Cost of Hybrids Coming Down

In a cost-cutting race between Honda and Toyota, the cost premium for hybrid vehicles is expected to be reduced substantially in the next three years.

The Financial Times reported that Toyota said that its new target would trim the cost premium for hybrids to about $1,900 in the next three years. The new hybrid technology, which will be used in the next-generation Prius, will be about half the size and weight of the current system.

In July, Honda said it expected to cut the cost premium of its hybrid system to about $1,700 per vehicle by 2009.

Source: Finacial Times via Inside Line.

Comments

[James Clark]

Your concerns about peak oil may or may not be justified. However, you should first read Thomas Gold's book, "The Deep Hot Biosphere" before you go any further. Gold's depth of knowledge and logic are difficult to challenge and no matter what you decide, his wisdom is bound to have some influence on your conclusions.
I was a peak oil fan before the term was coined. Even if Gold is correct, our decisions on how to deal with the energy question must be based on actual availablity, not the process of how it is achieved.

[Engineer-Poet]

Gold was an advocate of the steady-state theory of cosmology, which was quite wrong (albeit not confirmed wrong until the discovery of the cosmic background radiation).

Gold was just as wrong about the processes which form oil.  If he was anything other than completely wrong, we would find oil in many, many places which have turned up as dry holes.  Whatever his theory is, the data are in:  he was wrong again.

[Paul Dietz]

Gold liked to propose outre' theories. They were mostly wrong (another wrong one was the prediction of dangerous deep dust pools on the moon). The deep earth oil hypothesis is almost certainly in this category -- there's plenty of chemical evidence oil came from organic matter originating in the surface biosphere.

But at least once he was right, when he proposed pulsars were rotating neutron stars.

[amazingdrx]

The majic of mass production!

Watch what happens to hybrid cost when the ICE is left out completely. Battery electric drivetrains with fuel cell backup will have an order oif magnitude fewer parts and the production cost will reflect that.

[Mike @ HCVN]

amazingdrx -

Mass production won't solve current fuel cell's reliance on expensive materials and catalysts (palladium). There needs to be some more R+D before before volume will help it compete against the ICE.

Mike

[Cyrus]

SOFCs can run on hydrocarbons and most proposed biofuels, and do not require platinum or other rare catalyst materials. Yet so far, they have not received much attention for motor transport, because they run hot, and so require 30 minutes or so to warm up before they start producing energy. But 30 minutes (or 30 miles) is about the battery-only range of current plug-in hybrid prototypes, so I could see electric vehicles with SOFC recharge working out, especially since they can run on a variety of present-day motor fuels.

The initial niche would probably be vehicles that run most of the time, and keep predictable schedules, such as delivery trucks.

[Honda Cars List]

Depth of gold of knowledge and logic is a difficult challenge, and no matter what he decides, in its wisdom has certainly some effect on conclusions.I of peak oil on the fan before the term was coined. Although Gold is correct, our decisions about how to handle the issue of energy is based on the current state, the process is how to achieve it.