On Wed, 01 Feb 2017 12:09:50 +0000, David Cantrell
wrote:

On Tue, Jan 31, 2017 at 09:59:01AM -0000, tim... wrote:

And ISTM that if you are going to have to spend billions on zero-emission
R&D that is more likely to be profitable if the product you are making is
more generic than a "London" cab.

There's no real research needed for a plug-in hybrid. And the owners
aren't going to do any research purely for the London cab market,
they're going to do it for cars in general, a small fraction of which
will be London-style cabs. Once you've done the research, making and
bolting together appropriately shaped batteries and motors is relatively
straightforward.

The only real spanner in the works that I can foresee is if the Wonder
Miracle Battery (tm) has specific size and shape requirements.

The battery pack will consist of a slab of lots of small cells that
will probably be placed under the floor, just as with Teslas, the
forthcoming Jaguar I-Pace, etc. It'll be easy to do with a high floor
taxi.