and ultimately concluded that it would not be a very good car. You're forced to compromise. Because you need both a gasoline-powered engine and a big battery, neither can be very good, and the engine will be a weak engine. It's just not where the future lies. We'll be able to offer a car with a 305-mile range roughly three years from now."

"I'm very familiar with the 'long tailpipe' criticism [that holds that electric vehicles aren't so clean, because the juice they require is often coal-fired]. I have another company, SolarCity, which is the largest provider of solar power to homes and businesses in California. The solution is to get a SolarCity solar panel on your roof and then have an electric car. It takes actually only a small solar-panel setup -- of about 10 by 15 feet -- to generate 200 to 400 miles a week of electricity for your car."

Scott Doggett:  is an AutoObserver.com Associate Editor.