Range Anxiety: Fact or Fiction?
Critics say that fear of being stranded with a dead battery, or "range anxiety," will discourage people from adopting electric cars. Others say the issue is overblown.
One spring day in 2009, software engineer Bill Arnett slid behind the wheel of his new electric Tesla Roadster and set off toward Yosemite National Park, a journey of about 200 miles from his home in Redwood City, California.
Far from urban centers and up through the Sierra Nevada foothills, this is the sort of road trip that's supposed to strike fear in the heart of an electric car driver. "Range anxiety" is the name for angst over being stranded with a dead battery, miles from a plug.
Yet Arnett made the Yosemite trip without fear. He was driving his "Signature One Hundred" series Roadster —a high-end sports car said to travel up to 244 miles on a full charge. A year
