Se os Estados unidos fizessem uma lista de compras – apenas o essencial para a manutenção do seu poderio estratégico, como ela seria?

A resposta está em um longo documento publicado na noite de domingo pelo site WikiLeaks.

O documento mostra que o Departamento de Estado americano pediu que diplomatas em todo o mundo fizessem uma lista da infraestrutura e recursos imprescindíveis aos EUA nos países onde trabalham.

O telegrama, enviado em 18 de fereveiro de 2009, mostra uma primeira versão do que seria chamado de Iniciativa de Dependência Crítica de Infraestrutura estrangeira. Detalha todos os locais considerados etsratégicos para a sobrevivência dos EUA – de cabos de telefonia a minas. Fazem parte da lista por exemplo o gasoduto Nadyn, na Rússia, descrito como “o gasoduto mais importante do mundo”. A empresa MacTaggart Scott, na Escócia, é relatada como “crítica” para os submarinos nucleares”.

No Brasil, a principal preocupação dos EUA é com cabos de trasnsmissão submarinos em Fortaleza (Americas II e GlobeNet), e com as minas gerenciadas pela britânica Rio Tinto Company em Minas Gerais e Rio de Janeiro – elas fornecem minério de ferro – e com a Mina Catalão I, em Goiás (explorada pela Anglo American), que fornece nióbio, usado orincipalmente em ligas de aço. Até a Venezuela tem infraestrutura críitca para os EUA: são os cabos submarinos Americas-II, que passa por Camuri e GlobeNet, que passa por Punta Gorda, Catia La Mar, e Manonga.

O Departamento de Estado – já sob a administração de Hillary Clinton – pediu que os funcionários das embaixadas adicionassem quaisquer infraestruturas que considerassem essenciais, assim como “qualquer informação que mostre que a infraestrutura ou recursos críticos seja um alvo de fato ou esteja especialmente vulnerável por conta de circunstâncias naturais”. Mais do que que isso. Como mostra o telegrama, a coisa toda teria que ser feita em segredo: “não estamos pedindo que as embaixadas consultem os governos a respeito desse pedido”. Mais uma prova de que as embaixadas americanas no mundo fazem principalmente trabalho de inteligência.

Outro telegrama, enviado pela embaixada dos EUA no Qatar no dia 26 de março de 2009, revela também como o governo americano se importa com a segurança de cada uma dessas instalações. Por exemplo, os EUA procuram oferecer apoio financeiro para esses países, ou oferecer tecnologia e serviços americanos na proteção desses locais.

O documento é classificado como secreto, a mais forte classificação dentre os documentos obtidos pelo WikiLeaks – que não contém documentos “top secret”. Mesmo assim, cerca de 1,5 milhão de funcionários americanos tinha acesso a ele.

Stuxnet is a Windows-specific computer worm first discovered in June 2010 by VirusBlokAda, a security firm based in Belarus. It is the first discovered worm that spies on and reprograms industrial systems,^[1] the first to include a programmable logic controller (PLC) rootkit,^[2] and the first to target critical industrial infrastructure.^[3] It was specifically written to attack Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems used to control and monitor industrial processes.^[4] Stuxnet includes the capability to reprogram the PLCs and hide its changes.^[5]

The worm’s probable target has been said to have been high value infrastructures in Iran using Siemens control systems.^[6][7] According to news reports the infestation by this worm might have damaged Iran’snuclear facilities in Natanz^[8][9] and eventually delayed the start up of Iran’s Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant.^[10] Siemens has stated, however, that the worm has not in fact caused any damage.^[11]

Russian digital security company Kaspersky Labs released a statement that described Stuxnet as “a working and fearsome prototype of a cyber-weapon that will lead to the creation of a new arms race in the world.” Kevin Hogan, Senior Director of Security Response at Symantec, noted that 60% of the infected computers worldwide were in Iran, suggesting its industrial plants were the target.^[12] Kaspersky Labs concluded that the attacks could only have been conducted “with nation-state support”, making Iran the first target of real cyberwarfare.^[13][14][15]

