Because now that lithium ion batteries are being developed and gas prices are skyrocketing, the technology is just starting to become competetive with gasoline. Don’t worry, in the next decade we’ll start to see more electric cars than gas cars.
Electric cars still cost a lot more than most gasoline cars, and whereas a Honda Civic can go like 400 miles now without needing fuel, most electric cars can only do about 150 miles without needing a recharge.
Oh, and recharging isn’t like getting gas, where it takes 5 minutes — recharging an electric car is an overnight process.
Electric cars will get better and better, and eventually they WILL overtake normal cars. But this will only happen once they’re cheaper and and can go longer distances.
It will happen, but it’s a slow transition. There are a few dominant factors (all boiling down to economics) that prevent a more rapid transition: (1) the price of developing the new technology (R&D, prototyping, testing) is very expensive and even when good solutions have been found, the resulting vehicles still have to be sold at a higher price than gasoline-fueled vehicles in order to cover those costs (this seems greedy to most of us, but remember that even the car companies answer to shareholders in terms of their bottom line, and it’s very difficult to convince most investors to take huge chances with their funds); (2) there are some trade-offs in moving to electric or even hybrid vehicles that people aren’t willing to make yet (one example is that battery cells for electric cars are very large, which cuts either into storage or interior space available or results in a larger vehicle that would decrease the efficiency of the vehicle); (3) oil has been one of the primarily drivers of industry for the last 100 years; any transition away from oil as the primary source for vehicles will require some support from those controlling interests – some progress is being made there, but it will be slow (for the same basic reasons indicated in #1, above). I’m sure others have additional reasons to add.
No battery-operated electric cars are good for anything but slow inner-city traffic, and thus there are no street-legal electric cars in production. There are no solar cars at all except as stunts.
What will work is a restoration of no-pollution mass transit, which we can do by re-building trolley-operated electric bus lines in our cities and suburbs. Then privately-owned cars can go back to doing their occasional duty as pleasure vehicles instead of commuter vehicles. With wireless Internet, rest rooms and coffee on the buses, everyone would take them, and they go over existing roads.
petro powered cars are still in use because of the cost to build EV cars
have a look at this link, it will provide more up to date answers
there are others as well
now for something you may not know
The big 3 toyed with the idea of EV cars back in the 60’s but the idea was scraped because of the oil tycoons.
If they had been allowed to build and work with ideas back then………. todays lifestyle would be a brave new world and oil would be a thing of the past
Oil is not scarce. Gas is still cheaper than solar panels, electric batteries, hydrogen and all that other stuff.
I can buy a new gas powered car like a Civic for $15k. Even a Civic hybrid will cost over $20k because its got a huge battery and small electric motor. Honda leases (at a huge loss) a hydrogen car (similar in size and build to the Civic) for $600/mo. Solar cars aren’t practical because people do drive at night. Big surprise that people rush to the affordable cars which at this time as gas powered.
Golly, I wonder where that absolutely free electricity comes from to recharge my electric car. Isn’t it great that giant car batteries are non-polluting when you have to dispose of them? I used to drive a solar powered car, but I got into a fender-bender and did $316,000.00 worth of damage to it and my insurance rates rose dramatically.
December 24th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
They can be made for about fifty thousand dollars. And only work in warm places.
December 24th, 2008 at 8:15 pm
Because now that lithium ion batteries are being developed and gas prices are skyrocketing, the technology is just starting to become competetive with gasoline. Don’t worry, in the next decade we’ll start to see more electric cars than gas cars.
December 27th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Electric cars still cost a lot more than most gasoline cars, and whereas a Honda Civic can go like 400 miles now without needing fuel, most electric cars can only do about 150 miles without needing a recharge.
Oh, and recharging isn’t like getting gas, where it takes 5 minutes — recharging an electric car is an overnight process.
Electric cars will get better and better, and eventually they WILL overtake normal cars. But this will only happen once they’re cheaper and and can go longer distances.
December 31st, 2008 at 1:16 am
It will happen, but it’s a slow transition. There are a few dominant factors (all boiling down to economics) that prevent a more rapid transition: (1) the price of developing the new technology (R&D, prototyping, testing) is very expensive and even when good solutions have been found, the resulting vehicles still have to be sold at a higher price than gasoline-fueled vehicles in order to cover those costs (this seems greedy to most of us, but remember that even the car companies answer to shareholders in terms of their bottom line, and it’s very difficult to convince most investors to take huge chances with their funds); (2) there are some trade-offs in moving to electric or even hybrid vehicles that people aren’t willing to make yet (one example is that battery cells for electric cars are very large, which cuts either into storage or interior space available or results in a larger vehicle that would decrease the efficiency of the vehicle); (3) oil has been one of the primarily drivers of industry for the last 100 years; any transition away from oil as the primary source for vehicles will require some support from those controlling interests – some progress is being made there, but it will be slow (for the same basic reasons indicated in #1, above). I’m sure others have additional reasons to add.
January 1st, 2009 at 12:25 am
No battery-operated electric cars are good for anything but slow inner-city traffic, and thus there are no street-legal electric cars in production. There are no solar cars at all except as stunts.
What will work is a restoration of no-pollution mass transit, which we can do by re-building trolley-operated electric bus lines in our cities and suburbs. Then privately-owned cars can go back to doing their occasional duty as pleasure vehicles instead of commuter vehicles. With wireless Internet, rest rooms and coffee on the buses, everyone would take them, and they go over existing roads.
January 2nd, 2009 at 11:38 am
petro powered cars are still in use because of the cost to build EV cars
have a look at this link, it will provide more up to date answers
there are others as well
now for something you may not know
The big 3 toyed with the idea of EV cars back in the 60’s but the idea was scraped because of the oil tycoons.
If they had been allowed to build and work with ideas back then………. todays lifestyle would be a brave new world and oil would be a thing of the past
January 5th, 2009 at 7:15 pm
Oil is not scarce. Gas is still cheaper than solar panels, electric batteries, hydrogen and all that other stuff.
I can buy a new gas powered car like a Civic for $15k. Even a Civic hybrid will cost over $20k because its got a huge battery and small electric motor. Honda leases (at a huge loss) a hydrogen car (similar in size and build to the Civic) for $600/mo. Solar cars aren’t practical because people do drive at night. Big surprise that people rush to the affordable cars which at this time as gas powered.
January 7th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
Golly, I wonder where that absolutely free electricity comes from to recharge my electric car. Isn’t it great that giant car batteries are non-polluting when you have to dispose of them? I used to drive a solar powered car, but I got into a fender-bender and did $316,000.00 worth of damage to it and my insurance rates rose dramatically.