I still recall the month when 45,000 hybrids were sold. Automakers bumped up the prices of hybrids and their sales were low.

Anyway on the other side, nearly 12 million Natgas vehicles were used worldwide. There is much faster growth in this sector.

James Hea, As you discuss , the latest trend in “green” energy rhetoric is how pollution, environmental damage, health problems, the oil gusher, etc are not included in the product price we pay at the pump or the price we pay for electricity for that matter. These effects are known as externalities and they exist in EVERY industry. They are nothing more than the risks of using a particular product, in this case gasoline. Society in general has accepted these risks for the benefits of personal freedom, independence and mobility as well as low-cost transportation of goods that cheap gasoline/diesel provides. Having the government artificially set a price floor (via a tax mechanism) will only hurt the economy and individual freedom. Allowing the market for energy products to work without damaging government intervention is the best solution.

There are talks of peak oil. That we’ve reached it or that it’s coming soon. When that reality finally hits, then we’ll all be moaning why didn’t the government do more, etc. We need to step up and demand alternate energy solutions in our transportation. Until then, the oil producing companies will continue to play us like puppets by up and lowering the price of oil until we’re completely desensitized and addicted.

Those vehicles of 1990′s were not only smaller, but also light weight and does not have so much emission controls, such vehicles are there in China today.

Anyway, these Hybrids & Diesels sell only in few 1000′s. But the Flexfuel vehicles which run on E85, there are 8 million in USA.

Unfortunately the fuel is expensive and so many dont care to buy it.

http://robslink.com/SAS/democd47/hybrids.htm

You can click on he bar segments (or the legend color-chips) to drilldown, and click the month number directly below the bars to go to that month’s hybridcars.com report!

What happened to the Volkswagen 100mpg car? Would be a top seller today. It was also low end, and it burned clean diesel. This was just about 10 years ago.

Meanwhile the other AFVs like flexfuel, CNG & LPG vehicles have crossed 40 million + worldwide.

Expect AFVs to take a bigger bite of the gasolene / diesel market.

Prius has sold 31K + in Japan capturing more than 10% of their market excluding minivehicle sales.

There are 27 hybrid models listed above, but they could capture only 2.2 % of the market.

While Prius alone captured nearly 1/2 of hybrid sales, Fusion, Insight and few other models could take atleast 1,000 + in sales.

What the market needs is a Prius like smaller vehicle from Ford which could have 50 MPG.

So Honda sold only 3,714 units of CR-Z in Japan. In US, they are launching the 2-seater version with 39 MPG. I dont think it will sell much.

With Malibu, Vue & Aura – I think only the 2009 model inventory is being sold and by the end of this year, those 3 along with Mariner & Milan will be phased out. We dont know what is the direction of LS600h with 4 units being sold.

All automakers should rethink their hybrid strategy.