[edit]History

The worm was first reported by the security company VirusBlokAda in mid-June 2010, and roots of it have been traced back to June 2009.^[5] It contains a component with a build time stamp from 3 February 2010.^[16]

In the United Kingdom on 25 November 2010, Sky News announced that it had received information that the Stuxnet worm, or a variation of the virus, had been traded on the black market. Sky News stated that the virus had possibly been traded to a criminal gang or terrorist group and that such a virus was a “tier 1″ threat to national security.^[17]

[edit]Affected countries

A study of the spread of Stuxnet by Symantec showed that the main affected countries as of August 6, 2010 were:^[18]

[edit]Operation

Stuxnet attacks Windows systems using four zero-day attacks (plus the CPLINK vulnerability and a vulnerability used by the Conficker worm) and targets systems using Siemens‘ WinCC/PCS 7 SCADA software. It is initially spread using infected USB flash drives and then uses other exploits to infect other WinCC computers in the network. Once inside the system it uses the default passwords to command the software.^[5]Siemens advises immediately upgrading password access codes.”^[22]

Stuxnet requires specific variable-frequency drives (frequency converter drives) on the system. It only attacks systems with variable-frequency drives from two specific vendors: Vacon based in Finland and Fararo Payabased in Iran.^[23] It monitors the frequency and only attacks systems that run between 807Hz and 1210Hz which is very high and only used in particular industrial applications. Stuxnet then modifies the output frequency for a short interval of time to 1410Hz and then to 2Hz and then to 1064Hz and thus affects the operation of the connected motors.^[24]

The complexity of the software is very unusual for malware. The attack requires knowledge of industrial processes and an interest in attacking industrial infrastructure.^[1][5] The number of used zero-day Windows exploits is also unusual, as zero-day Windows exploits are valued, and crackers do not normally waste the use of four different ones in the same worm.^[6] Stuxnet is unusually large at half a megabyte in size,^[25]and written in different programming languages (including C and C++) which is also irregular for malware.^[1][5] It is digitally signed with two authentic certificates which were stolen^[25] from two certification authorities (JMicron and Realtek) which helped it remain undetected for a relatively long period of time.^[26] It also has the capability to upgrade via peer to peer, allowing it to be updated after the initial command and control server was disabled.^[25][27] These capabilities would have required a team of people to program, as well as check that the malware would not crash the PLCs. Eric Byres, who has years of experience maintaining and troubleshooting Siemens systems, told Wired that writing the code would have taken many man-months, if not years.^[25]

A Siemens spokesperson said that the worm was found on 15 systems with five of the infected systems being process manufacturing plants in Germany. Siemens claims that no active infections have been found and there were no reports of damages caused by the worm.^[21] Jeffrey Carr raised the possibility that the Stuxnet took India’s INSAT-4B Satellite out of action, making it effectively dead.^[28] However, ISRO has provisionally ruled out the possibility of Stuxnet attack, and awaits further details from Carr’s presentation on the topic.^[29]

[edit]Removal

Siemens has released a detection and removal tool for Stuxnet. Siemens recommends contacting customer support if an infection is detected and advises installing the Microsoft patch for vulnerabilities and prohibiting the use of third-party USB flash drives.^[30]

The worm’s ability to reprogram external programmable logic controllers (PLCs) may complicate the removal procedure. Symantec’s Liam O’Murchu warns that fixing Windows systems may not completely solve the infection; a thorough audit of PLCs is recommended. In addition, it has been speculated that incorrect removal of the worm could cause a significant amount of damage.^[31]

