Toyota Prius News
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Hybrid vehicles have been alternately portrayed as the saviours of modern transportation or the last gasp of the dying oil-based economy. Either way, Toyota has capitalized on their popularity with its world-beating Prius, even managing to sell more than 2.5 million hybrids worldwide--and at a faster rate than ever before. So far this year Toyota’s hybrid sales are ticking over at 2,000 a day--one third higher than in 2009 when the automaker's hybrid sales topped one and a half million for the first time. The higher demand follows last year's release of the third-generation Prius and the...
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Report: Hybrids To Make Up 10 Percent Of Market By 2015Sales will be more than 1.4 million units.
Tim Healey -
Video: What Would A Toyota Prius Say About You?We already know that many Toyota Prius owners have a very special bond with their cars. It’s this connection with the Prius that many rival automakers would love to emulate but are struggling to do so. Mention the word “hybrid” and the first vehicle almost everyone will think of is...
Viknesh Vijayenthiran -
Video: Pearl’s Story – The Life Of A Toyota PriusImagine if your car could talk. What would it say about you? While for the immediate future, this is largely an impossibility, one aspiring actress based on the “West Side” has envisaged just what it could be like if cars were able to talk. Alyssa Price, the proud owner of a Toyota Prius and...
Viknesh Vijayenthiran -
What Will The True Residual Value of a Used EV Be? Toyota May Provide the Answer.If you're lucky you may already be on a waiting list for the 2011 Nissan Leaf. Or perhaps you've decided to get the 2011 Chevrolet Volt. If your next car is electric it could easily immunize you from fluctuating gas prices and ensure low running costs. But what will that shiny new electric car be...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
How Many Million Priuses Would Offset the Gulf Oil Spill?One million gallons a day is a lot of oil. According to estimates late last week, that could be the daily rate of oil escaping from the Deepwater Horizon well in the Gulf of Mexico. To put that number in perspective, we decided to look at what it would take to compensate just for the lost gasoline...
John Voelcker -
Chevrolet and Nissan both have electric vehicles set to hit the streets this Fall. But unless you're extremely lucky the chances are you won't be driving one until at least the middle part of 2011. Why? Because of limited production runs, demand is outstripping supply. Is it part of some big conspiracy with big oil, automakers dragging feet or a plot to ensure EVs never become popular? Orwellian conspiracies aside, the answers behind limited EV production runs at the present time are more practical and pragmatic. Here's five reasons why EVs are being produced in limited numbers right now...
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Baby Dies While Parents Play Obsessively With Prius OnlineWe know that Prius owners love their cars. Sometimes they talk endlessly about them, their great fuel efficiency, how cool the all-electric mode is, and so forth. But could you get so enthusiastic about Prius that you'd let your own child starve to death? Good. We didn't think so. And, no, it's not...
John Voelcker -
Who Buys a 2011 Nissan Leaf? Toyota Prius Owners, Of CourseSo who are these strange people who might want something as unusual, as perplexing, as downright radical as an electric car? More specifically, an all-electric 2011 Nissan Leaf compact hatchback? Turns out they're the same people who wanted the last most radical type of family car: a...
John Voelcker -
Expanding the Prius Lineup: Minivan, Compact Hatch, or Coupe?While the all-electric cars being launched as 2011 models--the Nissan Leaf, Chevrolet Volt, and Coda Sedan--get lots of attention, their total U.S. sales won't break 100,000 in their first year. Toyota, on the other hand, sells more than twice that number of hybrids here each year, making it by far...
John Voelcker -
March Debut Expected For New 2012 Toyota Prius Alpha MinivanSpeculation about what models will join an expanded Toyota Prius lineup has run rampant since Toyota confirmed at January's Detroit Auto Show that it would add more body styles to the current five-door hatchback. One candidate: the Auris Hybrid, effectively a hybrid version of the Corolla hatchback...
John Voelcker -
So, IS This the Next Toyota Prius Model? Should It Be?Toyota's plans to expand its Prius hybrid into an entire line of vehicles still aren't completely clear. Rumored new models have included a coupe version and a tall station wagon or "people mover" small minivan. Now a road test of the Europe-only 2011 Toyota Auris Hybrid raises the question: Will...
