On the BBC this morning they were talking about electric cars and their costs and practicality. The electric version of the Nissan Leaf is about £12,000 more than its traditional engined version and has a range of about 100 miles between re-charges.
For £12,000 (ignoring interest etc.) we could buy enough diesel to do over 110,000 miles in our current car and it's range between "recharges" is about 750 miles ( and a recharge takes less than 3 minutes and can be done in a lot of places). Our current car cost under £1000 second hand.
A car with a 100 mile range would mean we couldn't get to our boat moorings without a recharge (and another one on the way back) and we'd need two (four for the round trip) to get home to visit my parents.
Of course people will say " Well you use the Leaf for commuting and you have a second car to do long trips" . Financially an electric car will never make sense for a lot of people and that includes us.