for electric cars

Electric cars should come with batteries that are easily replaceable. That way you stop at a gas station that supports electric, they take out your spent batteries and replace them with fully charged ones. No waiting.

theteofscuba: using a fork lift?
inhahe: i dont know, i suppose they could design the car to make it easily exchangeable with a machine
theteofscuba: mayb
theteofscuba: the chevy volt uses electricity for u p to 40 miles
theteofscuba: and when it ruins out of batery it uses gas
theteofscuba: but the tesla roadster goes like 400 miles on one charge and the batteries are huge so replacing it doesnt seem feasible
inhahe: if they instated this system the batteries would conform to some particular voltage and size standard
inhahe: so the roadster would just have more of them

Obviously some people might consider it an issue that the gas station may give out a battery that's newer and has a longer lifetime left than the one they receive. The problem is basically what happens when a gas station is stuck with a battery that's used enough that they're obligated to throw it away/recycle it (and there should be a code for this). I think the answer is that the gas station simply foots the cost, and it averages out over all the service they do. After all there's not really opportunity for the motorists to defraud the gas stations in this way, especially if they don't even have to worry about the age of their batteries because of this system being instated. Although not even the gas stations necessarily have to foot the cost per se; they could have deals with the battery companies.