Stealthy Combo Tesla + Toyota Sneak Out a Surprise: the RAV4 EV!

July 12th, 2010 by Susan Kraemer

I once hosted a booth at an eco festival – just like this one – flanked by one of the original RAV4 electric vehicles, Plug-in America’s Marc Geller’s.

All day I was besieged by throngs of moms trailing sandy-footed children dripping icecream, urgently asking “Ooooh!!! Can we get the RAV4 EV again?” “Is the EV version for SALE again??? It’s perfect for me!” “I need this EV!” “What ever possessed Toyota to stop making the electric version?”

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I had never experienced a consumer frenzy like it. Now admittedly, this was an eco fair, and this was an electric vehicle: but none of the other eco products generated this response.

Surely Toyota is aware of this fan base, so I have never understood why Toyota abandoned it. California’s mandates in the 90’s forced it to reluctantly give birth to the electric RAV4, and now, according to Electrovelocity it is California that has just delivered it back to Toyota again.

To the great astonishment of everyone in the EV world, Elon Musk of Tesla just delivered a new RAV4 electric vehicle prototype to Toyota on Friday.

Not a hint preceded it. Indeed, both companies suggested that Toyota’s investment in Tesla would NOT generate any collaboration, or new shared electric vehicle development.

It and the other electric vehicle prototype that Tesla delivered, (a Lexus RX) are both tough SUVs capable of carrying the weight of the lithium-ion battery packs without any changes or strengthening in the suspension or chassis.

Toyota is now said to be aiming to sell the RAV 4 version for around $40,000 initially, with a 150 mile range, in 2012. Even second hand RAV4 EVs were selling on eBay in that price range (and up to $60,000!) so the reissue makes sense.

And a Corolla version is planned. Sensible, obvious moves. I wonder why everyone was so taken by surprise.

Image: The Creative Greenius (at a different eco fair)

Susan Kraemer @Twitter

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Tags: CARB, mandates, RAV4 EV, stealth, Tesla, Toyota

About the Author

Susan Kraemer writes at CleanTechnica, CSP-Today, PV-Insider , SmartGridUpdate, and GreenProphet. She has also been published at Ecoseed, NRDC OnEarth, MatterNetwork, Celsius, EnergyNow, and Scientific American. As a former serial entrepreneur in product design, Susan brings an innovator's perspective on inventing a carbon-constrained civilization: If necessity is the mother of invention, solving climate change is the mother of all necessities! As a lover of history and sci-fi, she enjoys chronicling the strange future we are creating in these interesting times. Follow Susan on Twitter @dotcommodity.

http://zenestate.blogspot.com/ John W. Rivard

This should be a good partnership for both Tesla and Toyota. They seem to me to have a pretty good split of strengths and weaknesses. Both companies and the general public should benefit. Somebody has to do the initial work and put those first few models out there even if not many people can afford them. I have not heard about any complaints yet from Tesla Roadster owners.
http://www.LowCostMLS4u.com Leota Ulerio

Hi,

I wanted to say that I have been watching for a while and I would like to sign up for the feed. I’ll give it a try but I might need some help. This is a good find and I would hate to lose touch, and maybe never discover it again.

Anyway, thanks again and I look forward to reading again in the future!
http://electrovelocity.com/ Ben Branch

@Roger – I agree about the pricing issue. The problem at the moment is the cost of the lithium-ion, a battery pack big enough for a car is going to cost $10-15,000 USD (this is why when you buy a Nissan Leaf they lease you the battery). With mass production and the continued 8-10% increase in battery capacity each year we should see these battery costs continue to decline. In the meantime cars like the Chevy Volt/Vauxhall Ampera are a good compromise.
Roger L

Hey Susan: Nice article but what percentage of the population can afford a 60K vehicle no matter the savings. Yes, you have to go there first to get the price down later, but real movement on the e vehicles will not take hold until some one mass produces a lower middle class available vehicle (under 20K) that can replace such vehicles in use today. Maybe you can do some research and publish some findings about how the automotive guys might get to this point. It would be interesting. Maybe the government is now focused on achieving this or helping this occur??

Roger
- http://cleantechnica.com/author/susan Susan Kraemer
  
  @Roger Actually the writers at Gas 2.0 regularly cover the innovation stream in post-oil age driving. The RAV4 news just caught my interest because of my experience with it. I agree about pricing.
Paul

The surprise has been that’s it’s taken so long for Toyota to make these moves AT ALL. The fact that they’re going to Tesla AT ALL proves they don’t even have a strong electric motor R&D program under way.

Toyota have been caught off-guard by it’s arrogance/ignorance by the demand demonstrated for the Nissan Leaf which sold out it’s first years production in just 35 days.

An EV Corolla that goes like a Tesla Roadster??!! They’ll have a stampede on their hands, just like Nissan already have.