[edit]Prevention

Prevention of control system security incidents,^[32] such as from viral infections like Stuxnet, is a topic that is being addressed in both the public and the private sector. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) National Cyber Security Division’s operates the Control System Security Program (CSSP).^[33] The program operates a specialized Computer Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT), conducts a biannual conference (ICSJWG), provides training, publishes recommended practices, and provides a self-assessment tool. Several industry organizations^[34][35] and professional societies^[36][37] have published standards and best practice guidelines providing direction and guidance for control system end-users on how to establish a Control System Security management program. The basic premise that all of these documents share is that prevention requires a multi-layered approach, often referred to as “defense-in-depth”. The layers include policies & procedures, awareness & training, network segmentation, access control measures, physical security measures, system hardening, e.g., patch management, and system monitoring e.g., anti-virus, IDS, etc. The standards and best practices also all recommend starting with a risk analysis and a control system security assessment.^[38] The purpose is to assess the current level of risk and the size of the gap between that risk and what is tolerable. The other purpose of an assessment is to identify the vulnerabilities and develop a prioritized program to eliminate or minimize them.

In response to these concerns, Cyber security standards and certifications programs such as ISA 99 and SASecure have been developed to evaluate and certify the security of industrial automation products.

Automation, SCADA and Control System developers often use off-the-shelf equipment, software and protocols, integrating and configuring these in different ways for a variety of applications. This ‘common’ approach can make it easier for malware to bring down some vulnerable systems. However, proprietary Automation, SCADA and Control System developers, eg. Infinitronix and others, are able to provide a completely ‘bespoke’ solution, using new protocols and HW/SW/FW solutions yet unknown to developers of malware.

[edit]Speculations about the target and origin

Alan Bentley of security firm Lumension has said that Stuxnet is “the most refined piece of malware ever discovered … mischief or financial reward wasn’t its purpose, it was aimed right at the heart of a critical infrastructure”. Symantec estimates that the group developing Stuxnet would have been well-funded, consisting of five to ten people, and would have taken six months to prepare.^[39] The Guardian, the BBC and The New York Times all reported that experts studying Stuxnet considered that the complexity of the code indicates that only a nation state would have the capabilities to produce it.^[6][39][40]

Israel, perhaps through Unit 8200,^[41] has been speculated to be the country behind Stuxnet in many of the media reports^[39][42][43] and by experts such as Richard Falkenrath, former Senior Director for Policy and Plans within the Office of Homeland Security.^[44] Some have also referred to several clues in the code such as a concealed reference to the word “MYRTUS”, believed to refer to the Myrtle tree, or Hadassah in Hebrew. Hadassah was the birth name of the former Jewish queen of Persia, Queen Esther.^[45][46] However, it may be that the “MYRTUS” reference is simply a misinterpreted reference to SCADA components known as RTUs (Remote Terminal Units) and that this reference is actually “My RTUs” — a management feature of SCADA.^[47] Also, the number 19790509 appears once in the code and might refer to the date “1979 May 09″, the day Habib Elghanian, a Persian Jew, was executed in Tehran.^[48][49][50] According to the New York Times a former member of the United States intelligence community speculated that the attack may have been the work of Unit 8200.^[51] Yossi Melman, who covers intelligence for the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz and is at work on a book about Israeli intelligence, also suspected that Israel was involved. He noted that Meir Dagan, head of the national intelligence agency Mossad, had his term extended in 2009 because he was said to be involved in important projects. Additionally, in the past year Israeli estimates of when Iran will have a nuclear weapon had been extended to 2014. “They seem to know something, that they have more time than originally thought”, he added.^[8]

Additionally, in 2009, a year before Stuxnet was discovered, Scott Borg of the United States Cyber-Consequences Unit had suggested that Israel might prefer to mount a cyber-attack rather than a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.^[52] According to Borg this kind of attack could involve disrupting sensitive equipment such as centrifuges using malware introduced via infected memory sticks: “Since the autumn of 2002, I have regularly predicted that this sort of cyber-attack tool would eventually be developed … Israel certainly has the ability to create Stuxnet and there is little downside to such an attack, because it would be virtually impossible to prove who did it. So a tool like Stuxnet is Israel’s obvious weapon of choice.”^[53] There has also been speculation on the involvement of NATO, the United States and other Western nations.^[54] It has been reported that the United States, under one of its most secret programs, initiated by the Bush administration and accelerated by the Obama administration, has sought to destroy Iran’s nuclear program by novel methods such as undermining Iranian computer systems.^[55] However, solid evidence pointing to Western (and specifically American) involvement has been scarce.

