When I started writing about electric cars about a year and a half ago, I already totally understood the superiority of EV technology over the Internal Combustion Engine. The benefits are easy to see: fewer parts and less complexity make for a great increase in reliability. The performance of EVs is also far superior. For example, the Tesla Roadster has faster acceleration than any Porsche out there, as well as most Ferraris - except for the Ferrari Enzo. The only issue with Electric Vehicles that has lingered for some time is batteries.
Batteries do not yet provide the high energy density of gasoline, so they are much heavier than gasoline and don’t allow for the same range. Batteries have also been much more expensive than gasoline. But I believe this will change as technology improves and gasoline prices continue to increase. I’m willing to bet my retirement that gasoline prices will never come down again, from a long-term perspective. Price may spike up and down, but the trend is a continual increase. I have predicted this years ago when many people thought I didn’t know what I was talking about. My prediction is based on the Peak Oil theory. This theory is quite simple: gasoline is finite and as we use it up some day there won’t be any. The only question about Peak Oil is “when will global oil production peak?”. Predicting exactly when it will happen is the hard part. In any case, just take my word that gasoline prices will increase to $5, $6, $10 a gallon and beyond. The only way to reduce the price of gasoline in the US is by significantly increasing our own oil production (which I don’t think we can do) or stealing oil from another country. Another way would be to substantially reduce our internal consumption, but that is extremely unlikely to happen. Americans are reluctant to give up their car, and I personally doubt we’ll ever find a replacement for gasoline. Biodiesel has proven to be a failure not only because its net energy return is small, but also because producing biodiesel allegedly has increased the cost of food (not something people want) by having farmers allocate land for fuel production that would otherwise be used for food production.

blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com