Every article I read on new car development mentions hybrid vehicles.  Not all hybrids are the concern of this blog, just the ones that you plug into a wall socket.

Most American power comes from coal, a power source that is 30% efficient and produces a lot of environmental damage.  Coal mines tear the earth to pieces, and the burning of coal produces a lot of CO2 waste.  Since coal it only about 30% efficient, most of the energy produced by coal is wasted and roughly 70% of the pollution produced comes from something that did not even generate power.

The main selling point of these electric cars is that you can achieve over 100 miles per gallon, while producing virtually no CO2.  All this really does is trade pollution produced by gasoline to pollution produced by coal.  However, since you will never actually see that your electricity comes from coal, you can rest easy by telling yourself that your power came from wind or some other "environmentally friendly" power source.

I would be hard pressed to believe that plugging your car into an electric grid will really decrease any amount of pollution.  The only benefit I can see is that if you plug in your vehicle at work and essential run your car for free.  Next time you go and plug in your car, remember that most of that power comes from a very inefficient, high polluting source.