Battery power has a bloody long way to go to match that.

Early days. John B Goodenough gave us the Lithium-Ion battery that made this debate possible, a mere 30 years ago. And at 95 he still heads-up the team trying to go beyond Cobolt on Lithium. But Tesla claim 400 miles - is your 600 mile journey really necessary? A 30 minute break re-charging the car and YOU is very wise counsel.

If we are to divorce ourselves from carbon fuel we must find alternative portable power. Electricity has the momentum, we need it NOW. New Scientist points out that using electricity for hydrolysis is not viable without acres of PV. It is doable at the point of delivery where the acreage is available - say private rooftops - but at realistic levels it would not deliver sufficient on-demand for a busy urban station. Use electricity from the grid? What is that made from?

All of this points us to the possibility that we will have to consider favouring traveling in daylight hours &/or when the wind is blowing. Or get stranded in strange towns. Like I say, science has solutions, we may not like the answers.

One novel mass storage solution seen involves heavy rail wagons driven uphill (by electricity) during daylight/windy days. And let downhill when recovering the stored energy by generating electricity and storing on batteries on each wagon. In future iterations the battery boxes will turn sideways at the top and bottom to maximise parking area. The company claim 95% ability to recycle the whole system at the end of life.

prototype is the second picture