Toyota and EDF Testing Plug-in Prius in UK
by Michael Graham Richard, Gatineau, Canada on 09.12.08
Plug-in Hybrid Trial
Toyota and EDF (Électricité de France) has had a partnership to test plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV) for over a year now. It started in France, and it is now expanding to the UK. The plug-in hybrids are modified Toyota Prius hybrids. Extra NiMH battery packs extend their all-electric range, and they can be recharged from the grid (something the regular Prius can't do).
Plug-In Prius Hybrids in the UK
According to Toyota (pdf), "The UK partnership is designed to evaluate vehicle performance within an urban environment, vehicle infrastructure requirements, and driver behaviours and expectations." Read on for more on the UK trial.
The right-hand drive PHEVs will be driven by EDF employees and tested under everyday driving conditions. To make charging the cars easier, EDF has helped install 40 charging stations (see picture above), a first for the UK, and more are coming.
So far the results seem good:
Early test results indicate that fuel efficiency of the Prius PHEV prototype is significantly higher than current Prius. For example, for trips up to 25 km (15.5 miles), the PHEV consumes roughly 60% less fuel than Toyota’s hybrid Prius. One of the research objectives of the UK tests is to confirm such PHEV performance.
They could certainly get even better results with a vehicle that was designed from the start to be a plug-in, and with lithium-ion batteries to further extend the electric range, making the gas engine turn on less often.
Via EDF Energy and Toyota Launch UK Trials of PHEV
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I just hope we can get all this electricity generated in a clean way.
"I just hope we can get all this electricity generated in a clean way."
That's best, obviously. But even if it isn't, it's still better than burning gas. And it's easier to clean up power plants than to clean up millions of tailpipes.
With some smart metering, they could also probably make prices go down or make smart-chargers charge up when the wind is blowing and offshore wind farms are producing most. Lots of possibilities!
An add on to an existing Prius would be a great thing. They have sold a million of those babies and sales are accelerating. You can buy add ons now but put one in and kiss your warranty goodbye. They're not cheap either. Still they are less expensive than buying an new electric car.
It would be cool to see these charging stations at special parking lots and stalls.
I guess you have to pay for the electricity with your credit card? How does this work exactly?
"For example, for trips up to 25 km (15.5 miles), the PHEV consumes roughly 60% less fuel than Toyota’s hybrid Prius."
What does that even mean? If the electric range is less than 25 km, then this is not exactly the most useful conversion in the world; I'll keep holding my breath for Li-ion batteries. If not, then on trips
In other words, this is cool, and if everyone drove a car that efficient we'd all be in a much better place than we are now, but there is still work to do.
But don't plug-in hybrids require the factory to put out more emissions during production than regular gasoline or even plug-in electric cars? This is why I don't see the point of a hybrid; it still depends on extremely limited resources (*cough*petroleum*cough) and is therefore not the answer to our problem.