Originally Posted by
lotusexige
TBH, on the car side I tend to view the current craze for the hybrid as a triumph of marketing and legislation over basic physics.
Only if you don't know how a hybrid works.
The battery is used to *save* energy that would be otherwise be wasted (regenerative braking) and the electric-only drive is used when the ICE would be less efficient because working in unfavorable regime.
The battery in hybrid vehicles, in fact, is very small, able to run the car for few kilometers.
The net effect is a car that consumes less fuel.
A hybrid plug-in or fully electric car is another beast but, if you do the calculations the net energy efficiency (from source to shaft), even from oil-powered plants is greater (not much but still greater) than the ICE.