Is the 100-MPG Prius Just a Year Away?

Imagine the 2010 Toyota Prius, a faster, cleaner and greener hybrid. Such a car is coming soon and will launch at the Detroit auto show in January 2009.

The Toyota Prius has made "hybrid" a household name, a kind of brand that signifies an ecology-friendly future. In fact, the Prius is a brand, not just a car. Prius drivers nod knowingly to one another on the highway, members of a social movement on the road to the future. The Prius has made automotive technology fashionable again, although it's the silent, virtually invisible technology of microchips, circuit boards and humming electrons.

Five years after the introduction of the second-generation Prius, anticipation for the next car is already building. Will it get 100 mpg? Will it further the social revolution that the hybrid has created?

Our information suggests that the 2010 Toyota Prius will be everything Americans already love about the hybrid, including its unique styling and crusading eco image, yet it will be delivered in a more high-grade package that's not only smarter but also has a much broader appeal. It'll be a better hybrid for more people.

When the 2010 Toyota Prius arrives, the hybrid revolution will start to get serious.

A Prius With Power
Yes, the 2010 Toyota Prius will mark the point at which the Prius shifts gears and moves up to the next league. Until now the Prius has been just one model, but Toyota plans to expand the Prius franchise with a range of different models as the company closes in on its bid to be making 1 million hybrids per year by the early 2010s.

While the new car is still under wraps, our well-placed Toyota source says the next-generation Prius looks good: "Still Prius-esque, but a bit bigger and more solid-looking." The car will be some 3-4 inches longer and about an inch wider, yet it will not be significantly heavier, our sources say.

The Prius will need more power to propel this larger package, and Toyota plans to deliver a larger-displacement 1,797cc inline-4 engine to cope with the bigger body and also counter criticism in some quarters about the weedy performance of the current 1.5-liter inline-4. With the new 1.8 engine, output is expected to climb from today's 75 horsepower to a more rousing 100 hp. Together with a next-generation electric motor, the combined output from the Prius powertrain will increase from the current 110 hp to some 160 hp, our sources predict.

As a result, the next Prius will be significantly faster, especially away from stoplights and through the range of medium speed that's most useful in urban traffic.

Bigger Sparks for Better MPG
Though the story of the new Prius begins with performance, the smooth, seamless, electriclike power delivery, electric-only operational mode and fuel-sipping mpg will continue. Toyota will reengineer the Prius' gas engine/electric motor/battery powertrain to make it smaller and more space-efficient, so there's more room for passengers.

Yet advances with the electric motor, battery pack and recharging system mean fuel economy won't be adversely affected. Quite the opposite, in fact. While the current Prius posts a class-leading 35.5 km/liter in Japan's 10.15-mode fuel cycle (equal to 83.5 mpg in the U.S.), Toyota's reported target with the third-generation Prius is a stellar 40 km/liter (94 mpg) in the same cycle.

Hold the champagne, however. Japan's 10.15 mileage cycle is now an old system, far from relevant to global standards, and especially kind to hybrids. (The cycle enables hybrids to run on electric-only power for extended periods, which helps deliver wondrous fuel-mileage numbers.)

Different markets around the world have their own take on exactly how green and frugal the Prius actually is. For example, the U.S. rates the 2008 Toyota Prius at a far more realistic 48 mpg city/45 mpg highway and 46 mpg combined, numbers not so far removed from those attained by diesel-powered cars.

While Japan's 10.15 mode isn't perfect, it does give an idea of the kind of efficiency improvements we can expect with the next Prius (about 10 percent). If so, the EPA's combined mpg for the 2010 Prius might exceed 50 mpg, a magic number in the imagination of American drivers.

The Greenhouse Gas Thing
What about CO2? Here and now, the Prius is good for 65 g/km under Japan's 10.15-mode banner (although it achieves 106 g/km on the European cycle). Nobody outside Toyota knows yet what the third-generation Prius will deliver, but it's still expected to be one of the cleanest cars on the planet. Indeed, we expect the next Prius to produce a big statement on CO2.

Toyota is also working on a plug-in version of the next Prius, of course. The idea of being able to recharge the Prius' battery pack from a standard electrical socket in order to extend the vehicle's ability to run in electric mode is the next step along the way to lifting the Prius into the stratosphere of eco prestige.

Tests are now under way on American, European and Japanese roads with a fleet of plug-in Prius prototypes, and Toyota has already announced that it plans to launch sales of plug-in hybrids (fitted with state-of-the-art lithium-ion batteries) to fleet buyers in the U.S. and elsewhere by late 2010.

