It's pretty counterintuitive that a Hummer has less environmental impact.

but where the "hybrids are just for symbolism not for really doing something about the environment" idea shows some truth is in the fact that hybrid technology is mainly devoted to small cars which 1) already have the least environmental impact and 2) are the most negatively affected by having to carry the excess weight and space of the hybrid system. it seems intuitive that the biggest bang for the buck would be for hybrids in things like... well, a Hummer. Or a Suburban. the bigger the vehicle, the more room for improvement; the bigger and more thirsty the gasoline engine you're turning off at lights and while cruising; the less the impact of the weight and bulk of the system on the total mass of the vehicle.

Obviously a few manufacturers have made steps towards hybridizing their trucky vehicles; Ford Escape, for instance, although I think they've only gotten as far as shutting down the engine when stopped. technology that Subaru sold, deaces ago.

but chrysler still features the Hemi for their monsters, rather than a hybrid, emphasizing the ability to crush the earth, rather than preserve it.

it's symbolism on both sides; the pro-environmental folks want not only to be environmentally conscious, but to advertise themselves as environmentally conscious. and the big vehicle buyers, want something that serves as a bumper sticker saying 'screw the environment'.

Even Honda's Accord hybrid which was the brilliantly logical answer to how do you make a midsize car faster without making it more thirsty was a failure in the market to the point where Honda pulled it. That undoubtedly gives pause to any manufacturer who wants to revamp their car line intelligently. Rather look at Toyota, who gets huge public relations boost for selling a few Priuses, while simultaneously selling thousands of big heavy thirsty trucks and suvs.

Your point is moderately valid, in that every major purchase has some symbolic significance to the purchaser. But it is easy to make far too much of this and imply that the symbolic significance is the sole or primary element in the purchase decision. For instance, people who claim that the odd shape of the Prius is significant mostly for advertising the purchaser's environmental virtue, ignore that the odd shape's intention was to lessen drag and is one of many significant design choices that make Prius indisputably the most efficient existing hybrid. Does it look different? Yes. Is it the best hybrid? Yes. So which fact is truly the most significant to a purchaser?

Your example of the Accord exemplifies this confusion. Yes, the Accord does not look like a hybrid, and on casual consideration one might therefore decide that this is the reason for its failure in the marketplace. But, Honda decided to use hybrid technology in the Accord not to significantly improve mileage, but to increase the car's power. The hybrid Accord was the most powerful and well-quipped model in the Accord line. But it's improvement in mpg was minuscule. Therefore, a purchaser interested in a hybrid could see the hybrid Accord, which cost significantly more than a normal Accord, as a poor solution to his or her desire to significantly increase mpg, and reject it for that reason. Did the Accord hybrid look like a normal car? Yes. Did it significantly improve mpg at a reasonable cost? No. So which fact was truly more significant to a potential purchaser?

Consider as well that they hybrid Civic, which looks like a normal car and is second only to Prius in hybrid mpg, has always been the second best selling hybrid, and this argument is further undermined.

drossless:

Your point is moderately valid, in that every major purchase has some symbolic significance to the purchaser. But it is easy to make far too much of this and imply that the symbolic significance is the sole or primary element in the purchase decision. For instance, people who claim that the odd shape of the Prius is significant mostly for advertising the purchaser's environmental virtue, ignore that the odd shape's intention was to lessen drag and is one of many significant design choices that make Prius indisputably the most efficient existing hybrid. Does it look different? Yes. Is it the best hybrid? Yes. So which fact is truly the most significant to a purchaser?

Your example of the Accord exemplifies this confusion. Yes, the Accord does not look like a hybrid, and on casual consideration one might therefore decide that this is the reason for its failure in the marketplace. But, Honda decided to use hybrid technology in the Accord not to significantly improve mileage, but to increase the car's power. The hybrid Accord was the most powerful and well-quipped model in the Accord line. But it's improvement in mpg was minuscule. Therefore, a purchaser interested in a hybrid could see the hybrid Accord, which cost significantly more than a normal Accord, as a poor solution to his or her desire to significantly increase mpg, and reject it for that reason. Did the Accord hybrid look like a normal car? Yes. Did it significantly improve mpg at a reasonable cost? No. So which fact was truly more significant to a potential purchaser?