Though Israel has not publicly commented on the Stuxnet attack, it has since confirmed that cyberwarfare is now among the pillars of its defense doctrine, with a military intelligence unit set up to pursue both defensive and offensive options.^[56][57]

Symantec claims that the majority of infected systems were in Iran (about 60%),^[58] which has led to speculation that it may have been deliberately targeting “high-value infrastructure” in Iran^[6] including either theBushehr Nuclear Power Plant or the Natanz nuclear facility.^[25] Ralph Langner, a German cyber-security researcher, called the malware “a one-shot weapon” and said that the intended target was probably hit,^[59]although he admitted this was speculation.^[25]

There are reports that Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at the Natanz facility was the target of Stuxnet and the site sustained damage because of it causing a sudden 15% reduction in its production capabilities. There was also a previous report by wikileaks disclosing a “serious nuclear accident” at the site in 2009.^{[9][43][60][61][62][63]} According to statistics published by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) the number of enriched centrifuges operational in Iran mysteriously declined from about 4,700 to about 3,900 beginning around the time the nuclear incident WikiLeaks mentioned would have occurred.^[64] On November 23 it was announced that due to a series of major technical problems in Natanz Iran had to temporarily cease its uranium production altogether.^[65] [66]

The name is derived from some keywords discovered in the software.^[53] The whole Stuxnet code has not yet been decrypted, but among its peculiar capabilities is a fingerprinting technology which allows it to precisely identify the systems it infects. It appears to be looking for a particular system to destroy at a specific time and place. Once it has infected a system it performs a check every 5 seconds to determine if its parameters for launching an attack are met. The worm appears programmed to cause a catastrophic physical failure; early speculation on methods had included overriding turbine RPM limits, shutting down lubrication or cooling systems, or sabotaging the high-speed spinning process of centrifuge arrays at Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility;^[59][67] in November 2010, according to The New York Times, experts at Symantec found that the worm speeds up rotation rates for the accelerators to the point where they break.^[68] The complex code of Stuxnet looks for a very particular type of system and controller, namely frequency converters made by the Iranian company Fararo Paya and the Finnish company Vacon.^[68][69][70]

[edit]Iranian reaction

The Associated Press reported that the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency released a statement on 24 September 2010 stating that experts from the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran met in the previous week to discuss how Stuxnet could be removed from their systems.^[4] Western intelligence agencies have been attempting to sabotage the Iranian nuclear program for some time, according to analysts.^[71][72]

The head of the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant told Reuters that only the personal computers of staff at the plant had been infected by Stuxnet and the state-run newspaper Iran Daily quoted Reza Taghipour, Iran’s telecommunications minister, as saying that it had not caused “serious damage to government systems”.^[40] Director of Information Technology Council at the Iranian Ministry of Industries and Mines, Mahmud Liaii has said that: “An electronic war has been launched against Iran… This computer worm is designed to transfer data about production lines from our industrial plants to locations outside Iran.”^[73]

It is believed that infection had originated from Russian laptops belonging to Russian contractors at the site of Bushehr power plant and spreading from there with the aim of targeting the power plant control systems.^[74][75][76] In response to the infection, Iran has assembled a team to combat it. With more than 30,000 IP addresses affected in Iran, an official has said that the infection is fast spreading in Iran and the problem has been compounded by the ability of Stuxnet to mutate. Iran has set up its own systems to clean up infections and has advised against using the Siemens SCADA antivirus since it is suspected that the antivirus is actually embedded with codes which update Stuxnet instead of eradicating it.^{[77][78][79][80]}

According to Hamid Alipour, deputy head of Iran’s government Information Technology Company, “The attack is still ongoing and new versions of this virus are spreading.” He reports that his company had begun the cleanup process at Iran’s “sensitive centres and organizations.”^[78] ”We had anticipated that we could root out the virus within one to two months, but the virus is not stable, and since we started the cleanup process three new versions of it have been spreading,” he told the Islamic Republic News Agency.^[80]

In ancient Greek mythology, ambrosia (Greek: ἀμβροσία) is sometimes the food, sometimes the drink, of the Greek gods (or demigods), often depicted as conferring ageless immortality upon whoever consumes it.^[1] It was brought to the gods inOlympus by doves,^[2] so it may have been thought of in the Homeric tradition as a kind of divine exhalation of the Earth.

