As some of your may know, Electric Vehicles have been around for some time, the earliest appearing by 1837, designed by Robert Davidson. This article on Yahoo News talks about some early work Ferdinand Porsche did with EV’s. Certainly not the Porsche you’re used to seeing, but today they’re returning to their roots.
The EV’s simplicity made them an obvious approach, but the battery technology of the day made internal combustion engines more attractive. Many technical hurdles have been overcome, but internal combustion engines are still much more complex, require more maintenance, than their EV counterpart. Fortunately battery technology has come a long way as well, and we’re seeing some great electric vehicles in production today.