"Battery swapping is applicable to certain markets where you have higher fuel cost and smaller geographic profiles, like Israel and Denmark," said John Gartner, research director at Pike Research, a clean-technology research firm.
"If you want to build a coal plant, you have the same problem [getting capital]," says Ron Pernick, founder and principal of Clean Edge, a clean-technology research firm based in San Francisco.
"If they can deliver what they are saying, and you don't even have to make a change in the vehicle, that is a positive check in the column," says Ron Pernick, a partner at clean-technology research and publishing firm Clean Edge.
Britain should be opening more mines in tandem with rapid and substantial investment in clean coal technology research.
An international clean energy technologies research project based at Queen's University in Ontario, Canada has received a C$4 million (US$2.9 million) grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).
Money is flowing into alternative energy companies so fast that "the warning signs of a bubble are appearing," according to a report on investment in clean technology by a New York research firm, Lux Research.
Under this, the government will identify broad innovation areas in line with national priorities and strategy, such as clean technology, biotechnology, life science research, Web technology and infrastructure.
The government agrees and says it will invest more than £800m in driverless and clean technology, and a further £246m in battery technology research.
Matt Hopkins is a research fellow at the UMass Center for Industrial Competitiveness, focusing on issues of clean technology and economic development.
