It’s widely assumed that the car of the future will be powered by
gasoline.
At least partly powered by gas, that
is, and at least for the near future.
When, if ever, will the pure
electric car—one powered solely by battery, without a drop of gas—go
mainstream?
Much will have to happen before pure
EVs will appeal to the masses.
For now, auto observers foresee a much rosier
future for gas-electric hybrids such as the Chevy Volt and the Honda Accord
Plug-in—which can be driven a limited number of miles on electric power before
a gas engine takes over—than for plug-ins like the Nissan Leaf, which operate
solely on electricity.
In a new report from the advisory company KPMG,
auto industry executives were asked to name the electric vehicle technology
that they thought would generate the most interest among consumers.
The most popular answer was the plug-in hybrid, the category that includes the
Volt. More than one-third of those surveyed (36%) said so, compared to 21% who
gave that answer in the previous year’s poll.
By contrast, faith in the future of
purely battery-powered EVs is waning; just 11% of executives pointed to the
category as the top electric car technology of the next decade, down from 16%
the year before.
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