The service station of the future will dispense liquid hydrogen and hydrogen fuel cells will recharge the vehicle's batteries while you drive -- then you could coast on the electric. 15 years from now or less?
You can carry 2/5 Gallon Jerry Cans of gasoline (or diesel) but carrying 200 miles worth of electricity reserve is an issue.
In America cross country you can travel 500 to 700 miles (up to 1000km) daily -- that takes 10 to 12 hours ... Ft. Worth to El Paso TX is a 600mi/970km haul ... now take a look at that map the "Texas Autobahn" 140 - 160 km/hr.
For short haul interurban, or urban commutes, electric cars can make sense.
Even when EV autos have 300 - 400 mile ranges they are not practical for some longer haul travel. Apart from that, there are no functional electric utility plants in the Zombie Apocalypse -- you can always scavenge up some gasoline :P
Farmers keep storage tanks of diesel and gasoline ;)
Sure, but drivers like me, drive between downtown and the outskirts, maybe about 15 kilometres. In the summer, this gives me about 2 and a half round trips on a single charge. But since I can charge at home and downtown, this works out perfectly.
Also, cars like the Volt have a gas backup engine, so when we do need to take a long trip, we can easily do it.
A fun thing to do is to plan a trip using EV charging stations along the way. It's hard to do today, but considering how fast EV charging stations are popping up (80 more are being added here in Montreal and surrounding area this year), planning EV-only trips will be getting easier and easier.
Tesla's go for about 450 kilometres on a single charge, and charge up to about 80% in 20 minutes. I bet that pretty soon, EV's will be able to to travel coast to coast.
you know what would be supercool is for tesla to put a supercharger button on their new sprts car that allows the motor to output like 110% for 4 seconds or something.
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