I think EV's could have easily been done in the 90s. Yet we're still fighting the same crap today...
One concern that always keeps coming up is the range. If you need to drive more than 140 miles in a day, you need to move closer to work. Most of the time, the whole "I can go to a gas station and fill up in 30 seconds" debate is moot, because if you charge your battery every night when you're sleeping, then who cares how long it takes to charge? And that ties into the range concerns as well. If you're one of those people who forget to charge, then there's always hybrids.
While we're talking about battery capacity, the story would be a lot different right now if Texaco and Chevron didn't hold the monopoly on NiMH batteries. If you want to buy NiMH, you have to buy it from them, and you have to buy them in large quantities. They're holding the market back from using better batteries, which we already have available today.
One thing manufacturers will need to start thinking about is setting a common standard for charging. Without it, nobody will want to build a charging station based on the fact that the charging station only supports one make of cars. Unless they build the chargers into the cars and use standard extension cords to plug the cars in, but that seems expensive.
Another thing that always comes up with talking about EV's is the concern of where the power comes from. While it is true that most countries still use coal as their main source of fuel, I would rather shift the carbon to the power generation facility, than have it hang over our cities in that dense unbreatheable mass called smog. Luckily for me, 56% of my power comes from nuclear (followed by 22% hydroelectric, coal only accounts for 2%). Also, regardless of what power companies would tell you, there is no energy shortage. In fact, for my area alone, we export 15% of what we're currently generating, and we still have tons of power to go around.
Going back to another item I touched on, is the price. EV's are too expensive right now. While I won't get into conspiracies that manufacturers are artificially inflating EV prices to keep ownership low, between R+D, and battery costs (again, patents and licensing), among other things, something needs to be done to bring the prices down. Or perhaps governments could stop subsidizing manufacturers for making and selling gas-powered vehicles. It was suggested in a documentary that one could essentially buy a Hummer for nothing due to subsidies, but those same subsidies didn't apply to EV's.
I won't even get into the whole "ethanol kills the corn market" thing, because it's just more protectionist garbage meant to maintain the status-quo. Not to mention, it's not the only source of ethanol. One thing I will touch on though, which I find interesting, is that people still haven't taken up SVO/WVO as a fuel. It's free (aside from the costs of the refining equipment), and all you have to do is acquire it and filter it. It really wouldn't work here in Canada, but it could easily work in the US, moreso in the southern states.
Long story short, we could have fixed all this 20 years ago, but we didn't because doing nothing is easy... and the rich get richer.
edit: I guess I should note that I am an electric scooter owner.
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