Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) has been a lightning rod of controversy from its beginning, to say the least, and discussion concerning its stock, TSLA, is no different. Those folks interested in the company, or more specifically the Tesla Roadster (or perhaps more generally electric cars) find themselves asking whether they should buy Tesla stock.

Is the stock a good value at this point and a great time to get in on the ground floor?  Or, is Tesla grossly overrated and the stock destined to plunge into a free fall any moment?

Tesla's rather unlikely ascent and early success is rather well covered.  Their iconic sports car, the Tesla Roadster, has been the poster child for all EV car enthusiasts and their history does not need repeating here.  The company has only been around a short while, but it feels like it has weathered the initial storms that battered it since about 2006, though it is by no means in the clear yet.

Electric vehicles (EV) are in the news on a daily basis, globally as well as locally--featured in articles in local, nightly news reports as well as national glossy magazines. Everyday you can find that another company is set to release an electric car this year or a young startup has discovered some groundbreaking technology that will suddenly change the industry.

It's becoming more and more difficult to understand if this is simply electric vehicle hype or if we are witnessing an EV Revolution that is a clear and distinct paradigm shift, marking move away from gasoline powered vehicles to those powered by electricity.

It's helpful at this point to perform an electric car survey of the various car companies--both new and old--to see what is perhaps going to be released in the next year or so.  The mix essentially contains established, larger auto manufacturers like Toyota, Nissan and GM with a large development budget and plenty of resources and those smaller upstarts like Tesla, Fisker and Aptera who are struggling to find a legitimate place at the table.  All parties are ultimately fighting for what is currently a rather limited, but seemingly growing, electric vehicle market.

Electric Vehicles from Large Automakers

Google once again puts its support behind renewable energy projects, this time installing the nation's first wireless, hands-free charging system.

The inductive energy charging system called Plugless Power manufactured by Evatran, LLC will be used at Google's Mountain View headquarters to charge one of its low-speed, short-range electric vehicle it uses to motor around the grounds.

The CEO of Plugless Power, Tom Hough, says that "the interest shown by Google and the cooperation we’ve received to retrofit their EV provides evidence that a simple, convenient charging process is needed for the widespread adoption of electric vehicles.”

To use the inductive charging system, a vehicle simply pulls up to the machine, positioning the vehicle adapter over the parking block and the charging begins.  There is a small energy loss of about 10% from traditional wired charging but charging times are not increased.  According to the company,"the battery will continue to accept the same amount of power at one time, but the charger will draw additional watts from the electrical outlet to compensate for the small efficiency loss."

Renewable Energy firm Harvest Power has recently raised $51.7 million in a Series B clean tech funding round from a host of venture capital firms led by Generation Investment Management, a company co-founded by Al Gore. Harvest Power, based out of Waltham, Mass., processes organic matter such as yard waste and discarded food to produce methane, which can then be used as a fuel for generating electricity.

The company has plans to build two new facilities in Canada, one of which Harvest has already broken ground on. This renewable energy facility, outside of Vancouver, will become North America’s first commercial-scale high solids anaerobic digestion facility.

In addition to producing methane, Harvest Power can generate fertilizer in the process as well as compressing the natural gas for transportation purposes.  In fact, the company hopes to use the new green tech funding to also add new renewable energy technologies.  One of which would utilize a high temperature process to make synthesis gas, or Syngas. The by-product can then be used to generate electricity, automotive fuels and additional chemical products.

Press Release

Photo from Harvest Power

As gas prices continue to rise, interest in alternatives to gasoline powered vehicles, notably electric cars, draws more and more attention.  Does this strong interest, however, translate into an increased interest in demand for electric vehicles?

It's obviously the case that high prices at the pump draw more attention to alternative fuel choices, as well as other options such as bicycling and public transportation. Suddenly, there is a feeling of urgency in the air, as if car manufacturers can't get their fuel efficient cars out quickly enough and everyone needs to trade in their SUV for a hybrid.  It remains to be seen, however, just how high prices have to go until we actually see large numbers of alternatives on the road.

Highlighted below are a series of articles that speculate on this phenomenon and question how high fuel prices will change the demand for electric cars and the purchasing decisions of their potential buyers:

Sales for the range-extended Chevy Volt have been off to a rather slow start thus far in 2010, less than 1,000 so far, but General Motors remains optimistic that the Volt will sell well and may have plans to increase production this year and next.

According to GM CEO Dan Akerson, production will increase on the Volt to 120,000 a year by the 2012 model build. That is a jump from the 10,000 originally planned for this year as well as the 45,000 to 60,000 once hoped for in 2012.