At least that's the prediction of Lawrence D. Burns, General Motors Corp. vice president of research, development and planning, who oversees advanced technology and innovation programs. 

Burns says he foresees a day when consumers will have agreements with their local utility companies to use their vehicles to generate electricity. 

"The idea is that each morning you'd leave home with a fully charged vehicle and then you'd go to work," Burns said. 

"You could plug the car in at work and use some of the hydrogen to generate electricity during peak periods of demand and get paid for having done that. And then you go back home and refill." 

Burns said some auto parts supplier companies are already working on home appliances that would create hydrogen from electricity and water to power cars and trucks. 

Consumers surveyed by GM love the idea of home refueling. 

"Home refueling will be great because you will give people decentralized control over how they are providing fuel for their vehicles," Burns said. "They don't have to get gas all over their shoes or deal with inclement weather." 

He also envisions a day when consumers will be able to exploit the computing power of vehicles, too. 

"Right now there are 23 computers on a (Cadillac) XLR that aren't doing anything while the car sits idle," he said. 

"If you could have that same connectivity, not only to the electric grid, but wirelessly, to the global computing grid, suddenly you've got all the computing power of all the cars in the world that are parked. 

"And you are usually 100 feet from your car when it's parked, so you could wirelessly be tethered to your personal computing power in the car." 

It's not a reality yet, but Burns gets paid to think big thoughts. 

"I get paid to play with these ideas," he said. "It's a lot of fun to think of a car becoming your information appliance, your mobile-power appliance and your transportation appliance."