Definition

Ambrosia is very closely related to the gods’ other form of sustenance, nectar. The two terms may not have originally been distinguished;^[3] though in Homer‘s poems nectar is usually the drink and ambrosia the food of the gods; it was with ambrosia Hera “cleansed all defilement from her lovely flesh”,^[4] and with ambrosia Athena prepared Penelope in her sleep,^[5] so that when she appeared for the final time before her suitors, the effect of the years had been stripped away and they were inflamed with passion at the sight of her. On the other hand, in Alcman,^[6] nectar is the food, and in Sappho^[7] and Anaxandrides, ambrosia is the drink.^[8] When a character in Aristophanes‘ Knights says, “I dreamed the goddess poured ambrosia over your head— out of a ladle”, the homely and realistic ladle brings the ineffable moment to ground with a thump.

The consumption of ambrosia was typically reserved for divine beings. Upon his assumption into immortality on Olympus, Heracles is given ambrosia by Athena, while the hero Tydeus is denied the same thing when the goddess discovers him eating human brains. In one version of the myth of Tantalus, part of Tantalus’ crime is that after tasting ambrosia himself, he attempts to steal some away to give to other mortals.^[9] Those who consume ambrosia typically had not blood in their veins, butichor.^[10]

Both nectar and ambrosia are fragrant, and may be used as perfume: in the Odyssey Menelaus and his men are disguised as seals in untanned seal skins, “and the deadly smell of the seal skins vexed us sore; but the goddess saved us; she brought ambrosia and put it under our nostrils.”^[11] Homer speaks of ambrosial raiment, ambrosial locks of hair, even the gods’ ambrosial sandals.

Among later writers, ambrosia has been so often used with generic meanings of “delightful liquid” that such late writers as Athenaeus, Paulus and Dioscurides employ it as a technical terms in contexts of cookery,^[12] medicine,^[13] and botany.^[14]

Additionally, some modern ethnomycologists, such as Danny Staples, identify ambrosia with the untameable hallucinogenic mushroom Amanita muscaria: “it was the food of the gods, their ambrosia, and nectar was the pressed sap of its juices”, Staples asserts.^[15]

W. H. Roscher thinks that both nectar and ambrosia were kinds of honey, in which case their power of conferring immortality would be due to the supposed healing and cleansing power of honey, which is in fact anti-septic, and because fermented honey (mead) preceded wine as an entheogen in the Aegean world: on some Minoan seals goddesses had bee faces: compare Merope and Melissa.

Propolis, a hive product also known for its sweet fruity taste, cures sore throats, and there are many modern proprietary medicines which use honey as an ingredient.

Etymology

The concept of an immortality drink is attested in at least two Indo-European areas: Greek and Sanskrit. The Greek ἀμβροσία (ambrosia) is semantically linked to the Sanskrit अमृत (amrita) as both words denote a drink that gods use to achieve immortality. The two words may be derived from the same Indo-European form *ṇ-mṛ-to- : immortal (n- : negative prefix equivalent to the prefix a- in both Greek and Sanskrit; mṛ : zero grade of *mer- : to die; and -to- : adjectival suffix).

However, the connection that has derived ambrosia from the Greek prefix a- (“not”) and the word brotos (“mortal”), hence the food or drink of the immortals, has been found merely coincidental by some modern linguists.^[16]

The classical scholar Arthur Woollgar Verrall denied that there is any clear example in which the word ambrosios necessarily means immortal, and preferred to explain it as “fragrant,” a sense which is always suitable. If so, the word may be derived from the Semitic MBR, giving “amber“, which when burned is resinously fragrant (compare “ambergris“) to which Eastern nations attribute miraculous properties. In Europe, honey-colored amber, sometimes far from its natural source, was already a grave gift in Neolithic times and was still worn in the 7th century as a talisman by druidic Frisians, though St. Eligius warned “No woman should presume to hang amber from her neck.”

