I find it amazing how when you throw out exploding millenia old dead plants in a box suddenly your motor and power train are about as complex as a RC matchbox car. Sure, replacing batteries is absurdly expensive, but that really is it. If you can just get the cost of the battery replacements down, you don't have to worry about belts or mufflers or the gear shift breaking due to complex machinery going on the fritz.
I'm sympathetic to electric vehicles, but they don't escape the problem of complexity. There's still power steering, brakes, gearboxes, differentials, a/c, and a million other things that can go wrong - little of which has the 100+ years of engineering development that ICE vehicles have.
I'm not saying don't buy one, but don't expect electric vehicles to be as reliable as ICE vehicles for at least another decade. Maybe two or three.
My Prius (which is almost guaranteed the worst of both worlds as it's both gas and electric) has had a stellar maintenance record - and I'm a very lazy oil changer and neglectful owner.
Electric vehicles using software "clutches" are to ICE-powered cars as SSD is to HDDs - at first, there will be downsides and only the adventurous will get to showboat, but in several generations the only reason you don't get an electric car (SSD) is if you really need the range (storage space using our analogy) or can't afford the upgrade.
