Elon Musk plans Tesla battery-swapping tech demo for June 20

Electric-car company Tesla is planing to hold a demonstration of its battery-swapping technology, which should enable its vehicles to travel nonstop on long road trips.

One thing holding many people back from buying a Tesla Model S is the fear of running out of power before the vehicle can make it to a power station. And since we don’t exactly have a ton of available travel stations (at least in comparison to gas stations), it makes driving over 500 miles nearly impossible on some routes. These concerns were perhaps inflated after a New York Times reviewer reported that he wasn’t able to get the full 250-300 mile distance off a single charge during a road trip.

And while the company flat-out denied the Times’s claims, it is apparently trying to curb those fears. Today Tesla founder Elon Musk announced on Twitter that his company would give a live demo of Tesla’s new battery-swapping tech on June 20 and post a video of the demo on its website shortly after. The move should presumably put potential Model S owners at ease when it comes to running out of power midtrip.

The news comes just weeks after fellow electric-car company Better Place, which tried to popularize the concept of battery-swapping, shut down after burning through almost $850 million. That said, it’ll be interesting to see if Tesla can make this work.

This is hardly the first time Tesla has done something big to make the notion of buying a Model S better than that of regular automobiles. Earlier this year, the company rolled out a financing plan that would allow Model S owners to essentially sell back their cars at the end of three years if they didn’t want them. Tesla also promises to set up more charging stations that will make it possible for a Model S to complete a road trip from coast to coast.