Other examples in mythology

Thetis anoints Achilles with ambrosia

• In one version of the story of the birth of Achilles, Thetis anoints the infant with ambrosia and passes the child through the fire to make him immortal—a familiar Phoenician custom—but Peleus, appalled, stops her, leaving only his heel unimmortalised (Argonautica 4.869-879).
• In the Iliad xvi, Apollo washes the black blood from the corpse of Sarpedon and anoints it with ambrosia, readying it for its dreamlike return to Sarpedon’s native Lycia. Similarly, Thetis anoints the corpse of Patroclus in order to preserve it. Additionally, both ambrosia and nectar are depicted as unguents (xiv. 170; xix. 38).
• In the Odyssey, Calypso is described as having “spread a table with ambrosia and set it by Hermes, and mixed the rosy-red nectar.” It is ambiguous whether he means the ambrosia itself is rosy-red, or if he is describing a rosy-red nectar Hermes drinks along with the ambrosia. Later, Circe mentions to Odysseus^[17] that a flock of doves are the bringers of ambrosia to Olympus.
• In the Odyssey (ix.345–359), Polyphemus likens the wine given to him by Odysseus to ambrosia and nectar.
• One of the impieties of Tantalus, according to Pindar, was that he offered to his guests the ambrosia of the Deathless Ones, a theft akin to that of Prometheus, Karl Kerenyi noted (in Heroes of the Greeks).
• In the Homeric hymn to Aphrodite, the goddess uses “ambrosian oil” as perfume, “divinely sweet, and made fragrant for her sake.”

Lykourgos of Thrace and Ambrosia

Lykourgos (Lycurgus) of Thrace, an antagonist of Dionysus, forbade the cult of Dionysus, whom he drove from Thrace, and was driven mad by the god. In his fit of insanity he killed his son, whom he mistook for a stock of mature ivy, and Ambrosia, who was transformed into the grapevine.

See also

• Ichor, blood of the Greek gods, related to ambrosia.
• Amrita, of Hindu mythology, a drink which confers immortality on the gods, and a cognate of ambrosia
• Elixir of life, a potion sought by alchemy to produce immortality.

The New York Times Syndicate

Espera pelo início das vendas do esportivo elétrico só aumenta o apetite - O quanto o Tesla Roadster é realmente rápido? Em alguns segundos vamos descobrir porque, emoldurado por seu pára-brisa do tamanho de uma vigia de submarino, está um delicioso trecho em linha reta da Skyline Boulevard, uma estradinha sinuosa muito atraente sobre a qual nunca havíamos ouvido falar e que fica nas colinas costeiras acima de San Carlos, na Califórnia. San Carlos, caso você não esteja mexendo com o Google Earth neste momento, é um subúrbio a noroeste do Vale do Silício, onde a Tesla decidiu estabelecer seu centro de pesquisa e desenvolvimento cerca de quatro anos atrás. Por entre as árvores, podemos vez por outra avistar a Hoover Tower, da Universidade Stanford, a aproximadamente 12 km.

Ok, então, eu estou com o pedal do freio colado ao chão. Os espelhos miram o tráfego inocente. A costa está limpa. Encostou o pé no acelerador e se lembrou de que Mark Twain ironizava o inverno mais frio que ele já havia enfrentado como sendo um verão em San Francisco? O mesmo vale para San Carlos. Exceto pelo fato de esta avaliação ter sido feita em dezembro, invernos nos EUA, de a capota do Roadster ter sumido sem avisar e de uma frente fria estar vindo direto do cinzento Pacífico. Mas voltemos ao trabalho.