Consider as well that they hybrid Civic, which looks like a normal car and is second only to Prius in hybrid mpg, has always been the second best selling hybrid, and this argument is further undermined.

i think we're kind of saying the same thing, but from mirror images. indeed, those after the absolute best mileage will go after hybrid subcompacts, the prius and the civic. (and the insight, r.i.p.) but the regular civic gets decent mileage without hybridization, IIRC, the third place mileage champ after the prius and civic hybrid is the Mini, nonhybrid. so you're chasing after diminishing returns. it's like trying to cut down your energy consumption by removing the nightlights in the house, while leaving all the 100 watt incandescents.

similarly for the accord hybrid; as you point out, those who want mileage most of all wouldn't see it as an improvement. but those whose biggest goal was a snappy car in the accord line should have jumped at it; it wasn't designed to sell as pure economy over all, it was designed to sell as a satisfying and well equipped and quick car, with no penalty in mileage. apparently, there's no market for that.

of course, this is like a while back, when honda brought out the accord station wagon, a terrific and roomy station wagon that got 30 mpg; and everybody ignored it and bought great big suvs.

"Even Honda's Accord hybrid which was the brilliantly logical answer to how do you make a midsize car faster without making it more thirsty was a failure in the market to the point where Honda pulled it. That undoubtedly gives pause to any manufacturer who wants to revamp their car line intelligently."

The hybrid Accord wasn't an "intelligent" move on Honda's part. Quite the opposite, really. It didn't outperform normal cars. It didn't get appreciably better mileage than normal cars. Plus it sold for a premium and potential buyers knew if they kept it long enough they'd be hit with the huge bill for replacing the batteries. And the trunk was considerably smaller than the regular Accord--a pretty major drawback in a family sedan. Finally, to top it all off, market research showed people were less likely to buy it specifically because it looked exactly like a normal Accord.

Sundown:

Finally, to top it all off, market research showed people were less likely to buy it specifically because it looked exactly like a normal Accord.

Yeah, that's kind of one of my points. People who want hybrids want it to look like a hybrid.

I still disagree with the huge generalization that "people who want hybrids want it to look like a hybrid," and consider it unproven. Bear in mind, the "market research" you are most probably quoting is from CNW Marketing, the very same company responsible for propagating the nonsensical report "proving" that a Hummer is greener than a Prius.

A lot of people who want hybrids want a car that does not look like a Prius. Else why would there even be a market for hybrids other than the Prius? It is the only hybrid on the market now that looks like a hybrid. The only other example of a hybrid that "looks like a hybrid" was the Honda Insight, which failed despite having even better mpg than a Prius and looking even more distinctive. Meanwhile, hybrid SUVs are selling ok. So looks aren't everything, or probably even the first thing buyers are considering.

Indeed, contrary to the popular meme, many Prius owners bought the car *despite* how it looks. It owes its success to a lot more than its dubious styling, which was in fact rather a hurdle that many early adopters overcame, instead of a positive attraction. I mean, really: just look at it!

I think many people still see hybrids as a separate category of vehicle, which explains why they want them to look distinctive. Would a super-fast car sell as well if it didn't look sporty? Would you want a heavy-duty pickup truck that didn't look tough?

People tend to identify with what they drive and hybrids having a distinctive look helps them do that. Certainly not everybody likes how the Prius looks or wants to brag to their neighbor about how green their car is, but research has shown that plenty do.

As hybrids become more common, people will eventually look at them as just another sort of engine system, much as they talk about 4-cylinders vs. 6-cylinders now.

But until hybrids cost roughly what regular cars do, I think it is going to be tough to sell the concept Honda tried with their Accord hybrid. It's a neat feat of engineering to be able to have a V6 get the same mpg as a 4 cylinder, but it produces no savings whatsoever for the buyer. Modern 4 cylinders aren't short on power, so they can save their money and just buy the 4--maybe it's not as quick, but it's thousands cheaper and gets just as good a mileage. But if you show them a little car that can get 50 mpg, that gives them real incentive to pay the premium because they'll be seeing savings at the pump.

