For me, the EVs are simply
For me, the EVs are simply not practical. If I were commuting close by or wanted a little runabout to take care of my local chores, sure, I'd love an EV to get me to and from the daily tasks. But not everyone is suited to an EV. There is no way I could take a long road trip like the one I just came back from, and expect an EV to get me there. If I'm in Utah traveling on some of the unpaved BLM roads, it's not like there's a convenient charging station anywhere. I have my full tank of gas that will take me 300-400 miles without fretting.
I think that could be the stigma that many have against EVs--the range is just way too short to be useful. It is for me, anyway. That and there is the forever looming cost of replacing the batteries--they won't last forever, and many of us will not lease cars. (Meaning, we will not be able to turn them in after two or three years, well before those batteries wear out.) That is the reason I will not own a hybrid either. I put a lot of miles on my cars, and that is one large expense I don't want to deal with.
I still think that these battery-powered cars are a stopgap. What we really need are the hydrogen fuel cell cars. Honda is on, what, it's third (?) generation of fuel cell vehicles, and others have taken it up. Before anyone complains about infrastructure, think back to the year 1900 and how many street corners had gas stations back then. Infrastructure takes time. There was recently an article posted about a new process for extracting pure hydrogen (and *only* hydrogen, no harmful emissions) from bitumen/oil sand fields that could last us hundreds of years, and it costs a fraction of what current extraction methods cost. A few "killer" innovations like that could really give the fuel cell vehicles the boost they need to become mainstream.
(I probably can't post a link here, but if you google this article "Scientists extract hydrogen gas from oil and bitumen, giving potential pollution-free energy" at the site "phys dot org," you can read about it there.)
But with hydrogen having the ability to offer quick refueling, and a range similar to petrol, that is really where I think we should be headed.
EVs and hybrids are still very much a niche market, partly for the reasons I pointed out, so it doesn't surprise me that production has been shifted.