Hybrids have been proven to be up to the chore. The best selling hybrid model (Prius) has been outselling some of the entire non-hybrid brands (Acura, VW, etc..). In California, hybrids will no longer qualify to drive in the HOV lane with a single occupant. Gen3 Prius is clearly a mainstream vehicle, hybrid or not. We now have Tesla Roadster and Mini-E on the road today. These EVs lack the trunk and capability to seat 5. Are EVs up to the chore? With Nissan Leaf, Tesla Model S, Mitsubishi MiEV and Toyota FT-EVII coming out in a few years... when will the EVs really be up to the chore?
The Leaf has a 100-mile range, which can drop below 50 in worst-case conditions. It will cost about $33K (before rebates), a lot for a niche car that cannot go everywhere. Much better battery technology must be pursued. The Prius and Volt approaches, while different from each other, both result in general-purpose vehicles.
Up to the task -- for whom ? What task ? I will keep our Prius for long drives, and eventually buy a 50 mile mini EV for daily trips. That, or a PHEV.
Which chore? My silly little Zap Xebra does everything I need a car to do 98 days out of a hundred. The chore that gasoline cars are best suited to is wasting the last of a resource so precious that when it is gone our children or grandchildren will curse us with every fiber of their souls, and nurture the blackest of hatreds in their hearts for the people (us) who were so selfish and so cruel as to leave them a world in which life will be as barbaric as it was in the Middle Ages. But why should anyone alive today give a rat's nice person what anyone thinks about us after we're dead? I'm just glad I don't believe in hell, because if there was a hell, and a just god, we'd all end up there for the way we are trashing this green Earth, all in the name of our own selfish comforts.
I'd say EVs are not upto the Chore*. * - Chore being defined as rape the earth and fund the terrorists.
You forgot, "validate U.S. meddling in other countries for the phony excuse of 'freedom' - which ultimately causes the other countries to hate us". Or is the above simlpy a subset of "fund terrorists" ?
I don't think that exhaustion of oil will be a disaster. Everything that oil is used for now can be switched to other materials. Plastics can be made from things like sugar cane. My tires are made partially from orange peels, instead of oil. Wood gas, or probably other biomass, can be used instead of fuel oil. There is a massive amount of natural gas that will be used when oil gets expensive enough. Brazil has already switched over from gasoline to ethanol. Biomass is carbon neutral, which is reason enough to use it instead of material recovered from under the ground. Oil is just the currently cheapest material available for its uses. The substitutes will get cheaper as their volume goes up, but they'll be competitive even at their current prices when the cheap oil is gone. Actually, natural gas is already cheaper on a fuel cost per mile basis. It just isn't as convenient or as space efficient as gasoline. Clearly a growing niche. One way to extend an EV's range would be a trailer with an engine driven generator on it. A slightly different approach I've already seen is a pusher trailer. This guy has an electric VW Rabbit, and the engine compartment / drive wheels of another Rabbit as a trailer. The pusher trailer extends his range beyond what the batteries in the main vehicle can manage. The world as we know it may not survive, but it won't be because of oil exhaustion.
