Tom I agree.... a Little, yes batteries are still inadequate. But so is oil....
If you look at capitalism, you will see that where the demand is the money goes...... Don't you think that battery companies would poor billions on new battery technology, if they knew that cars would be going electric..... its all about making money....
As with the link posted above... In the video a woman mentions that here "Ev" Electric Vehicle is costing her about $.60 to drive the same amount of mileage that a gallon of gas would cost her. Thats $2.40 cents difference here in NJ alone and we are one of the cheaps states for gas (since we pay for everything else). Besides, I understand battery technology isn't going to get us to take a Florida trip in a car, but it would be great for the commuters that drive 30-100 miles a day and simply just have to plug in your car.... Then have a gas / electric hybrid car for longer trips....
Companies could even offer their employees Plug-in stations for recharging purposes and the Government should offer incentives for companies to do so....
So yes battery tech is still inadequate, but it has come a long way.... my old Sony camera would go through 3 pairs of rechargeable batteries to take about 400 pictures at the NYC Auto Show.... This year my New Nikon Camera D50 model, Took 400 pictures (at 6.2 mega-pixal level) and still could have gone another 500 or 600 pictures, so batteries are getting better. One thing I like to look at is NASA....
Everything that people say isn't good for "We the People".... NASA uses....
- Solar panels don't generate enough energy.... NASA uses them On the Space Station....
- Fuel Cells aren't Right yet.... NASA Used Them for DECADES....
- Hydrogen is Really Dangerous.... NASA Used it for DECADES.....
- Hi-TECH Batteries....
This list goes on and on....
Funny Thing about NASA is when they launch a Rocket or Space shuttle, you could get a few gallons of water from all that exhaust.
Its just said that Henry Ford, Had an Eletric car 100 Years ago..... but for some reason they dissappeared too.
But hey we still have 40 years of oil left so we better get every pennies worth out of this earth right... ;-)