Click to enlarge pictureMitsubishi i (© Mitsubishi Motors North America)

2012 Mitsubishi i

'Zero Emissions'— Not as Green as It Sounds
You can buy bumper stickers for your EV pointing out that there's no tailpipe on your car, and therefore no emissions, which truly is great, except that the finished car represents just one step in the life cycle of the vehicle, and buyers have become hip to this. The materials used to make the batteries for electric vehicles — including, in most cases, copper, nickel, cobalt, tantalum, tin and tungsten — must be acquired through earth-unfriendly mining processes, much of which takes place in the conflict-addled region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Not to mention that much of the power grid in the United States is coal-fired, meaning that even while charging a zero-emission EV you are likely burning fossil fuels. And in some cases, charging an EV can create more emissions than driving a fuel-burning car.

View Slideshow:  The Most Fuel-Efficient 2012 Cars

Cost, Again
The high price of EVs means it's nearly impossible to recoup the vehicle cost against fuel savings. In fact, a recent New York Times article noted that the initial cost of a Chevy Volt could take up to 27 years to pay off, assuming it was regularly driven farther than its battery-only range allows. That number drops to eight years, or two years longer than the average American retains a new vehicle, if "gas costs $5 a gallon and the driver remained exclusively on battery power."

Watch Video:  2012 Chevrolet Volt

At the same time, the battery packs used in EVs are not only expensive — Ford CEO Alan Mulally was recently quoted at pricing a 23-kilowatt-hour battery pack for pure electrics at "around $12,000 to $15,000" — but their performance degrades over time. Whereas a gas- or diesel-powered vehicle will continue to perform as advertised with regular care and maintenance, a Nissan Leaf could be running at just 80 percent of its original capacity after five years, and a mere 70 percent after a decade — and that's by Mitsubishi's own estimates. That's a hard pill to swallow when you're shelling out $35K for a bug-eyed hatchback.

Read: Waiting for the Better Electric Car

The Good News
Electric vehicles in their current incarnation are specialists, good for densely populated urban areas where emissions are of greater concern and where gas prices tend to be highest. In fact, for all of our land, the U.S. is one of the most urbanized populations in the world, with more than 80 percent of its people residing in urban and suburban areas. That means the oft-cited issue of EV recharging infrastructure — that is, there's nowhere to charge the things — could be solved relatively quickly with proper planning. In other words, solving the bulk of the recharging infrastructure issue doesn't mean putting a charging station on every street corner in America — a daunting task given the scope of the country — but rather by concentrating on the densely packed urban and suburban areas where the limited-range, highly efficient vehicles make the most sense to begin with.

And while we chide the Obama administration for focusing almost exclusively on electric vehicles at the expense of other alternatives — notably, compressed natural gas and hydrogen-powered vehicles, which have their own benefits and limitations — that singular focus and financial support has allowed automakers and others to continue making technological breakthroughs. Batteries will become lighter, costs will drop and driving ranges will increase as charging times decrease, all while a reliable recharging infrastructure is put in place. Meanwhile, recent studies show that Americans are making their new-vehicle purchases based mostly on fuel prices, an obvious advantage for vehicles that use no gas and can be fully charged for just a few dollars' worth of electricity.

Compare: Nissan Leaf vs. Mitsubishi i vs. Chevrolet Volt

Conclusion
Any car, even a futuristic, zero-emissions technological marvel, is still the second-largest purchase behind a house for most people. At this stage, electric vehicles are more proof-of-concept demonstrations of a manufacturer's green bona fides than affordable and viable means of transportation, and EV sales demonstrate this. But luckily, EVs will continue to be developed in parallel with — not as an immediate replacement for — internal-combustion-engine vehicles. Given time and technological advancements, who knows? They may even turn out to be the future.

Josh Condon is the editor of MSN Autos' Exhaust Notes. Based in Los Angeles, his work has appeared in publications including The New York Times, Esquire, Popular Science, Men's Journal and Ralph Lauren RL Magazine.

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