From the article:

" . . . . Previous attempts to popularize electric cars have been thwarted by inadequate infrastructure and the cost of production. Toyota sold only about 1,900 electric RAV4 sport-utility vehicles between 1997 and 2003 in the U.S. and Japan. . . . "

So ... the issue was cost of production? Infrustructure? Funny ... the lie use to be that the range was too small ... only 100 miles or so. Yet now, GM says 40 miles is all we want ... ergo the Volt? Weird. Then my favorite ... that no one wanted them. Then, the fact that there was a waiting list of thousands for the EV1 was revealed. I wish they'd keep the story straight. Truth ... always in a state of flux.

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All you would have to do is make a commercial showing George Foreman cooking a burger on it and it would take off.

Get Mr. Fusion to make coffee & Joltin' Joe is out.

It actually doesn't matter where in the world you are - for electric vehicles to really take off, there will be the need for a deent infrastructure.

I was thinking about this only the other day - thinking more about whether the rental car companies will jump on the band wagon and offer electrics when they become available. Then thought how are people going to charge a rental. Most hotels will not be offering a plug to charge your car, and if it is valet parking, what chance that the valet will even consider plugging a car in, even if a plug point was available?

The same almost applies to fleet vehicles. Corporate car parks don't have much in the way of electrical outlets, or, at least not where I have looked, and a lot of people do not have garages, so accessing electric outlets becomes a major problem.

So it is worth the manufacturers thinking about how they are going to offer the ability to recharge electrics, before they start selling the cars.

According to Lutz, they are skipping the Volt and going straight to the Nuke.

It could be a huge marketing opportunity. Remember when "Free WiFi" was a huge marketing draw? Hotels and Valets could advertise "Free charging stations." How much does it cost to charge a car anyway? $1.00 ?

As far as mainstream infrastructure goes, I think most people are just going to plug their car into a 110V wall socket while they are sleeping (220V for Euro). If the chargers are programmed to slowly charge over the course of a whole night or if we implement a smart grid, I think we already have the infrastructure today. (smart grid technology could be organized via home WiFi)

Yeah, I remember seeing this car when I YouTube'd electric cars (I've actually done it a few times).

Certainly can't argue with hill though. He said it pretty damn well IMO. I'm still thinking about maybe making my Civic an electric one day if I can afford the conversion, because it just doesn't look like really smart vehicles will ever be available.