However, the plug-in won't come at the launch of the 2010 Prius in late 2009, and Toyota has also postponed its planned introduction of state-of-the-art lithium-ion batteries for the standard Prius due to worries over reliability, pricing, supply and other factors. Lightweight and high power, lithium ion is definitely in the future for Toyota, however, and the company is actively looking into mass production of the batteries in Japan in partnership with Panasonic.

So to start with, the third-generation 2010 Prius will kick off with nickel-metal hydride batteries. But the battery pack and indeed the whole system will be more efficient and tightly packaged.

The Prius Brand Is Here
Eventually, there will be two body styles for the Prius, according to a Toyota source. The Hybrid X concept from the 2007 Geneva Auto Show could perhaps provide a few clues about a minivan-style version of the upcoming Prius package.

Toyota is also planning both bigger and smaller hybrid models with the Prius badge, as these hybrids become an eco brand that's all their own. The tiny two-cylinder rear-engine 1/X concept from the 2007 Tokyo Auto Show suggests what a future mini Prius could look like. As for the bigger model, Nikkei (Japan's leading business-oriented newspaper) has mentioned an upscale hybrid model with an engine between 2.0 liters and 3.0 liters that could bow as early as 2010, although this has yet to be confirmed by other sources (and indeed this car might even appear in due course with a Lexus badge).

As far as the anticipated launch of the third-generation Toyota Prius at the 2009 Detroit Auto Show, we have that information from an impeccable source. Toyota President Katsuaki Watanabe himself has spoken about the unveiling of the new car at the North American International Automobile Show, so his word surely has to be gospel.

Making Big Numbers
On the production front, the numbers for Prius are clearly going nowhere but up, underscoring just what a major player the Prius has now become in Toyota's model lineup. Nikkei reports that Toyota plans to boost Prius volume by 60 percent to 450,000 units per year worldwide by 2009, making it one of Toyota's largest-selling models, rivaling Camry and Corolla.

Toyota reportedly built around 280,000 Prius models worldwide in 2007, an increase of almost one-third compared to 2006. The Prius is currently built in two plants in Japan and in limited numbers in China, and it's surely only a matter of time before local production in the U.S. kicks off.

America, after all, has taken the lion's share of Prius sales to date. Toyota's cumulative sales of the car worldwide from 1997-2007 amounts to 920,687 units, with the U.S. accounting for 525,543 units. Japan saw the second-largest number of sales during that time with 290,805 units.

A Different Kind of Car
Amid all the hoopla over the Prius, there continues to be an undercurrent of skepticism. Critics question the actual economy of the car in day-to-day driving, debate the effectiveness of the hybrid powertrain during American-style freeway driving and question the price-value relationship of the cost represented by the expensive hybrid technology. These are all points that the German manufacturers are likely to exploit as they introduce diesel technology.

But then the Prius is a different kind of car. Though the debate is all about numbers, the Prius is really all about enthusiasm, and Americans have embraced it as much for its unconventional style and anti-establishment eco-friendliness as for the cost benefits at the gas pump.

If all goes to plan, the 2010 Toyota Prius will answer these criticisms and more. If there is one automobile that can save Japan from the encroachment of cheap cars from China and India and higher-quality cars from Korea and the United States, it is the third-generation Prius. Its introduction at the 2009 Detroit Auto show will be a pivotal moment not only for Toyota but also for the future of the Japanese car.

According to the print-only article in their May 7 issue, the Prius will maintain its familiar teardrop shape, but swell by 10 centimeters in length and 3cm in width.

To compensate for the plus-sizing, the Prius’ engine is expected to move from 1.5-liters to 1.8-liters, giving about 100 horsepower. Despite the dimensional swelling, Toyota is pushing for a 12 percent surge in fuel economy and C02 emissions of just beyond 90 grams per kilometer.

Source

I dont get it. Why does the car HAVE to be ugly?

i thought it didn't look too bad... really depends on whats under the plastic

Hell, it's the plastic that SHOWS! I'm with Helldorado ... I don't see why the car has to look like a moving box on four little-bitty wheels. It's a cartoon.

And it's not just the Prius ... the Honda Insight looked like absolute pookie, too.

Thing is, I don't think there's anything about ugly that makes a car get better mileage. 

well obviously we all know that aerodynamics play a large part in fuel efficiency... Smaller thinner tires are part of that equation.  Plus people who wanna go green aren't usually as image conscious as other people right?



 

Well theres a ton of battery back there in the squared area.  The prius is making use of the area above the batteries.  The red car seems to be using that space for style and not much practical storage area.