@ JonB

> Where do you think the hydrogen comes from though?

Ummm.. just guessing here... but...water?

I think you what you meant to ask was where will the electricity to split the water to come from?

Well, the sources of electricity are many; solar (wind, photovoltaic, tidal, wave (not tidal-wave), hydro-electric, steam turbines (using heliostats or geothermal to create steam), Stirling engines (reuse the super-heated steam from the former, or waste heat from some other source). There are many many sources of power.. there are very few good ways to store that power. Hydrogen is one.

Now storing the Hydrogen can be tricky because it is such a small molecule, but that's another problem.

Re: Tree Hugging

I'll have you know that I have never once hugged a tree, and don't even consider myself a "greeny" - environmental responsibility is a mainstream view, IMO.

I am a strong advocate of electric cars and I understand very well electricity generation (where it comes from), transmission (distribution over the grid) and consumption (whether industrial or domestic).

Electric cars are about (or at least) three times as efficient as a normal car. A term that describes this well is "well-to-wheel efficiency", which is the distance driven per megajoule (MJ) of input energy from the original source (e.g. oil in an oil well, coal in a coal seam, or wind blowing around doing nothing other than messing up your hair). Taking into account the energy costs and efficiency of every stage (extracting, processing/refining, distributing, pumping and finally consuming energy), you get figures like this:

Normal petrol car (family sedan) - 0.28 km/MJ

Hybrid (e.g. Toyota Prius) - 0.56 km/MJ

All Electric (Li-ion battery) - 1.14 km/MJ

So, even if all energy is derived from fossil-fuel sources, electric vehicles STILL have the lowest emissions by far, AND there are zero emissions at the tailpipe, meaning they don't contribute to local pollution (e.g. smog). Remember when smog-reduction was a worthy aim in itself?

BUT, battery electric vehicles permit energy to be derived from any generating source - wind, solar photovoltaic, solar thermal, nuclear, wave, tidal, biomass, coal, "clean" coal, oil, gas, whatever. De-coupling the transport energy sector from oil, and permitting ANY MIX of electricity generating sources on the grid (then, of course, partly used for battery charging), produces the most efficient outcome and reduces emissions by the greatest degree. Furthermore, both the automotive technology and electricity generating streams can proceed at their optimum pace.

Clearer now? I'd like a dollar, pound, or slap-and-tickle-with-Sarah for every time I've had to explain this .....

Not quite what I need, but close...

When they make an estate/tourer/station-wagon version, with nice rails on the roof for my kayaks, then I'll be interested. Surf-boards and mountain bikes are one thing, but can't get a 20-foot racing K2 inside anything you would honestly call a car...

'course, that roof-rack might just shorten the range a little: it certainly does with a petrol engine :(

But the extra boot in the front sounds perfect for the wet kit after the race.

On the styling - it's not an Aston, Maserati, Jaguar, Audi, Renault look-alike: it's a Mazda RX8 with proper rear doors.