The heat is on the Chevrolet Volt's yes/no/yes/no/maybe 2010 timeline. Bloomberg reports that Toyota has reversed course, set aside their publicly declared antipathy to lithium-ion batteries and announced their intention to have a plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) by, coincidentally enough, the Volt's 2010 deadline. "The company will provide a significant number of plug-in hybrids to global fleet customers," Bloomberg revealed. "With a large percentage coming to the U.S., President Katsuaki Watanabe said at the Detroit auto show yesterday, without elaborating. The cars will help Toyota meet new U.S. fuel-economy rules early, he said." Uh, isn't that second bit considered elaboration? Still, point taken. While GM execs Luzt and Wagoner have been shooting their mouths off about the Volt in a consistently contradictory fashion, Watanabe simply says "we're going to do it" and then, if past history is a guide, does it. "You combine Toyota's experience with nickel metal, the lithium expertise for Panasonic and lithium research from Toyota, definitely they are the strongest player,'' said Menahem Anderman, president of the Advanced Automotive Batteries consulting firm.
Find Reviews by Make:
Read all comments
I wonder if Toyota will just add the new Li batteries to its (assumedly next-generation) Prius, and add a plug-in feature for overnight charging. That seems like a no-brainer for Toyota given its domination of the hybrid market.
Note it’s for fleet sales and leasing. They’re probably going to have a closed battery-management procedure, with service centers to make this work.
Note it’s for fleet sales and leasing.
I’ve started to tune out news releases about cars I can’t actually buy.
Don’t they already have a plug-in convertion for the current gen Prius that you can buy from some company in California. It should be a no brainer to get it to work in the next generation Prius provided they get the Li-Ion batteries developed properly. I just hope they don’t push the batteries to market prematurely to show up the Volts imaginary time line. That could be why they are only going with fleets at first so start up problems could be addressed by just swapping out cars and it wouldn’t be as embarissing. Plus they can keep a closer eye on reliability vs use and make tweeks before they start selling to the public.
Redbarchetta: Yep. It’s expensive and voids the warranty but it’s available today from at least two third parties (HyMotion and… I forget the other).
By the way, a few paragraphs down, Watanabe says they’ll have diesels here for the Tundra and Sequoia “in the near future.” Considering that their PHEV prototypes for the show were unknown until Sunday, “the near future” could be yet this month.
Now it’s getting real interesting.
KixStart :
January 14th, 2008 at 11:30 am
Redbarchetta: Yep. It’s expensive and voids the warranty but it’s available today from at least two third parties (HyMotion and… I forget the other).
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the current Prius, using non-lithium-ion batteries does not like deep discharging. It wears the batteries out too quickly. The electronics try to keep the battery in the 40-60% range. This gives a good boost to fuel economy while preserving the battery life.
With lithium ion batteries, deep discharging is no longer an issue, and plugging into a wall becomes a viable option.
Hmmm I wonder between GM and Toyota which company is most likely to deliver on its promised delivery of product and which one is most likely to fail?