I'm by no means as knowledgeable in automotives as most of the people on this discussion, so all of this is just my average consumer opinion, but it seems as though people are slowly accepting the "hybrids that don't look like hybrids" category. I'm definitely seeing more Highlander, Escape, Civic, and other non-Prius hybrids on the road. I own a Camry-hybrid and bought it because 1) it doesn't scream "look at me, I'm a hybrid", 2) the what could be viewed as small but still extra MPG is well worth it (particularly with 500 mile/week commutes), and 3) I just don't feel comfortable in a compact car. So the technology offers a good alternative for those who aren't necessarily co-op shopping, carbon footprint watching libs and is becoming the alternative engine system Sundown mentioned.

And as much as I have to roll my eyes at a lot of "smug alert" causing Prius owners, there is a bit of gratitude owed to their interest in alternative technology. Without the popularity of the Prius would manufacturers invest in putting "greener" technologies in non-Prius vehicles or see the value in concept cars that promise even more fuel efficiency in the future?

I haven't bought a hybrid yet. I figure I will wait until I need to buy a new car.

One of the stories I am following though is the likely use of ultracaps instead of batteries in the hybrid fuel cell vehicles that Honda is currently testing.

Environmentally, this would be as much of a leap forward as the modern hybrid is over the internal combustion engine because it gets rid of the potentially explosive and metal-based battery in favor of an extremely high-power carbon-electrolyte capacitor which has a much longer usable life and can absorb a larger amount of current during regenerative braking.

While such capacitors might store only 5% of the electricity that a battery might have, they are much lighter, and able to both absorb and release electric far larger bursts of electric current than a conventional battery is able to. This means less stuff ends up sent back to recycling centers, and parts last longer. It also means that the hybrid system will weigh less (part of your complaint).

Current generations of ultracaps use two layers of activated carbon as electrodes, with an electrolyte mixture which essentially extends the electrodes in principle to within 1 ion width of the other electrode. Yet there was recently an article in IEEE Spectrum about pans to make carbon nanotube-based ultracaps which might have up to half of the storage capacity of a lithium ion battery.

While it's true that one should expect bigger results from an improvement in hulking monsters, I remember one Ford SUV that went from 15 mpg in normal form to 16 mpg in hybrid flavor, a difference so miniscule as to be unrecoverable given the car's more-than-$10,000 premium. And on the other hand, people are likely to look for something like a Prius when searching for a commuter car, and going from the high 20s or low 30s to nearly 50, when you're talking about 20 or 25 or 30 thousand miles a year starts to look like really big savings and a fairly great environmental boost. Can you imagine driving even 20K miles in a Suburban? Oh, call my osteopath now! Make no mistake, I think that hybrids are not the way to go. Building lighter and smaller and smarter is, I think a better way to go. There's one VW out there (sold in Spain) that gets around 75 mpg. It's a rustic car, to be sure, but it's heading in the right direction. And without the heavy and expensive battery banks and the complicated commputer controls and electric motors and regenerative brakes. More than 30 years ago it was possible to get in the 40s (mpg) in cars that weighed a reasonable amount (1800 to 2100 pounds) which could carry 5 people at highway speeds at low initial cost. The Datsun 210 and Citroen Visa come to mind. And for all these decades, Detroit has maintained that it's impossible, they can't make efficient cars. That's why I sold my 22 mpg Ford and got a 38 mpg Datsun (couldn't afford the slightly more expensive 45 mpg Datsun) and have never looked back to Detroit for anything.

You are absolutely right about the value of hybrid technology in big trucks. This would save more fuel than in small cars. Trucks are heavier, so there is more energy lost to braking that can be captured by a hybrid system. But you are wrong about the Ford Escape Hybrid. The Escape hybrid has the same hybrid process (charging the batteries by capturing braking energy) as the Prius. Plus shutting off when stopped.

LeoS:

You are absolutely right about the value of hybrid technology in big trucks. This would save more fuel than in small cars. Trucks are heavier, so there is more energy lost to braking that can be captured by a hybrid system. But you are wrong about the Ford Escape Hybrid. The Escape hybrid has the same hybrid process (charging the batteries by capturing braking energy) as the Prius. Plus shutting off when stopped.

Indeed it does. I stand corrected. <link>

34 mpg!