Eu aperto o acelerador, me prendo e… bom, espere um pouco, a gente chega lá. Primeiro eu quero contar a você a ironia presente no nome deste carro. Você nunca se perguntou de onde vem esse “Tesla”? Historiadores automotivos podem estar acostumados com a famosa história de Thomas Edison encorajando um jovem empregado chamado Henry Ford (“Meu jovem, você tem o necessário. Mantenha isso. Carros elétricos precisam ficar próximos de estações de energia”). Mesmo assim, a realidade é que o genioso Tom rapidamente embarcaria em milhares de experimentos visando exatamente quebrar a noz da bateria automotiva e, em 1904, ele finalmente apresentou, durante uma festa de arromba, sua bateria de níquel ferroso para carros elétricos.

Não funcionou, pelo menos não automotivamente. Mas a relação disso com o Tesla Roadster é que, um ano antes de conversar com Ford, Edison teve um problemão com outro empregado, um curioso imigrante sérvio chamado Nikola Tesla. Dependendo da história da qual você gosta mais, Edison pode ou não ter descumprido a promessa de pagar US$ 50 mil a Tesla. Segundo Edison, a promessa era piada. Seja qual for a verdade, os campeões históricos da corrente direta, Edison, e da alternada, um bebê de Tesla, queriam mais era que o outro morresse depois disso. Então o que me chama a atenção é que agora, um século depois, o primeiro carro elétrico popular a quebrar a noz da bateria automotiva seja chamado de “um Tesla”, não “um Tom”. Sim, Tesla era um gênio. Mas ele sequer tentou fabricar baterias de automóveis? Nããão.

Tudo certo, então. Voltemos ao carro, mais especificamente a suas baterias. A razão pela qual sou preso de uma porrada só contra o banco quando espeto o acelerador não são os 250 cv do motor elétrico do tamanho de uma melancia. O que preocupa o meu pescoço é a combinação dos 250 Nm de torque presentes a zero rpm e a facilidade com que seu pacote de 6.831 baterias de íons de lítio podem acelerar o pequeno esportivo.

Note que, com um peso estimado de 1.220 kg, o Tesla Roadster tem uma relação peso/torque de 4,88 kg/Nm. Para comparar, sua referência natural, o quentíssimo Lotus Exige S (com 186 Nm e 286 kg a menos), oferece uma relação de 5 kg/Nm, mas apenas quando o motor atinge 5.500 rpm. Notavelmente, não é a zero rpm.

Apesar de o pacote de baterias conter o equivalente em energia a apenas 8 l de gasolina (antes de considerar as perdas com recarga), a Tesla alega que a eficiência do Roadster é seis vezes mais alta que a de carros esportivos equivalentes, além de ele contribuir com emissões de gás carbônico dez vezes menores (o carro em si não emite nenhum gás, mas se contabiliza as emissões provenientes da geração da energia elétrica que ele usa). Talvez. O que fica penosamente evidente enquanto você se enfronha no mundo dos carros elétricos, dos híbridos e dos movidos por célula de combustível é que a sequência de apresentações de PowerPoint de todos eles, ironicamente, favorece eles próprios.

Ainda assim, o Tesla é inegavelmente e inacreditavelmente eficiente: considerando sua parca ração de “combustível elétrico” a bordo e sua autonomia em ciclo misto (cidade e estrada) de 350 km (recentemente reduzida devido a um erro de cálculo de um fornecedor), o Roadster entrega um consumo equivalente a 43,75 km/l.

Supondo que a eletricidade seja fornecida (otimisticamente) por uma fonte altamente eficiente, como uma usina de gás natural (que a Tesla alega que pode entregar uma eficiência energética de 52,5% do poço à tomada), o consumo do Roadster do poço à roda seria equivalente, em litros de gasolina, a 23,4 km/l. É quase 1,5 mais eficiente do que um Toyota Prius, o padrão verde para os automóveis atuais.

