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The Chevrolet Commodities EV will match or exceed the Tesla Model 3 on primal specs when it goes on sale late this twelvemonth. Chevrolet just announced its EPA rating for range will exist 238 miles from its 60-kilowatt hr battery. Chevrolet confirmed this week that the list toll should exist less than $37,500, meaning less than $30,000 later a $7,500 federal tax credit.

This sets upwardly an interesting focus on mid-priced 200-mile EVs over the next year, with new or side by side-generation offerings expected from BMW, Nissan, Tesla, Volkswagen, and others. The entry indicate for competitiveness will probable be at to the lowest degree 200 miles range and $xxx,000 base price after tax credit. EVs with ranges of 75-100 miles will have to sell for about $10,000 less to exist competitive.

2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV

Bolt delivers Tesla Model iii specs a year earlier

Tesla says it has 400,000 potential Model three customers on its waiting list. They've put down $1,000 to hold a place in line, but those at the end of the line might non become their cars until the end of the decade. For some who like the cachet of the Tesla name, they'll stick with the waiting list. But others who want a serious compact runabout in 2022 without the range anxiety of today'due south 75- to 100-mile EVs volition exist open up to at least looking at the Bolt. Tesla is currently quoting a range of 200 miles for the Model iii.

One Chevrolet Bolt early adopter may be Apple c0-founder Steve Wozniak, who said in a Facebook mail service, "I expect to be switching cars soon!" Woz was pictured with a white Bolt, giving a thumbs-up. He has already owned a Toyota Prius and Tesla Model S.

Chevy Bolt Woz Facebook

Bolt press tests yielded 240 miles or more

Chevrolet recently ran a four-car test along the California coastline from Monterey down to Santa Barbara, a trip measuring 235 miles. The cars were piloted past journalists with Chevy engineers on board. The least economic commuter got 240 miles of range (235 miles plus an indicated 5 miles remaining). The near economical driver's Bolt showed 32 miles remaining, or an indicated range of 267 miles. With cool atmospheric condition at the start of the trip, some set the climate control to fan-only in social club to optimize mileage before switching to Ac in the afterward portions.

In other words, these drivers gave consideration to maximizing efficiency on a road that didn't permit every bit much risk for battery regeneration as yous'd get from stop-and-become urban driving. This suggests the Chevrolet Bolt/Tesla Model 3 grade should get 200 miles on a complete charge. The best-selling mid-cost EV, the Nissan Leaf, is rated at 84 miles with the 24-kWh battery and 107 miles with the 30-kWh battery. If drivers continue a cushion of, say, 15 miles nether nearly circumstances — never let the miles-remaining indicator fall below that floor — it knocks a bigger chunk out of the range of the Leaf-course EV.

Chevrolet Bolt charger

Bolt uses 60-kWh battery

The Commodities will use a sixty-kWh flat lithium ion bombardment pack with liquid thermal workout. There are 288 individual LiIon cells. It weighs 960 pounds and is located nether the cockpit floor, running the total width of the car and stretching from the firewall in front to the back of the rear seat. In that location's a built-in vii.2-kW charger. Chevrolet says information technology tin can add fifty miles of range in less than two hours from a 240-volt Level two charger, or a full charge in about nine hours. At that place volition exist an optional DC Fast Charging organization using an industry-standard SAE combo connector charging port that will add about ninety miles of range in 30 minutes.

The Bolt'due south electric motor produces 200 hp (150 kW) of power with 266 pound-feet of torque, giving it 0-60 mph acceleration of less than seven seconds. The Bolt measures 164 inches long, which puts it in the subcompact class. The Nissan Leafage, in comparing, is 175 inches long and the Honda Fit is 160 inches long.

Tesla $seven,500 tax credit expires sooner than Chevrolet's

First deliveries of the Bolt are slated "afterwards this year," Chevrolet says. That gives Chevrolet a one-yr atomic number 82 on Tesla's announced late-2017 first deliveries. Chevrolet volition also have the federal tax credit (up to $7,500) available longer than Tesla. The credit covers an automaker's start 200,000 sales.

Tesla's tax credit may exist close to reaching the limit around the time the first Model 3s curl out. Tesla tin tweak sales downward to legally extend the credit to several thousand more buyers. It works this fashion: The credit covers all cars sold in the quarter where the 200,000 cap is reached and it too covers the following quarter. That is followed by two quarters where the credit is halved (to $3,750) and two quarters where information technology's halved again ($1,875). Then it's gone. If Tesla is on track to attain the 200,000 cap tardily in the quarter, information technology could delay the 200,000th delivery until the kickoff of the next quarter.

All of that is momentary relief for Tesla. Chevrolet (actually, GM, since the credit jointly covers the automaker's brands) will have an advantage because its sales of EVs and plug-in hybrids (Chevrolet Commodities, Cadillac ELR) that are also covered are substantially less than Tesla'southward.