Captivated by the Tesla S Series Electric Car in Portland, Oregon

By Wesley Fryer On October 12, 2012 · · Add Comment

Today my wife and I traveled to Portland, Oregon, enroute to the Oregon Association of School Libraries 2012 Conference in Seaside where I’ll share a keynote tomorrow on “Mapping Media to the Common Core.” A couple weeks ago I heard the NPR segment, “Tesla’s Big Gamble: Can The Electric Car Go Mainstream” on the NPR Technology Podcast. In the episode they mentioned Tesla recently opened a new showroom in a Portland mall. Knowing I’d soon be venturing to Portland, I resolved to try and go to the showroom and see the Series S for myself. I went this afternoon, and was totally captivated not only by the Tesla Series S car but also by Tesla’s vision of disrupting the petroleum-based automative industry as we know it in the United States with a greener, electrical powered future. Here are some of my photos from today at the Tesla showroom in Portland with brief commentary.

The Portland Tesla showroom is located in Washington Square Mall.

This is the Series S, which is Tesla’s 2nd commercial vehicle designed to compete with upscale sport sedans.

The vehicle comes with 3 different battery options, which are all located below the car giving it a low center of gravity. The largest battery gives the car a range of 300 miles on a single charge, which (as far as I know) is the best in a currently available, commercial electric car.

There are over 6000 Lithium batteries like this one which comprise the Series S “car battery,” and they are liquid cooled. Tesla has over 300 patents on different elements of its car design, including its unique cooling system.

The charging plug was very cool – and GREEN, of course!

The interior was most stunning because of the multi-touch computer screen, which could show battery status, a navigation map, info about your music, a full size web browser, or additional diagnostic information about the car.

There are currently 13,000 people nationwide on the waiting list to buy their Tesla Series S, and this amounts to a 9 month wait.

The Series S can be re-charged in 4 to 9 hours in your garage, depending on the size of your battery and the charging level. It’s configured to plug into a regular dryer outlet.

I’m not going to be purchasing a Tesla Series S anytime soon, but there’s NO QUESTION I’d love to. BRING ON the electric car revolution!

Read more about Tesla’s amazing “Supercharger” stations they are in the process of installing around the United States on major interstate highway routes. Oklahoma City will be getting one soon!

Flash back to August 2010 and watch my video, “Meet the Tesla Electric Car,” which I shared in my post, “Jaycut, not YouTube, has the best online, free video editor today.”