John Voelcker -
The EPA and CARB like zero emissions vehicles, but don't want you controlling when you decide your vehicle is zero emissions. According to Tony Posawatz, line director for the Chevy Volt program, the two agencies concerned with protecting the emissions from cars aren't happy about a plug in vehicle having a mode which forces it to burn gas. The 2011 Chevy Volt has an all-electric range of 40 miles, more than enough for most trips on an average day. However, at 40 miles per charge there will be days when the Volt has to use its on-board gasoline-powered generator. GM announced not too long...
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2010 Toyota Prius Is Japan's Best-Selling Car For Entire YearSales of the 2010 Toyota Prius are booming in the U.S., up more than 50 percent over last year during April alone. But they're way better yet in Japan, where the 2010 Prius has just completed a full year as the country's best-selling car. Toyota sold 26,482 Prius models in Japan during April...
John Voelcker -
Snapped on the Street: Fiat 500 Electric Car Visits Palo AltoThe great thing about having your company headquartered in Palo Alto, California, is that you never quite know what you'll see on the street. There are lots of expensive cars like BMWs and Bentleys floating around. There are also a disproportionate number of Tesla Roadsters, since the company is...
John Voelcker -
Why Can't Toyota's Plug-In Prius Recharge Its Larger Battery?Toyota has come under some fire from electric-vehicle enthusiasts for what some perceive as a grudging, halfhearted approach to building vehicles that plug in. Its first U.S.-market plug-in vehicle--not including a thousand or so RAV4 electric crossovers a decade ago--will be the 2012 Toyota Prius...
John Voelcker -
3 Green-Car Trends: Smaller Cars, More Turbos, Luxury HybridsEveryone has opinions. But if you had to wrap up what's happening in green cars today by naming three trends, what would they be? The ever-eager publicists at auto-classified site AutoTrader.com sent us their list of three changes in the world of eco-friendly vehicles. We've reproduced them below...
John Voelcker -
Prius Plug-In Hybrid: It Won't Compete With the Leaf or VoltWe've been thinking a lot about the prototype 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid since our test drive of a prototype last month. And about the rest of the plug-in cars that will come to market over the next two years. To our surprise, we decided we don't think buyers will directly compare the Prius...
John Voelcker -
You'd be forgiven for thinking Hawaii is the center of the electric vehicle universe. Wednesday, Nissan announced it would be one of the first markets for the 2011 Leaf electric vehicle. Then yesterday South Korean manufacturer CT&T signed a deal with the state's governor, Linda Lingle, to build a plant in Hawaii to manufacture low-speed neighborhood electric vehicles (NEVs). Hawaii is keen to promote its green credentials and become known as a place where EVs are welcome. Earlier this year, the state installed its first public EV charging station. Two years ago, both Better Place and...
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Buying a Green Car: It's All About Being Seen Being GreenOn the surface, buying a "green car" often doesn't make sense. Or rather, it doesn't make dollars and cents: The extra cost of the necessary technology--whether it's a hybrid, a clean diesel, or a plug-in electric car--is often never recouped in fuel savings. So why do people do it? Turns out it's...
John Voelcker -
OK, We Get It: Adam Carolla Likes, and Hates, Electric CarsAs if legitimate news outlets didn't have enough trouble covering electric vehicles sensibly, now we get the comedians weighing in. Late-night talk-show host and stereotypical grumpy guy Adam Carolla recently lit into electric cars, in an interview with Gizmodo's Jason Chen in which he was invited...
John Voelcker -
2010 Toyota Prius Sales Up 50 Percent Over Last AprilToyota Motor Sales announced yesterday that its U.S. sales of new cars were up 24.4 percent over the previous April, during the worst of the economic meltdown. Despite recent months--during which a lawsuits have rained down on Toyota for unintended acceleration and brake related safety concerns...
Nikki Gordon-Bloomfield -
Toyota Prius Pedal Repair: Letters Go Out, Here's How It WorksWe've written several times about the accelerator-pedal recall for 2004-2009 Toyota Prius models. While plans for the recall were announced last fall, now Toyota has sent out letters inviting Prius owners to bring their cars in to dealers for the update. The recall came after it was discovered that...
John Voelcker -
VIDEO: Driving Tips For Hybrid Cars (Toyota Prius Included)Do you know when to accelerate your Prius "as though there's an eggshell between your foot and the pedal," and when to move away briskly? If you do, you may already be an experienced Prius driver. If not, we have just the video for you. In less than four minutes, our editor goes through some of the...
John Voelcker