Katherine Long

Seattle predicted as key market for electric cars

SEATTLE — After years of hype, it looks as though the mass-produced, all-electric car is really on its way. The Seattle area is poised to become one of the key markets for the initial wave of electric cars, in part because of plans to begin building a network of more than 2,000 charging stations throughout the region next year. Funded by part of a $100 million federal Department of Energy economic-stimulus grant, the charging stations are to the electric car what the cellphone-tower network was to the cellphone.