Leaf's nothing but a necessary evil, like the Prius was. Fact of the matter is that ICEs are reaching the pinnacle of what we can do with them, massive gains in efficiency are only going to come about if there are revolutionary improvements in materials tech, and when laser ignition becomes viable. The work done by Toyota with the Prius gave proof-of-concept for mass-produced batteries and power systems, and to a lesser extent improvements in the Atkinson cycle engine - piss poor car but served its purpose, and has its good use as a taxi. The Leaf/iMIEV was supposed to do the same for the pure electric but they've gone and ballsed that up with the price and promotion as a direct replacement for a car for everywhere, rather than something that'll work in specific places (50-80km/day is perfect for an Auckland to-and-from, but not for much else). Electric cars are well behind the development curve but there's a longer way to go - we stick with ICEs only and we're only going to hit the same developmental wall, just without a viable alternative.
wrong2,
Nov 3, 6:46pm
yeah, sure they are
afterall, its just 800 million new cars we are talking about converting too
greateft,
Nov 3, 7:48pm
Recyclable, and they're not 'rare' in that sense, only even expensive because mining capacity isn't there right now - it was (still is!) considered too amply abundant to risk putting money into a mine, just for an existing producer (China) to drop prices to kill it off. That'll change pretty quick with scale, as nations consider their own mines of strategic manufacturing significance and subsidise them against this sort of tactic, or demand rises beyond capacity very suddenly, or someone uses a more resilient business model that won't see them bankrupted if this happens.
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