JAPAN: Toyota says it plans to start selling a "plug-in" version of it's popular Prius hybrid cars, which will run on electricity alone

Record ID: 465177

  • Title: JAPAN: Toyota says it plans to start selling a "plug-in" version of it's popular Prius hybrid cars, which will run on electricity alone
  • Date: 15th December 2009
  • Summary: TOKYO, JAPAN (DECEMBER 14, 2009) (REUTERS) (CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY) VIEW FROM TOKYO SKYSCRAPERS TO TOYOTA TEST-DRIVE CIRCUIT SIGN ON BUILDING READING "MEGA WEB - TOYOTA CITY SHOWCASE" VARIOUS OF TOYOTA'S NEW PRIUS "PLUG-IN HYBRIDS" TEST-DRIVING LID ON POWER SUPPLY UNIT READING "PLUG-IN HYBRID" VEHICLE BEING RE-CHARGED TA CHARGING STATION POWER NOZZLE TOYOTA NEWS CONFERENCE (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) TOYOTA MOTOR CORPORATION EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, TAKESHI UCHIYAMADA, SAYING: "In two years, we would start mass-producing several tens of thousands of units of plug-in hybrids a year for sale to regular customers and we aim to have them available at affordable prices." PRIUS PLUG-IN HYBRID ON DISPLAY AT NEWS CONFERENCE (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) TOYOTA MOTOR CORPORATION EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, TAKESHI UCHIYAMADA, SAYING: "The main reason why we're going to have to wait for two years (until mass-production) is that we still need to allow some time for new batteries for plug-in vehicles to be developed and supplied." LITHIUM-ION BATTERIES USED FOR PRIUS PLUG-IN HYBRID SKELETON OF PRIUS PLUG-IN HYBRID ENGINE AND POWER CONTROL UNIT TOYOTA EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT UCHIYAMADA PUTTING POWER NOZZLE INTO VEHICLE POWER NOZZLE UCHIYAMADA POSING BEFORE MEDIA
  • Embargoed: 30th December 2009 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Topics: Environment / Natural World,Industry
  • Reuters ID: LVADJ85SW7VT8KFM44MZVYSEYJQ
  • Story Text: Japan's Toyota Motor announced on Monday (December 14) that it will begin selling "plug-in" hybrid cars in mass volumes in two years' time, taking a big step in further improving its cars' fuel economy and setting the bar for other companies to produce all-electric cars.
    Toyota's plug-in hybrid adds an external charging function and more batteries to enable longer-distance driving on the electric motor alone, compared with its current gasoline-electric hybrid cars--like the popular Prius.
    "In two years, we would start mass-producing several tens of thousands of units of plug-in hybrids a year for sale to regular customers and we aim to have them available at affordable prices," Takeshi Uchiyamada, executive vice president of Toyota Motor Corporation, told a news conference in Tokyo.
    Toyota, the world's biggest automaker, will begin global leasing this month of 600 plug-in hybrids based on the Prius model, primarily for government and corporate use. It said 230 will be in Japan, 200 in Europe and 150 in the United States.
    "The main reason why we're going to have to wait for two years (until mass-production) is that we still need to allow some time for new batteries for plug-in vehicles to be developed and supplied," Uchiyamada said.
    Plug-in hybrid cars can be cleaner than regular hybrids because they can be charged to run purely on electricity, but the need for more batteries makes them expensive. Because it also runs on an engine, plug-in hybrids eliminate the concern of limited cruising range that pure battery electric cars have.
    The Prius Plug-in Hybrid (PHV) has a cruising range of 23.4 km (14.5 miles) and top speed of 100 km/h (62 mph) on the battery-only mode. At full charge and with a full tank of gas, the car could theoretically travel 1,400 km (870 miles), Toyota says.
    Toyota's vice president noted that currently in the United States, after-market kits to convert a conventional Toyota hybrid car into a plug-in hybrid vehicle are available for about about 1 million yen ($11,260 U.S. dollars), and Toyota "would have to do much better than that, he said.
    Toyota's plug-in cars would be the brand's first to employ lithium-ion batteries, which are costly but can store more energy than the nickel-metal hydride batteries used in most gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles.
    Toyota said the Prius PHV could halve the running cost of traveling 30 km compared with a regular Prius when using cheaper, nighttime electricity. The car can be fully charged in about 100 minutes at 200 Volts and three hours at 100 Volts.
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