Remember that when you plug in that electric car overnight, you are using COAL to power it!
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This little plug-in electric car sure has come a long way, just as the company has since parent Mercedes-Benz took over management from Penske Automotive Group in spring 2011.
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"If the public infrastructure is out there, it makes people feel more comfortable, particularly the people who aren't very familiar with electric cars, " said Paul Scott, vice president of Plug In America, a coalition of electric car advocates and drivers.
What the company has said is that a plug-in electric version of the car will go on sale in 2014.
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The commercial success of plug-in hybrids and pure electric car companies such as Tesla will help to drive innovation and competition, accelerating solutions for the range and cost issues.
The growing smorgasbord in new car showrooms includes 43 hybrid-electric vehicles, four plug-in hybrids and 12 pure electric cars.
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The plug-in hybrid is an interesting bridge to the electric car, so settle down all you Prius owners!
Now that Tesla is striving to be a mass-market automaker, it cannot realistically expect all 20, 000 buyers a year (the Model S sales goal) to be electric-car acolytes who will plug in at every Walmart stop.
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GM's plug-in electric hybrid, the Volt, won the coveted North American Car of the Year award, while Ford won the award for best truck.
The new BMW i3, a tiny electric car, and the BMW i8, a plug-in hybrid, both due in 2013, are the first fruits of that effort.
Its EVolve app is intended to help people wrap their heads and hearts around the experience of driving electric before getting behind the wheel of a real plug-in reliant car.
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But there are at least two major obstacles hindering wider adoption of plug-in electric vehicles: the premium that drivers will have to pay for an electric car compared with a gas-powered vehicle and the limited number of electric car charging stations nationwide.
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The company has created hundreds of American automotive jobs and its first model, the Roadster sports car, lit a fire under Detroit to begin producing electric and plug-in hybrid electric cars but with less success.
Of course, there are some high-profile debuts, most notably the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid, perhaps the most-hyped car in history, and the Nissan Leaf all-electric, both due in November.
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