Forget that they're cramped, have a limited driving range and outstrip the average consumer's wallet. The race is on to create viable electric cars.
Although they are unlikely to catch on fast in the Gulf with its cheap petrol prices, travellers could one day find they'll be the only vehicles you can hire abroad.
Germany, home to brands including Volkswagen, Porsche and BMW, became the latest country to fast track development of electric cars, the government approving a plan that aims to put one million of them on the road by 2020.
The goal is ambitious. Of the 41 million cars in the country, only 1,452 are electric, and Germany is entering an increasingly congested field.
This month alone, Nissan Motor Co. in Japan unveiled the Leaf, an electric car scheduled to go into mass production for a global market in 2012; General Motors touted triple-digit mileage figures for its rechargeable Chevrolet Volt; and President Barack Obama committed $2.4 billion in federal grants to develop next-generation electric vehicles and batteries in the US.
To help bring Germany up to speed, the government plans to spend some $705 million on the plan over the next three years.
The massive, sensitive, costly and fast-depleting batteries that take the place of international combustion engines and gasoline are expensive to produce, and countries like South Korea and Japan are far ahead in research and development.
Electric cars are also more limited than their gas-guzzling cousins, running 40 and 120 miles (60 to 200 kilometres) on a charge, while taking anywhere from two to seven hours to fully recharge.
However, electric cars are becoming a more common sight in European cities where the streets are narrow, parking spots are rare and traffic is thick.
