I don’t know about you but despite the fact that I “work” in this field, I often find myself perplexed about the decisions regarding hybrid, electric, bio-diesel run cars.  I am clear that walking/riding bikes/riding public transportation is greenest (in most cases)…but then I get a bit lost.

Full disclosure:

We have two cars. One is a 1980 mercedes that we run on Dr. Dan’s bio-diesel. One is a Euro-van (no matter what Toyota says, we couldn’t but a mini-van) that we run on regular super expensive gas.

When we considered a hybrid, my husband convinced me that  the manufacturing of the battery alone  for the hybrid (at least the Prius) was worse for the environment than a convention car that runs on bio-diesel.

When we have considered the electric, I’ve been torn about size (how do we fit 3 kids? and then some), price, availability,etc.

I thought this side by side comparison in this past Sunday NYTimes was quite helpful– makes the question of cost pretty clear. Looks like I need to start researching more.

According to Deloitte, more than half (60%) of U.S. consumers say two hours or less is the longest amount of time they would be willing to wait to fully recharge the battery if they were to purchase an electric vehicle. Only 23% find eight hours of charge time acceptable. (Green Car Congress  4/19/11)

And if can be patient and you are worried about long road trips check this out: A map for electric car charging stations…