I think the 'F-word' should be banned on GCC. We've wasted too much breath on this already.

Excellent charger target for the UK. They also expect 1.5 M new EVs to be sold in the UK by 2020 which must also be good news for the Ampera/Leaf etc.

"All those PV and wind turbines built in the '2013-2015 timescales will be broke by then." That could be the funniest thing I've read on GCC yet!

I think the most interesting thing to take from this is that the leading battery suppliers are able to provide OEMs with cells at E180 (~$234) per kWh. That's equivalent to $3,744 for a Volt-size battery. It's no wonder that the smaller players can't compete with that. Such figures also suggest that if anything the rollout of PHEVs will be quicker than expected.

Home batteries are just a win-win for everyone. Home owners can buy electricity at 5 pence per kWh at the night rate (or when the wind is blowing strongly) and no longer pay for peak rate (25 pence per kWh) electricity, so saving £800 per year. Or they could go mainly off-grid and live off their own solar PV. Or they could earn money from their electricity provider by exporting at peak times. From the nation's point of view, home batteries would add grid stability and reduce energy costs for everyone (less requirement for peaking power plants). The energy mix could also be moved almost completely over to renewables. From the electricity producer's point of view, they can invest much more aggressively in cheap renewables without having to pay for backup power supplies. They can also dump cheap electricity to storage when they generate too much (sunny, windy days) and buy back from consumers when they don't have enough.

Having one of these in the home will soon be as commonplace as having a hot water tank.

Hi Mahonj, sorry for the long links, but here are a couple: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-29/toyota-prius-escapes-niche-to-surge-into-global-top-three.html http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/2012/05/toyota-prius-ranked-worlds-third-best-selling-car-so-far-this-year.html

Toyota sold just 323 Prius in 1997 when it first came out. Now it is the third top selling car in the world. Give the PHEVs time.

Should we start a sweepstake for best guess as to year of introduction of the first self-driving car available to buy?

If we assume 50 kWh is available from the battery, and 3 miles per kWh because it's quite large, fast and heavy, then range could be up to 150 miles?

Toyota sold just 323 Prius in 1997 when it first came out. Now it is the third top selling car in the world. Give these time.

Gen1 and Gen 2, 36% peak, Gen 3 37% peak. http://green.autoblog.com/2011/04/24/toyota-targets-45-thermal-efficiency-for-engines-in-next-gen-hy/

@Lucas, Gas is already almost $9 per gallon here in Europe.

At 22 kW that's about 88 miles range per hour charging time. I think we need 50 kW as an industry minimum standard (Chademo is 62 kW DC).

Sign me up, I want one! If I can buy cheap night-time electricity at 6 p / kWh to offset my own use the next day at a daytime rate of 30 p / kWh, that suits me fine and helps stabilise the grid too.

"Plug-in vehicle baseline of $450/kWh through 2050" Any shred of credibility was lost after this.

160 Wh/kg and $400/kWh by 2020 ? Tesla are already using Panasonic cells at 237 Wh/kg, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk recently said he sees his battery price "dropping below $200/kWh soon".

So the linked article says they saved 6 tonnes per 6 car train, or one tonne per car (500 kg in each front coupling alone). If that really was only a 3% weight saving then each car would normally weigh 33 tonnes - sounds a bit too much for me!

VW had the Audi Duo plug-in hybrid estate for sale and on the roads back in 1997.

Enercon also has 7.5 MW direct-drive turbines - who will be first to 10 MW?

@AD They are avoiding hydrogen fuel cells because they are grossly inefficient.

Maybe not when the price of batteries is plummeting and the price of gasoline can only increase. When we get down to $250 per usable kWh it will be PHEVs for everyone.

Those numbers are very disappointing. Difficult to believe it ended up so inefficient.

I still favour a compact 'bum bag' which clips in place of the rear bumper, and contains a very small (opposed or rotary) 20 kW genset and 20 litres of diesel (for safety). Most of the time you'd leave it at home, only using it for trips >100 miles. Or if you didn't own one you could rent one from the otherwise defunct fuel filling stations on the way. Total mass would be about 80 kg, and car rear suspension and stability controls would be engineered to adapt to having it on or off automatically. The consumer can then buy a cheap, compact EV with plenty of interior space which can be converted to fossil fuel use whenever the need arises. Kind of like a Volt in two bits.

"The researchers observed a high specific capacity of about 730 mAh/g" So assuming 2.2 volts for the cell, that would be equivalent to ~1,600 Wh/kg - presumably that's just for the cathode? Either way that is massive capacity, you'd be talking about a 45 kg battery pack providing 300 miles range.