Here is an article I wrote a while back about the X-Prizes rules and how I thought they were weighted in the pure electrics favor. Of course I think diesel is more practical in most situations but look in your tool box do you just have one tool of course not. For urban commuting an electric would work great I just rode in my friends Tesla and it was incredible. Fast and quite.
Still right now we could have a normal diesel vehicle that gets 100 mpg easy and few emissions running on a decentralized biofuel industry controlled by people like you and me instead of a cramped 2 seat electric that can't go further than 2 hours on the highway. If you agree vote for the Vincitore 1000 (aka VK).
One more thing have you ever seen a dog hiding its head and pretending like you can't see it? That is exactly what people who say electrics are zero emissions remind me of. What about the mining of the toxic unrecyclable (at least to get more batteries) metals, EMF frequency poisoning, more people living under power lines, and coal fired power plants. These things might not be visible but doesn't' mean they don't exist.
Also if you check out this link to the X-Prize site you can witness some more fishy business. Don't get me wrong I think the X-Prize competition is a great idea but the execution is off. For one thing the BITW people got elliminated because a boost control line to their turbo came loose. The Edison2 people's electric engines fried and they are still in the competition because a support vehicle pushed them up to speed and then let them test the rolling resistance. I bet if it was a diesel vehicle they would have thrown them out. Not fair.