My favourite bit is heating the cabin of an electric car...

Step 1: Burn fuel, create heat, 95% - 100% efficiency

Step 2: Use heat to drive turbine, generate electricity, >85% efficiency

Step 3: Send electricity to end user over grid, (variable efficiency dependent on transmission losses...)

Step 4: Use electricity to turn back into heat

Overall efficiency: approx 33%!

Still, we've gotta start somewhere. It's the "holier-than-thou" attitude of some people I know (all with one particular make of hybrid) that I find hardest to deal with. It's educating the general public about the bigger picture when it comes to energy supplies and how we use them to make things and move ourselves about which is a tough nut to crack. Probably almost as hard as the challenges of alternative propulsion systems. I once heard a TV presenter describe carbon as "dangerous". Not carbon dioxide, just plain old carbon. I hoped they realised their bodies contained a pretty hefty proportion of it!