Hybrid Jungle

While companies like Toyota are banking on lithium-ion batteries being the future of hybrid vehicles, Honda has a different plan. Honda’s President Takeo Fukui thinks that lithium ion batteries are still too unreliable to warrant mass production. He went on to say “In terms of reliability and durability, I must say there still remain some concerns,” he said. “I don’t think they are necessarily best suited for mass-produced vehicles.” and “It’s not really practical as of yet, based on our experience”. As a result they plan to keep using the nickel metal hydride in their future hybrid vehicles, however, their cars will be engineered so lithium-ion batteries can be swapped into the cars with little effort.
Many automakers are pursuing lithium-ion batteries as they are smaller, lighter and can hold more electricity, but many questions their safety as they tend to overheat. In addition lithium-ion batteries tend to be more expensive and Honda thinks that the recharging times are too long and the range is too limited to be a viable option. At this time it appears that Toyota will be the first on the market with a lithium-ion battery expected to be in the Prius by 2010.

Honda is currently in the final stages of developing a new hybrid vehicle based on the 1.8-liter Civic engine which will be mated to a new electric motor. While it will be able to accommodate lithium ion batteries at some future stage, the model set to be released will use current nickel-metal hydride technology. This car is expected to be cheaper than the Civic hybrid and many people are speculating it will be a “Prius killer”, but at this time they have not release what kind of fuel efficiency this car will have.

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