HybridCenter Mailbag: Offroading & Plugging in

Here are a couple more good questions, and our attempt at good answers answers, that we think would be of broader interest.

Q: The Toyota brochure specifically states that the 4wheel drive Highlander hybrid is not intended for offroad use but the brochure does not state why this is so. I have seen comments on webboards that the highlander hybrid should not be used offroad because it has a separate electric motor for the rear axle and that motor might be damaged by driving on bumpy roads, by driving through deep snow, or by driving through puddles, or even by rocks from gravel roads. Are any of those statements correct?

A: While we recommend you contact Toyota directly to verify, our understanding is that the same statement is made in the conventional Highlander brochure.  It has nothing to do with the hybrid system, but rather the statement is to note that it is not a Jeep-like vehicle designed for heavy duty off-roading.  Both the conventional and hybrid highlander can go on dirt roads, snow, etc, but Toyota accepts no liability for people trying to treat either vehicle like a Jeep Rubicon.  Indeed, we found the following statement on Toyota's website:

"Highlander Hybrid in 2WD or 4WD is not designed to be driven off road...Toyota Highlanders are designed to meet most off-road driving requirements. Abusive use may result in bodily harm or damage. Toyota encourages responsible operation to protect you, your vehicle and the environment."

Q: The UCS piece on the Technology and Potential of Hybrid Vehicles you authored is excellent, but doesn't discuss the advantages of including connection to the grid for increasing the fuel efficiency of using hybrids for commuting by charging at night when utility rates are at their lowest and power is readily available.

A: Plugin hybrid technology definitely is one to watch, but the jury is still out.  There is no doubt that allowing a hybrid to connect to a clean power source to recharge the battery has the potential to improve its overall performance (our report, A New Road, estimated plugin hybrid technology at being able to achieve 70-80 mpg).  However, the benefits of using the electrical grid depend on three things:

• How clean the electricity is—about one half of U.S. electricity is generated from coal.  Using dirty sources of electricity to recharge a plugin can cause just as many, or more, problems than plugging in solves.
• How often consumers actually plug them in—if consumers do not regularly plug their vehicles in, the fuel economy could actually end up worse due to the extra weight of the batteries.
• When they plug them in—charging during the peak of the day could stress infrastructure and lead to increased pollution.  Ideally, consumers would plug them in regularly and only at times of lowest electricity use, but there’s no guarantee of either.

The additional batteries and larger motor needed to make plugin hybrids are also another fiscal burden that would add to the sticker price.

That said, the potential of plugins cannot and should not be ignored.  A future of hybrids, whether plugins or conventional, running on clean, renewable fuels made in the U.S.A. is appealing enough to merit just as much attention as fuel cell vehicles.

More mail soon...

Posted by: ScottN

Comments

[altfuels]

The part of this post on plug-in hybrids repeats the "elsewhere-emissions vehicle" accusation against battery electric vehicles (or in this case, the battery-powered part of a plug-in hybrid's driving), which I thought had long been put to rest. There's a report on "EVs and Smokestacks" from almost a decade ago that provides some facts and figures at

http://www.evadc.org/pwrplnt.pdf .

There are indeed some disadvantages for plug-in hybrids (or battery EVs) in terms of sulfur dioxide and particulates, when recharged with electricity from coal-fired power plants, as measured by the decade-old data in this report. However, even if coal is the main power source, driving on utility electricity gives substantial reductions in smog-forming pollutants, carbon monoxide, and greenhouse gases. Moreover, the big advantage of plug-in transportation is that it gets cleaner over time as electricity-generation plants are upgraded (to natural gas or "clean coal"), whereas any gasoline engine, including those in hybrids, gets dirtier over time as catalysts age, calibrations drift, etc.

WIth regard to the questions of how often consumers will plug in their grid-rechargeable hybrids and when, there are solid economic reasons why this would work out for the best. Using electrical energy rather than gasoline for your driving is cheaper, so you have an incentive to plug in as much as you can; and in states where battery electric vehicles were taken seriously (at least for a while), it was common to set up metering on the EV charging circuit in your garage to take advantage of a "time of use" rate that made off-peak electricity much cheaper than on-peak. Together, these considerations give owners of plug-in hybrids a financial incentive (the most effective kind) to use as much electricity as possible instead of gasoline, with as much of that as possible being off-peak.

It is of course true that a plug-in hybrid would cost more than a non-plug-in equivalent; but the same comparison holds between regular hybrids and non-hybrid vehicles, and hybrids aren't selling too badly in spite of this! EDrive (www.edrivesystems.com) plans to retrofit second-generation Priuses with plug-in capability for under $12k; this is without any economies of scale or the ability to optimize the vehicle before manufacture, so automakers should be able to do significantly better. From there, it's just a question of balancing initial price, running costs, where you think the price of gas is going, and other factors like an individual consumer's interest in doing less damage to the environment and national security, being an "early adopter," etc., just the same as for non-plug-in hybrids.

All in all, I'd say that plug-in hybrids merit not "just as much attention as fuel cell vehicles," but a heck of a lot more! Plug-in hybrids (or battery EVs, and to a lesser extent even natural-gas vehicles) have advantages of cost, efficiency, infrastructure availability, maintainability, etc., that should make them a shoo-in in a comparison with fuel cell vehicles. Unfortunately, they have one big disadvantage that makes them highly unpalatable to automakers: the automakers have gone to great lengths to convince consumers and policymakers that "plugging in = bad," and every product website or sales brochure that I've seen prominently points out that "you never have to plug it in". I don't foresee them wandering "off message," and maybe reopening the door to electric vehicles, by building grid-connected hybrids that show that plugging in might not be such a bad idea after all.

[RWR]

Concur with the view that for the near term and most likely for the long term emphasis should be on the currently more practical Plugin Hybrid. The manufacturers seem to be unable to adapt to the present until it is in the past.

[marc Geller]

UCS is stubbornly clinging to a failed policy that is essentially: "Gasoline only for cars until the perfect solution for all arises." While I prefer to see renewables power plug-ins (I have solar PV and an all-electric vehicle - you could too if anyone made PHEVs or EVs) and half of the US already uses non-coal produced electricity, even coal generated electricity into cars moves us in the right direction. Plugging in, even to coal, provides consumers with cleaner, cheaper, domestic fuel. Oil can never be produced renewably and necessitates killing and being killed (see Iraq.) The fact of excess nighttime electric capacity and the fact that the American grid is getting cleaner every year make plug-ins a no-brainer. It's time for American environmentalists to get on board.

[mike melley USA]

How come there's no one concerned about what happened to General Motors EV-1 electric car, built in the ninetys. It got speeds up to 100mph, and drove up to 120 miles on a single charge at your home. To me this is the answer to the energy problem in the US. It wouldn't have anything to do with BIG OIL AND THE US GOVERNMENT suing the state of CALIF. to back down from mandateing it. Log on to PLUG IN AMERICA AND WHO KILLED THE ELECTRIC CAR. Mike

[TheSUBWAY.com]

It's good to hear BP & GM talk about alternative fuels, but 50 years to implement is too long.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/03/05/news/companies/bigoil_hydrogen/index.htm

Perhaps this link will spark more attention:

http://www.chevrolet.com/electriccar/

It is GM's electric concept car the Chevy Volt. If more people begin to demand alternative fuel cars, we should be able to speed the rate at which the technology is developed.

We have started an Investor Forum where Investors can meet and discuss topics like this:

http://investor-forum.thesubway.com/