Falando nisso, não há porque se preocupar com algo parecido com o calor infernal que as baterias de laptops geram. As baterias são refrigeradas pelo mesmo líquido usado pelo ar-condicionado; todas as baterias são expostas a uma área de refrigeração de 27 m² para eliminar qualquer possível ponto de aquecimento. A verdadeira fonte de problemas para a Tesla não está nas baterias, mas em sua transmissão. Ou melhor, transmissões. Um carro elétrico, mesmo um com uma linha de corte de rotação em 13.500 rpm, precisa de pelo menos duas engrenagens para chegar rapidamente aos 96 km/h e ainda assim bater a máxima de 200 km/h.

O primeiro desenho de transmissão se mostrou frágil; o segundo, aplicado ao carro que estou dirigindo, funciona direitinho, mas não duraria mais do que alguns milhares de quilômetros. Na época do teste, mais dois fornecedores estavam desenvolvendo simultaneamente os projetos três e quatro para acelerar o desenvolvimento. É possível até que os carros dos primeiros clientes recebam uma transmissão temporária, mais confiável, de apenas uma velocidade.

Questionado numa recente reunião com entusiasmados, mas claramente preocupados candidatos a proprietários do carro (há cerca de 600 pessoas na fila esperando por um Tesla), o presidente da empresa, Elon Musk, previu que a produção começaria devagar, mas que chegaria a sua velocidade máxima em meados de 2008. Quando um cliente perguntou se os investidores do Tesla estavam ficando tímidos, Musk (que vendeu a PayPal por muitas centenas de milhões de dólares), respondeu: “Eu (a conta bancária dele, na verdade) tenho muita bala na agulha antes que (dinheiro) se torne um problema”.

De modo otimista, Musk frisou que o desenvolvimento doloroso da transmissão do Roadster está preventivamente suavizando o caminho do próximo Tesla, um sedã desenvolvido sob o nome-código “WhiteStar”, ou Estrela Branca.

A transmissão atual é de duas velocidades, ao estilo dos manuais automatizados de dupla embreagem (DSG), com o motor subindo ou descendo de giro para acertar as rotações. Mova a alavanca e você estará na verdade apenas acionando um interruptor. Não há pedal de embreagem e o som é semelhante a um bip eletrônico. Imagine o C3PO levando um chute.

Apesar de eu estar dirigindo um protótipo, o diferencial precisará de muito menos chicotadas quando você enfiar e tirar o pé do acelerador, o que atualmente evoca um conjunto propulsor descoordenado (o que também não ajuda em nada a frágil transmissão).

Desacelerar basicamente ajusta a inerente tendência a um suave subesterço do carro, mas é interessante a força que os freios com regeneração de energia geram quando você levanta o pé. Na verdade, os freios tradicionais, por fricção, são raramente exigidos e, quando são, seu pé direito desfruta da mesma sensação proporcionada pelos freios de carros esportivos antigos porque o sistema de regeneração não é concomitantemente reforçado.

Em movimento, o passo do Roadster é surpreendentemente flexível. A Lotus fez um trabalho admirável ao esticar o chassi do Elise em 5 cm e acomodar quase 450 kg de baterias (separadas por uma carcaça em fibra de carbono) enquanto conservou essa coisa como um potente dardo rodoviário em estradas sinuosas.

Checo os espelhos mais uma vez. Ainda não há trânsito. Estou quase fazendo caretas quando solto o freio e empurro o acelerador para o chão. Bruuuummmm, 50 km/h, 60 km/h, 70 km/h; nos 4 s que você levou para ler essa frase o carro já atingiu os 100 km/h (o tempo que a Tesla diz que o carro leva para chegar a essa velocidade, de 3,9 s, seria perfeitamente plausível em um cenário controlado, como uma pista de testes).

Não há cantada de pneu, eixo bobo, vacilação, fumaça, tremida no capô, nada. Estou sendo inexplicavelmente teletransportado pelo cano de uma catapulta eletromagnética (railgun), com a cabeça sendo puxada para trás por uma aceleração forte e constante. Bizarro. E antes que seja tarde, humilhando profundamente qualquer Ferrari ou Porsche que urre e cometa o erro de se colocar ao lado de um silencioso e econômico Tesla Roadster em um semáforo fechado.