Tesla Is Calling Out Other Manufacturers For Being Rubbish At Making Exciting Frugal Cars

American fuel economy targets are getting tougher; by 2025, manufacturers must get an average of 54.5mpg across their ranges. Unfortunately for the bean counters behind car makers, Americans just don’t buy efficient cars, so plans are being made to fight back against these more stringent emissions regulations. Simply put, car manufacturers want the target lowered.

There’s one manufacturer, though, that is swimming against the tide of industry opinion, and that’s Tesla. According to the Wall Street Journal, Elon Musk’s team is preparing to put forward an argument in favour of keeping the targets intact, or even making them tougher.

The problem is that gas-guzzling trucks and SUVs made up more than half of all vehicle sales in 2014, and with petrol prices dropping, their popularity shows no signs of diminishing. On the flip-side, hybrids, electric vehicles and clean-diesel vehicles represent a measly 5.6 per cent of sales; they cost more to make and buy, and with fuel prices dropping, there isn’t much of a draw for consumers.

In order to hit these new targets, it would mean selling fewer profitable trucks in favour of cars that don’t rake in cash. Obviously, for a company that only makes electric vehicles, this isn’t a problem, and it’s in Tesla’s best interests to make things difficult for its competition. Obviously, Musk’s intentions with Tesla are to prove to the world that clean cars are a real possibility, and he wants other manufacturers to follow his lead to make cleaner cars, however it would be naive not to think there’s a business motive behind this.

Tesla’s vice president of development, Dairmuid O’Connell, has come out on the offensive to say that the regulations are not very difficult to achieve, if only manufacturers would create hybrids and electric vehicles people actually want to buy:

“We are about to hear a lot of rhetoric that Americans don’t want to buy electric vehicles…From an empirical standpoint, the [regulations] are very weak, eminently achievable and the only thing missing is the will to put compelling products on the road.”

It’s a fair point. With the amount of money most companies throw at research and development, there’s no doubt they could create brilliant low-emission vehicles. It would be a bold step, but the best way to reduce the cost of hybrids and EVs would be to invest in the technology heavily and make it the only option.

It’s not like it’d be a huge leap - the Chevrolet Bolt will be with us in a couple of years with a Tesla-rivalling range of 200 miles, but by that time Musk’s vehicles will likely travel even further. All the time people are buying into uneconomical petrol cars and trucks, though, progress will be slow.

"But I’m a petrolhead! Why should I care about economy cars?" I hear you cry. Well, for a start, we’re on an irreversible plummet towards economical vehicles - and anyone who has choked and spluttered their way through a large city will know this isn’t necessarily a bad thing - so why put up with half measures and stop gaps? The naturally-aspirated V8 is becoming a thing of the past, so instead of sitting back and complaining about 1.6-litre three pots and artificial noise, I believe it’s better to get behind the next generation of fascinating technology, and the opportunities it brings.

Anyone who has enjoyed the instant acceleration of a Tesla, or has seen how hypercars like the McLaren P1 use electric motors to fill an engine’s torque gaps, will know that the performance car is far from dead. What we need now is huge investment in a new generation of battery technology so that we can properly utilise the potential performance benefits. There will always be a place for a classic internal combustion engine, but it’s about time manufacturers stopped thinking purely about lining their pockets.