Everyone knows electric cars will never be popular because there's no getting around an inconvenient truth: they have limited range. It's easy to dismiss a car that can't go 100 miles before needing a lengthy recharge. Okay, fair enough—if that's your only car, or your primary car. But what if it's your second car? What if it's the car you use to commute 14 miles to work and back every day—and you have a traditional car back home for long trips?

I think the electric car would be quite popular if it were positioned as just an around-town, commuter car. The "failure" of the electric car, I think, was all in the positioning. I mean, honestly, what percentage of cars are used just to drive to work and back? Or just around town to do errands? There must be a shitload of cars out there that could be happily tooling around town every day without ever using a drop of gas!

electric car would be a perfect "ride to work" car, just the essential miles to and fro.

side note: mets won the division baby, we're going deep into the playoffs if not all the way.

The problem is, why buy an electric when you can easily buy a gas powered commuter for the same money? None of the electric cars are particularly cheap, even the NEV's (neighborhood electric vehicles, ie golf carts) cost as much as say...as a used gasoline toyota or honda, without the range of those cars. Most people just care about getting the most car for their money, and until the newer battery tech gets out, that means gasoline. An electric can do it, yes, but isn't as versatile as a gasser.

The problem is, why buy an electric when you can easily buy a gas powered commuter for the same money? None of the electric cars are particularly cheap, even the NEV's (neighborhood electric vehicles, ie golf carts) cost as much as say...as a used gasoline toyota or honda, without the range of those cars. Most people just care about getting the most car for their money, and until the newer battery tech gets out, that means gasoline. An electric can do it, yes, but isn't as versatile as a gasser.Getting the most car for your money is important for many, but not all. Some are interested in using less gas. That's why some people are buying hybrids. True, a hybrid can be your only car—or your primary car—and travel long distances. But for a second car, an electric would make total sense. (Though I know there really are no electric cars avaiable now. I'm not counting fancy "golf carts".)

Just as a guess, what percentage of second cars are never driven more than 75 miles a day—or more than 25 miles from home? I bet it's quite high!

We really need to jump right to hydrogen powered. Battery technology continues to lag the paradigm shift need.

Iceland has a great hydrogen vehicle prototype system. Geothermal steam energy direct-powers electric generators and that electricity is used to separate hydrogen from water, which is ultimately used in vehicles. Of course most nations do not sit atop such natural geothermals, but hydrodynamic is another underutilized option here as well as wind turbine.

GM's common hydrogen powered undercarriage, with safer 'solid state' fuel storage, looks promising.

http://semanticparanoia.wordpress.com/2006/05/25/semantic-traveller-washington-dc-gm-hydrogen-test-drive/

http://www.sandia.gov/news-center/news-releases/2005/tech-trans/gm-hydrogen-storage.html

http://www.evworld.com/index.cfm

Electrics, and electric conversions, woudl make perfect second cars or city cars. But you're wrong about the positioning. For a couple decades, electrics were ONLY positioned as city cars, and most were butt ugly and poorly built.

Most were like this one:

http://www.chemistryland.com/CHM107/Energy/KenStandByElectricCityCar-w.jpg

Ford was selling these:

http://www.autointell.com/news-2000/Oktober-2000/Ford-Thnk-City.jpg

This is from Italy...

http://www.micro-vett.it/images/Ydea.gif

But people, while complaining loudly about oversized SUVs, will ALSO not drive something like this.

Lithium Ion batteries are coming along, and are what's powering the Tesla sports car (that gives both real perforamnce and real range, in a relatively lightweight car, albeit at a high price to pay for the new technology).

Truth is, a converted smaller older car is a viable, economical way to say, hey, I don't want to support gasoline prices. And with the hobbyist aftermarket, you can build some damn quick electric cars, like my buddy's electric Porsche 914 and CRX.

And personally, I think every new house in the country should be outfitted with solar panels on the roof to charge storage batteries that can recharge your commuter overnight without going on the grid. it might add $10-30k to the price of a new house, but with so many in the $400k range anyhow, that
s a small price to pay to use less grid energy.

The perfect solution for something like what you're talking about is a plug-in hybrid. People have been modifying the Prius to do this for a while, but for broad appeal, obviously it would have to be a factory option.

Charge it up every night and you can do your 30-40 miles to work and back with no gas at all. If you do run out of charge, you still have a 400-500 mile range with the conventional hybrid drivetrain. You don't need two cars to have a practical electric in this case, one car does both electric only and long range.