From the article:
home recharging stations cost extra if you have a house
Not true. All currently sold EV's ship with a L1 EVSE that can charge 50-80% of the range overnight on 120V.
It is true that you may wish to spend $500 or less to purchase a L2 EVSE that charges the car fully in 5 hours.
manufacturers are struggling to get people to buy them in numbers that make producing them profitable
Tesla makes 28% margin (latest numbers from Q1 2015 earnings) on sales of the Model S. The car itself is profitable.
Of course, Tesla is spending that per-car profit (and more) on R&D developing the next major steps to their plan.
It’s not even clear that electric cars are more emissions-friendly: according to a recent report by University of Toronto professor, Christopher Kennedy
Didn't read the article did you? How about the chart showing that Canadian power production is a model for the world, our electricity is greener than most. My Smart ED runs 100% on renewable electricity and is the absolute king of the efficiency hill, it is not possible to drive a more energy efficient car from production to end of life than the Smart ED in Canada.
new generation of batteries still won’t be able to compete with the longer driving range of conventional gasoline vehicles
Ridiculous! The Tesla Model S is easily able to cover 100% of all trips I have ever taken in our family SUV. The next generation of electric cars due out in 2017 will have the same range as the Tesla, and thus will be perfectly good enough to replace the primary gas vehicle in the majority of house holds when judged on this metric.
electric cars will have to be recharged more frequently than conventional vehicles
Correct, and thanks to having a refuelling stations in practically every garage (otherwise known as an electrical outlet!), owners will have no anxiety about needing to refuel out in the cold and wet.
the recharging time is painfully slow compared to the 5-minute fill-up time of a gas tank
Laughable! The convenience of plugging in every few days, just 5 seconds as I walk around the car when I get home is far less time than I would have spent at gas stations driving the same 10000km I have so far on electricity alone. The EV is designed to be fully charged over night and ready with a "full tank" every morning. Nothing is more convenient than this, nothing!
in ten years, the number of public charging stations won’t come anywhere near the number of public gas stations
There are more available EV charge points in my neighbourhood listed on plugshare than gas stations, and that's because gas stations are restricted in where they can be built, why is that again...something about them not being compatible with being on a residential street?
Oh, and the Tesla superchargers cover the vast majority of the continental US and the major population areas in Canada. Within a few years, fast DC charging (free, ie. included in the price of the car) will be ubiquitous.
at some point, organizations who’ve invested in recharging stations will have to start charging for power.
No. They will put charge points up for customers, just like restaurants that buy big screen TV's (which cost WAY more to buy and provide power for than a charge point) use them to attract customers.
hope that oil companies will decide to get on board and promote electricity
Forget them. I will be off gas when I trade our Mercedes up for a Tesla. I vow to never buy gas again.
prediction is that in ten years, pure electric cars will still be the next big thing
Well, I hope you are happy with your land line telephone, OH, you use a cell phone? Why is that?
Disruptive technology has a way of changing the world overnight.
So much fail in one article.