battery

It's a dream, a bad dream. I'm standing on a street corner, it's late, it's dark, I know my location but I don't know where I am. There are figures in the shadows. I am not comfortable. I decide to call a cab and I reach into my pocket, pick up my phone, the latest model from a leading manufacturer, click to wake it up - but it's dead. And it's only six hours since I unplugged it from the USB cable that it spends most of its life attached to in the office. It might still be a cellphone, but it's hardly mobile, says Pete Jackson.

Research by Australian Newspaper News.Com.Au has turned up a hidden problem with electric cars: if the battery goes flat, it might not be possible to recharge it, resulting in a very expensive - and not at all ecoologically friendly - replacement

The Nissan Leaf may be a great car (Nissan haven't given us one to drive yet) but as the UK disappears under another snow storm, it's clearly not the car for this year, or at least not this winter.