All-electric vehicles are not going over well with drivers who know there are few charging stations in operation across the nation.
Consumers want hybrids that combine gas with battery power, like the Toyota Prius, or that plug in but have a backup gas tank, like the Chevrolet Volt, the Detroit Free Press reports.
Sales of the all-electric Nissan Leaf, which can travel about 75 miles on a single overnight charge, plummeted 69% in June from a year earlier. Meanwhile, sales of various models of Toyota Prius hybrids are selling as fast as the automaker can ship them.
The Volt is still not an overwhelming success, but sales for the first half of 2012 more than tripled from a year ago to 8,817.
President Barack Obama set a goal of getting 1 million plug-in hybrids and all-electrics on U.S. roads by 2015. The administration pumped billion of dollars in loans and grants into battery technology companies, but now, some of the recipients -- including A123 Systems, with nearly 800 workers in Livonia and Romulus -- are sitting on more capacity than the market wants.
Last week, Pike Research of Boulder, Colo., said the president's 1 million plug-ins would not happen before 2018, if then.
