Can an electric car give you the same feeling as a great sports car can? Porsche wants to convince you, with its all-electric Taycan
Hey there, welcome back, I’m Jeff. JR is the producer. And you are part of the best audience in the world—the Plain English audience. We have listeners from 184 countries. I didn’t even know there were 184 countries! But you’re out there and it’s my pleasure to be a small part of your routines. All the resources for today’s episode can be found at PlainEnglish.com/198 because this is episode 198. That makes sense, right? PlainEnglish.com/198.
Coming up on today’s episode: We’ve come a long way since an electric car meant a teeny little thing that looked like an insect or a rollerskate. We now have an electric car that looks like a Porsche—because it is one! The German carmaker has released the Taycan, a direct challenge to Tesla’s dominance in the luxury electric car space. We’ll talk all about the new Porsche Taycan in today’s episode. The phrasal verb we’ve chosen is “live up to”—maybe you can imagine the context already. And we have a quote to round out the show; the quote is from Ferdinand Porsche himself.
Porsche takes on Tesla with its all-electric Taycan
For a lot of people, it would be a dream: sitting behind the wheel of a Porsche sports car, the open road ahead is all yours. You hit the accelerator, you lean back in your seat, reach 60 miles an hour in under 3 seconds (if you dare). The only thing missing? The roar of the engine. And, for that matter, the shifting gears. That’s because you’re in the newest Porsche—the all-electric Taycan.
Porsche is an 88-year-old carmaker with a rich heritage of making high-performance vehicles—first, small sporty cars, and more recently bigger performance SUV’s. But can an electric vehicle match the performance of the famous Boxter or the 911? Can it live up to the expectations of Porsche buyers? And can it make a dent in market leader Tesla’s dominance of luxury electric vehicles?
It’s a big bet for the 88-year old company, and they’re taking it seriously. They unveiled the car in the Americas at Niagara Falls, a potent symbol of renewable energy. And they’ll make it at a factory in Stuttgart, Germany—the same place Porsche made its first sports car, the 356, in the 1950s, and where it makes its current flagship 911. Although it would have been cheaper to build a new factory in the countryside, the company wanted the new Taycan in the heart of Porsche’s operations and near its headquarters.
Taycan, a word of Turkic origin which roughly means “soul of a spirited young horse” (like the horse on the Porsche logo) has officially entered production. And it looks, if I may say so, amazing. It has Porsche’s signature teardrop-shape headlights; a sleek, low-to-the-ground profile; a muscular-looking front end.
The interior has almost no physical buttons; it’s all touch-screen. And yet it avoids the sense that you’re driving with a monitor glued to the console, like the Teslas, or with a tablet sticking up, like so many competitors.
As an electric car, the Taycan doesn’t have an internal combustion engine. It’s got two electric motors—one in the front and one in the rear—with a battery beneath the floor. If you’re a traditionalist and like to hear the roar of the engine, or if you’re like me and you like to shift your own gears, you might find the Taycan to be a bit of an adjustment.
But, speaking for myself, I think I could live with the compromises! Early reviews say it’s a pleasure to drive on the highway or back roads. Uniquely for an electric vehicle, it does have a transmission with two speeds—most electrics only have one speed. The Taycan’s top speed is 162 miles per hour; it can get to 60 miles per hour in 2.6 seconds. Over 20,000 people are already convinced; that’s how many pre-orders the company has taken.
A big question with electric vehicles is always range. Porsche says the Taycan can go 240 miles on a charge. It will take 22 minutes to get the battery 80 percent charged. Another question for the Taycan is how well it’s going to compete with the Tesla’s Model S. The Taycan is considerably more expensive than its competitor. They have similar acceleration and top speed. The Model S has the edge in range—it can go 345 miles, on a charge, compared with Taycan’s 240 miles—but the Taycan is definitely a sharper-looking car. The Model S was groundbreaking when it came out…seven years ago. Its design is a bit stale now.
What’s certain is that electric vehicles are coming into the mainstream. Not too long ago, electric vehicles were nerdy-looking small cars. You would not catch me driving a Nissan Leaf. But now, most large carmakers have extensive plans for electric vehicles. Porsche’s parent Volkswagen has plans to launch 70 new electric models in the next ten years. European countries, notably Norway, are embracing electric vehicles. China, too, is hoping to combat air pollution in its large cities with more electric vehicles.
The US, until now, has been a laggard in electric vehicle adoption. The government does provide subsidies and tax incentives to buyers of electric cars, it has traditionally not gone as far as counterparts in Europe. The wide-open spaces in America pose their own challenges—namely, setting up a network of electric vehicle charging stations. Europe has almost four times the population density of the US, so it’s more economical to build out charging stations there.
Ironically, one company that may be changing some of that in the US is Porsche parent Volkswagen itself. Part of the fallout from its egregious emissions cheating scandal is a $2 billion fine, which is now being used to fund new charging stations around the US.
So are you ready for your electric sports car? If so, you can order your Taycan now, starting at $150,900 for the entry level model and $185,000 for the higher-end model.
It looks like a nice car. I’m not a big fan of the big Porsche SUV’s, but the Taycan looks good. $150,000, though. That’s a lot. My favorite Porsche is still the Boxter, a much more reasonable $50,000 car. But you know, money no object, if I had to choose one sports car to drive, I think I might choose the Mazda Miata. I just love the way that car looks. I’ve never driven one, but I have a much more practical Mazda 3, which I absolutely love. So if I had my choice of sports cars, I think I might choose the Mazda Miata.
I was very practical when I got my current car. I thought about all the options, the tradeoffs, fuel efficiency, reliability, how big is it, safety features, cost. All that goes out the window when you buy a sports car. When you buy a sports car, I think, it’s just pure emotion. Just pure desire. If I ever have the opportunity or ability to buy a sports car, I need to take practical, analytical Jeff and lock him in a closet, and just go get the one that looks and feels best. We can dream, right?
I’d like to say hello to a few listeners. The first Afghan listener I have ever heard from is Alireza. I can see via my media host where people listen, and we have a handful of listeners in Afghanistan and I marvel at that, but I’ve never heard from anyone from Afghanistan, until Alireza sent me a note on WhatsApp. He’s living in Turkey now, 19 years old—that blows my mind. He’s been listening for a month, so I wanted to give a big and warm welcome to Alireza for joining us here at Plain English.
Ricardo from Sao Paulo is listening. He’s a seat belt engineer. So when you’re behind the wheel of your new electric sports car, you can thank Ricardo for keeping you safe as you accelerate from zero to sixty in just a few seconds. Also quick hello to Luiz, a mathematician from Belo Horizonte, Brazil; Aiden from South Korea, currently in Baltimore; and Victor Hugo from the beautiful historic city of Queretaro, Mexico.
Quick housekeeping item. I vastly improved the commenting system on our web site. It was just the straight out-of-the-box WordPress commenting system before, kind of dull. But now your avatar shows up, if you have one; you can reply to comments, upvote comments. You can downvote comments; I’m not sure I like that. Maybe I’ll try to remove that feature. We value all comments at Plain English! It’s a good way to practice writing, too. So go PlainEnglish.com/198 and tell me what you think about this episode—whether you think you’d want an electric sports car. Maybe tell me what your favorite one is.
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