[geeks] electric cars

[Sheldon T. Hall]

Charles Shannon Hendrix writes ...
[of the drawbacks of electric cars]
>
> For example, when a hurricane knocks out power for a month, I still
> need my car.  Things like that.

Unless your local gas station has a generator, you're still screwed;
gasoline pumps run on electricity.  Yeah, maybe some oil company will bring
in a tanker, and you can fill up from that, but that only seems to happen
for major disasters, not the outages we have around here.  On this island,
in the winter, you just fill up when you get down to half-a-tank.

Actually, I'd like to see an electric car with enough of an on-board
generator to charge the battery whenever it gets down to some low percentage
of charge.  Automatic actuation, etc.  If you kept the battery charged off
your home wallsocket, you'd rarely use the on-board generator, but it would
be available as a range-extender, off-grid charger, etc.  Basically, a
hacked Prius, but with more battery and less engine. 

FWIW, my son has a Prius, and even if you ignore the whiz-bangs like the
GPS, it's quite something.  He gets astounding gas mileage, and it is not a
small car.  It's not slow, either.

-Shel