Gzuckier

Your conclusion is based on several false assumptions. Let's pick out 2 or 3. 1) You need a huge car to haul around all that hybrid junk. Wrong. If you can fit a hybrid system in a small car like a Prius and lose only the equivalent of a large suitcase in the trunk, then it can't be that large. Also the system isn't heavy enough to require a Hummer engire to haul it around. Most American cars (as well as Japanese and European cars slated for the American market) are ludicrously over powered anyway. Just about any four cylinder engine has enough to "drag" around the additional weight of the hybrid and batteries.

2) The larger the vehicle, the more efficient the system only workes if you consolidate trips and pack it with people. If you took your H2, filled it with 8 commuters and carpooled every day, your observation would begin to make sense (except that a Hummer spews far more air pollution (CO2 and otherwise) into the air. The logical extention of your rule would getting 35 people on a really big vehicle and dropping them off at pre-arranged stops every morning, then picking them up in turn every evening. But we already pursue this idea on something called a bus. We call this uncommon arrangement ...Mass Transit. Getting a Lincoln Navigator so that a 110 lb housewife can drive to the supermarket down the road doesn't count.

P.S. You wrote this in March. On June 11, with gas at $4 a gallon do you STILL feel good about your conclusions?

cfarris:

Gzuckier

Your conclusion is based on several false assumptions. Let's pick out 2 or 3. 1) You need a huge car to haul around all that hybrid junk. Wrong. If you can fit a hybrid system in a small car like a Prius and lose only the equivalent of a large suitcase in the trunk, then it can't be that large. Also the system isn't heavy enough to require a Hummer engire to haul it around. Most American cars (as well as Japanese and European cars slated for the American market) are ludicrously over powered anyway. Just about any four cylinder engine has enough to "drag" around the additional weight of the hybrid and batteries.

2) The larger the vehicle, the more efficient the system only workes if you consolidate trips and pack it with people. If you took your H2, filled it with 8 commuters and carpooled every day, your observation would begin to make sense (except that a Hummer spews far more air pollution (CO2 and otherwise) into the air. The logical extention of your rule would getting 35 people on a really big vehicle and dropping them off at pre-arranged stops every morning, then picking them up in turn every evening. But we already pursue this idea on something called a bus. We call this uncommon arrangement ...Mass Transit. Getting a Lincoln Navigator so that a 110 lb housewife can drive to the supermarket down the road doesn't count.

P.S. You wrote this in March. On June 11, with gas at $4 a gallon do you STILL feel good about your conclusions?

Um; yeah. price of gas does not affect math and physics.

1) weight of hybrid system addons = X.

weight of vehicle not including hybrid sysem= Y

X/(X+Y) goes down as Y goes up. you don't NEED a truck to haul the hybrid goodies, but i never said you did. i said the additional load of the hybrid goodies was relatively less for a bigger vehicle.

2) If a compact gets 20 mpg and a hybrid compact gets double that, 40, and you drive 1000 miles a month, you've saved 25 gallons. if a behemoth gets 10 mpg and a hybrid behemoth gets double that, 20, and you drive 1000 miles a month, you've saved 50 gallons. you get more bang for your buck plugging the big leaks first.

you seem to be under the impression that i'm putting down hybrids, hybrid compacts, and/or the folks who buy and drive them? not so; the other way around. i'm instead saddened by the fact that the folks who buy the big tanks which would benefit both the world and themselves by going hybrid, seem determined to cut off their noses to spite their face, shoot themselves in the foot, etc.; whether out of misunderstanding, just to prove a point to those "commie environmentalists", or because of successful auto company advertising, I don't know. maybe $4 a gallon gas will make them rethink.

Interesting points, but they could be used more effectively to argue for getting people out of big cars and into small cars. Give the driving that the vast majority of Americans do, it is incredibly inefficient to use a SUV (hybrid or not) to buy and carry home six bags of groceries. Goosing people to make functionally inefficient SUVs marginally more fuel efficient postpones the reconkoning. As for your second point, hybrid SUVs may save 50 gallons as apposed to 20 for a Prius, but that is 30 gallons that didn't have to be burned. This mindset would allow us to minimize air pollution, reduce spraw development, reduce environmental risks from oil development for those extra 30 gallons, reduce the geopolitical exposure in the Middle East and conserve our oil reserves.