A timeline of hybrid technology from 1665 - 2004.
When Jim Press was the top executive for Toyota USA, he said that the Japanese government never directly aided the company in the development of the Toyota Prius. Now, as president of Chrysler, he says that the Prius had 100 percent government backing. Why would Mr. Press flip-flop?
The Toyota Prius will be celebrating its 10th anniversary later this year. Looking back to the birth of the Prius, the engineers behind the vehicle were apprehensive about being able to achieve what appeared to be an impossible goal. But that task may be child’s play compared to the next 10 years for the Prius.
David Hermance, Toyota's executive engineer for advanced technology vehicles, died Saturday, Nov. 25, when the airplane he was piloting crashed into the Pacific Ocean. Hermance was widely regarded as Toyota's hybrid guru in North American. In a 2004 interview for HybridCars.com, Hermance said, "I'd like to leave the planet a little better than I found it."
There are times when it makes sense to play along with the crowd. And then there are moments when you have to say exactly what's on your mind. One of those moments came up at the Society of Automotive Engineers' 2006 Hybrid Symposium in San Diego.
Thirty years before the Toyota Prius got the attention of an energy-anxious nation, a starry-eyed inventor named Victor Wouk built a hybrid gas-electric vehicle that sipped fuel at half the rate of virtually all other cars on the road.
How do you make sense out of the Society of Automotive Engineers' Hybrid Technology Symposium that took place Feb. 9 - 10, 2005, in Costa Mesa, Calif.? How do you summarize the two-day jam-packed sessions dealing with various hybrid configurations, energy storage approaches, fuel choices, legislative developments, and market forecasts? The answer: it's been 100 years since car inventors debated over the right technology to power our mobility. Today, the choices are greater than ever before.
