End of the Beginning 337
the Model S is, in fact, the best car is a huge vindication and,
I think, what will be hopefully seen historically as a turning
point in the transition from gasoline to electric.”^193 The
Toyota Prius won the competition in 2004 and Chevrolet
Volt won it in 2011.
While the Chevrolet Volt is not a true electric car, it
has a small combustion engine in reserve, it’s a first step.
General Motors admitted they started the Volt program as
a direct response to the Tesla Roadster.^355 “All the geniuses
here at General Motors kept saying lithium-ion technology
is ten years away, and Toyota agrees with us – and, boom,
along comes Tesla,” Bob Lutz of General Motors said. “So I
said, ‘How come some teeny little California start-up run
by guys who know nothing about the car business can do
this, and we can’t?’ That was the crowbar that helped break
up the logjam.”^59
Elon is not a fan of the Volt. The Volt’s battery pack is
half as large as the Roadster’s, but has only one sixth of the
electric range. “You’ll have a tiny engine pulling around a
big car with a dead battery – you’ll be the worst car on the
road,” Elon said of what will happen if the Volt’s battery
runs out of juice.^59 And Lutz is not yet a fan of Tesla. “This
is a little bit like saying that a new, exclusive, high-end
restaurant in New York, with a three week reservation list,
is ‘doing a better job’ in the food business than McDonald’s,
Burger King, Wendy’s, and Pizza Hut combined,” he said.^376
One of the executives who was blamed for killing the
EV1 was Lutz. He received e-mails like, “You sold out to the
oil companies,” “You killed my grandchildren,” and “I hope