Electric vehicles are still a decade from becoming mainstream, experts said at Tuesday’s Megatrends auto conference in Dearborn.

“Continuous improvement in gas engines will continue to push plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles farther into the future,” said Michael Omotoso, senior manager, global powertrain forecast, with LMC Automotive.

The Troy-based firm does not see electric vehicles hitting 1% of the market until 2018.

It took eight years for hybrids to hit 2% of the U.S. market but the second 2% only took a year, said Mike Tinskey, Ford’s director of global vehicle electrification and infrastructure.

And a recent Harris poll showed that 60% of consumers in the showroom today are interested in hybrids and one in four shoppers are interested in plug-in hybrids, Tinskey said.

One reason is electricity is 20%-25% of the cost of filling a vehicle with gasoline, Tinskey said. The Focus Electric costs $2-$3 to charge; the Fusion hybrid costs about $12 to charge.

There are about 12,000 charging stations in the U.S. and 15,000 in Europe, he said.

More electric vehicles are coming to market but most are small cars: Nissan Leaf and electric versions of the Focus, Honda Fit, Fiat 500, Smart, Scion iQ and the Toyota RAV4 crossover.

“We expect sales of each to be low,” Omotoso said, and the lack of a full range of mainstream electric vehicles will keep them from penetrating the market.

President Barack Obama set a goal of having 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015. “He won’t reach it until 2017, and there will be more plug-in hybrids than electric vehicles,” Omotoso said.

Regulations are at odds with what consumers want, Omotoso said. Automakers find themselves in the tough position of trying to appease regulators, consumers and shareholders with their mix of vehicles.

Automakers must meet corporate average fuel economy requirements of 54.5 m.p.g. by 2025 although Kevin Green of the CAFE program for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said the standard can be met with efficient gasoline engines and advances in areas from transmissions to tires.

Only 1%-3% of the fleet in 2025 needs to be plug-in hybrids or electric vehicles, Green said. That is good given reluctance by consumers to buy them. Even early adopters are buying them as a second or third car, not the primary vehicle for road trips.

And automakers are introducing more diesels. On the horizon: diesel versions of the Chevrolet Cruze, Jeep Grand Cherokee, Mazda6 and Ram 1500.

Diesel prices remain high, in part because of a global shortage, said Stuart Johnson, Volkswagen of America manager of engineering and environment.

Even with the high fuel prices, “we expect diesel to grow,” Omotoso said, in part because the premium for the engine is $2,000-$4,000 while a hybrid can cost $6,000 extra, a plug-in hybrid has a $10,000-$15,000 premium and an electric vehicle is $15,000 to $20,000 more.

“The price is not low enough yet to justify purchase by consumers,” Omotoso said. “As long as the price of gas remains below $4 a gallon, alternatives such as diesels and hybrids are not needed, let alone plug-ins and electric vehicles.”

And gasoline engines can improve efficiency by 10% with just turbocharging, and another 10% with direct injection, in addition to other technologies that don’t involve electricity or recharging.

More Details: Non-electric engine strategies

Automakers are embracing technologies that improve efficiencies of gasoline engines without resorting to electricity. Turbocharging has gone from 6% of cars in 2009 to a projected 30% in 2017, according to LMC. Direct injection is expected to grow from 12% in 2009 to 55% in 2017.

Gasoline engine efficiencies

• Turbocharging improves engine efficiency 5%-10%
  
• Direct injection, 10%
  
• 8-to-10-speed transmission, 1%-2%
  
• System that turns off idling vehicle, 3%-6%.