Electric automaker Tesla Motors posted a blog post on its website earlier this week detailing how the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Program had helped it expand and prepare not just one but many electric cars for the market.
The blog post was designed to help rally support for the ATVM low-interest loans, which despite helping many automaker bring zero or low-emissions vehicles to market could be in jeopardy under increasing pressure from the Republican party.
But Tesla isn’t just speaking out in defense of a scheme which helped it get to where it is today: it wants more money.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the Palo Alto-based firm has recently filed another low-interest loan application under the scheme -- although company officials have declined to detail just how much Tesla has asked for.
UPDATE: Tesla's Ricardo Reyes contacted us over the paragraph below, to point out that the company has said it has enough cash on hand to finish development of both the upcoming 2012 Model S and the subsequent Model X crossover.
The requested loan, Reyes said, is to help the company "build increasingly affordable electric vehicles," but he gave no other details.
At the moment no-one outside the company knows what the money will be used for, but we’d like to guess it has something to do with either the 2012 Model S due to be unveiled in a few weeks’ time -- or the Model X crossover SUV Tesla aims to make for 2014.
Just like any other applicant, Tesla Motors will have to prove that it is a good recipient of the loan and will have not only the ability to pay it back but also to survive without official funding from the DOE.
+++++++++++
