Tesla Veteran Explains How Electric Motors Crush Gas Engines

Before leaving this year to join electric bus manufacturer Proterra as director of battery engineering, Dustin Grace spent almost nine years working on drivetrains at Tesla (“TSLA”). Grace sees the electric machines he has helped to perfect as feats of engineering as much as they are agents of environmental redemption. Arguing that electric motors are inherently superior to gasoline engines, he walks through several fundamental advantages that electric motors have over gas:

Electric motors generate motion, not heat. A fossil-fuel engine produces motion, basically, with tiny controlled explosions. Those explosions push interlocking pieces of metal, which connect to a driveshaft. All that metal rubbing together generates a lot of heat, even when the parts are swimming in oil. That’s energy that’s not being used to push a vehicle forward.

(Link to full article below)

https://fortune.com/2015/11/17/electric-motors-crush-gas-engines/

- David Z. Morris