Are battery powered cars the answer?

NVDL: I would say it is worth a try, but the short answer is: "battery power is only part of the answer, and it's not nearly the final answer." I am not sure if the technology exists to make the sort of batteries we have for mobile phones and notebooks on the sort of scale and for the sort of energy consumption driving involves.

My gut says no, because 1) electric car batteries are very expensive and have a limited lifespan and 2) it still doesn't solve the energy problem. Oil/energy is now simply routed via electricity - it still amounts to the same equation in terms of energy consumption. The answer starts to become evident when we're talking about driving less, changing how we move around, moving around differently (like public transport, trains etc), not finding ways to maintain what is essentially unsustainable.

clipped from www.wired.com "Once you have a mission," Agassi told me over dinner one night last winter, "you can't go back to having a job." By early summer 2008, Agassi had two countries ready to roll out the plan, a major automaker producing the cars, and $200 million in committed capital. He had launched the fifth-largest startup of all time in less than a year. After a career spent thinking exclusively about business software, Agassi now thrills to the idea that he's changing the world. "I get to shift multiple markets," he says. "I get to shift economies. It's extremely liberating. I breathe differently."