“Keep your eyes on them there hills… the PHV is a comin’”
Posted by Colin Hensley on May 15, 2009 in 360° approach, Green Technologies
This week is really about a few updates of previous posts. At the end of March I wrote about the Plug-in hybrids that we are testing, and the plans for enlarging this test in Europe. At the time I just mentioned the cars that will be going to Strasbourg, well things are starting to move on quite nicely. We are now in discussion to bring the cars to the UK, Germany and the Netherlands, and as you can imagine are keen to work with other countries too if we can. As a consequence, it looks like we will certainly need more than the originally planned number of 150 cars here in Europe.
This is great for us, as we will have even more data to evaluate, and more opinions and experiences of the drivers who are participating in this limited lease pilot. PHV won’t be ready for mass commercialisation for a little while, but when it is, we believe PHV will really complement the Prius, and the other full hybrids in our line-up.
I also promised to update you on the Toyota Technology Challenge in the UK. Well, the final is tomorrow at the Burnaston plant, and there will be thirteen teams competing from all across the country. The teams have already won their regional heats and are now competing for the national title in each of the categories. Seven will compete in the solar powered vehicle category and six in the PIC microcontroller category. Good luck to all of the teams, and, I will, of course, let you know who is finally triumphant
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Martin Said,
Colin
Very interesting blog, and fascinating to hear more about the Tsutsumi plant that builds our Prii. For second-gen Prius owners it’s a little frustrating, however, to hear you say “PHV won’t be ready for mass commercialisation for a little while”. Many of us will I suspect be thinking about trading up to the new model, yet at the moment it doesn’t represent the kind of breakthrough in performance and technology that the second-gen model did six years ago. Meantime, other manufacturers seem to be eroding Toyota’s lead, with new GM’s range-extender Volt likely to be on sale within a year or so. You may not be able to commit to a timescale yet, but can you urge Toyota to get a move on with PHV?
KonstantinMiller Said,
I think I will try to recommend this post to my friends and family, cuz it’s really helpful.
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