REPORT: Toyota will launch series production PHEV Prius in 2012
by Sam Abuelsamid on Jul 5th 2009 at 11:24AM 
Toyota Prius PHEV prototype - click above for high-res image gallery
According to Japan's Nikkei news agency, Toyota has decided to start series production of a plug-in version of the Prius hybrid in 2012. At launch, the automaker plans to build about 20,000-30,000 units a year of the plug-in hybrid. The report indicates that the model will be priced comparably to the Mitsubishi i-MiEV at about $48,000. That's a pretty steep price and quite a bit higher than the $40,000 pricetag expected to be applied to the Chevrolet Volt when it arrives late next year, and it also puts the PHEV Prius at about twice the price of a conventional model.
The PHEV Prius will likely be the first product to use lithium ion batteries produced by Panasonic EV Energy Co. The battery is expected to provide about 12-18 miles of range, although it's not clear how much of that will be possible without running the engine. We'll probably have a better idea of that next year after the 500 or so prototypes go into test fleets starting late this year.
Gallery: EDTA 2008: Toyota Plug-in Prius
[Source: Reuters]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Jon 11:34AM (7/05/2009)
So it costs more than the Volt and has less than half its range? I know Toyota don't like plug in vehicles but it looks like they're trying to ensure it will be a failure.
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downtoearth 12:11PM (7/05/2009)
I'd take any price estimates with a grain of salt. Toyota won't launch a completely uncompetitive plug-in hybrid.
locoyocal 1:11PM (7/05/2009)
no. they are just making the current Prius purchasers feel good about their decision.
Chuck 11:03PM (7/05/2009)
Explain your headline! Are you saying that toyota will put a series plugin hybred into production? or just a another series of the car with the bad Head Light! Either way this
vehicle is not as environmentally friendly as most people think look at the lithium mining
and the area around it in canada. there is a dead area of about a 5 mile radius around the
mine.
Just my 2 cents
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SumideXE 1:07PM (7/05/2009)
Go look at some oil rigs and refineries and you'll have an idea of what a 'dead area' is.
Also.. ever heard of an oil spill before?
Finding oil is more difficult these days and takes a hell of a lot of work.. then it needs to go through a refinery process.. people forget what it takes to bring you a gallon.
Lithium needs to be mined.. there is tons of lithium out there though.. in bolivia you can scrape it off the ground practically. It can also be recycled.
Last time i checked you can't recycle gasoline.
Not sure what motivates you to come on here and troll autobloggreen.
Paul 12:37PM (7/05/2009)
The most environmentally friendly car you can drive, it seems, is the one you currently own, maintain properly and drive as long as possible:
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2009/03/10/scrap-it/
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SumideXE 1:20PM (7/05/2009)
This is simply not true.
Cars do widely vary in their emissions output by design, no matter how you maintain them.
Since the 70's, cars have gradually been putting out less emissions due to better fuel injection systems, catalytic converters, variable valve timing, and nowadays, direct injection.
There is that old oddball, such as my 92 nissan maxima that performs, somehow, up to LEV standards does exist, but they are far and few between
Anyways at $48,000 this car seems a little out of line, but not too much. The cost will go down eventually. It is nice, at least, to see that Toyota is finally producing something like this.
j 1:31PM (7/05/2009)
so i guess you missed the part in his calculations that he assumes that you will be scrapping your 12 year old part and then he assumes the car life cycle to be 4.9 years in the energy calculation, most new cars dont get scrapped in 5 years, that means we should be scrapping 2005 model year cars now?
the4thheat 1:10PM (7/06/2009)
What are you assuming that people drive? Replacing a 1997 Ford Expedition with a Prius is going to yield different results than replacing a 10 year old Toyota Echo with a Prius.
Nick 12:52PM (7/05/2009)
^ Or don't drive at all, most of us could get away without it 90% of the time by walking, cycling, using public transportation.
Cars really are an expression of laziness, except for those living in rural areas.
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Andy 4:27AM (7/07/2009)
Why are rural people exempt from laziness. They can ride a bike too.
I'm fed up of farmers and other rural dwellers bucking responsibility for environmental degradation.
Blame it all on those city folks !!!
Mike!!ekiM 1:06PM (7/05/2009)
The fix is in.
Compare this price to a home conversion project. Big Oil must have put in some Huge Kickback to stop the Battery Revolution.
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ufgrat 10:02PM (7/05/2009)
The good news is that aluminum foil is still cheap, so you can repair your leaking tinfoil hat.
I love how everything is a conspiracy... Or are you a disinformation plant? Who are you actually working for? Is it the Aluminum Bavariati!?!?
Truth is, most of the companies that are developing in-wheel motors like this plan uses, are charging premium prices for them-- not because of a conspiracy, but because of a desire to make as much money as possible in a new market. Same goes for ultra-capacitors, AC inverters, DC controllers, and high-density battery technology. They're charging what the market will bear because of this really old concept of "Supply and Demand"-- They've got the supply, and they demand you pay their price.
Mike!!ekiM 1:09PM (7/05/2009)
This kind of pricing means we're all headed for a Brick Wall, an Economic Collapse and "The Great Depression II" are assured to happen, Big Oil's Influence will wipe us out:
How can it get this bad this fast? For starters, China, at its current growth rate, expects to consume 98 million barrels of oil DAILY by 2030. Yet, no one dares look at the flashing red light signifying ‘empty’ on earth’s fuel gauge! Folks! That’s a mere 22 years from now. The U.S. burns 20 million barrels daily in 2008. Ninety-eight million barrels equals five times our current consumption. Humans pump 85 million barrels of oil daily in 2008. Something’s got to give. Kinda’ like the I-35 Bridge in Minneapolis last year!
http://www.examiner.com/x-3515-Denver-Political-Issues-Examiner~y2009m7d1-Part-1-Americas-sobering-futureThe-Long-Emergency
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Mike!!ekiM 1:13PM (7/05/2009)
And it proves no lessons were learned:
Rear End Kissing = Political/Economic Disasters:
- Wall Street "Deregulation"
- Big Oil and Big Wars( Iraq )
- Big Oil and Coal and the Environment ( 8 Degree Climate change is coming ), 2-8 degree is already here!
- Privatization of the Health Care Industry: Unaffordable, rejected coverage, under-coverage, and No Coverage.
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gorr 1:18PM (7/05/2009)
Never trust someone that postpone his products for the long distant future, all they hope is to cash money now from consumers with s&it products and receive subsidies from big oil and goverments in the present. They intent to do nothing for their customers at all because all they ever done up to now is suffocate them to the max and make a fortune and they accepted money to not build and put into showroom for cash a green car worth mentionning. They are below big-oil in the decision process, so they sell there mandated suffocating machines and cash money from goverment, big-oil and constricted consumers. With this promise, all they intent is that you become more miserable in 2012 then you are right now. It's another terrorist attack from the same folks that exploded the hinderburg in 1937, the oil crisis of 1973, the wtc in 2001 and now with this stupid press realease.
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SumideXE 1:23PM (7/05/2009)
you're right dude, this press release is a terrorist attack.
Alan 1:37PM (7/05/2009)
Toyota (and Honda) are getting really annoying now - plenty of confusing mixed signals, well screw them, surely after all the false starts THIS TIME the EV and the Plug-In EV will flourish with or without companies like Toyator and Honda or thought they hard the market on 'eco' cars and now seem to be running around like headless chickens. Tesla's example bodes well though, the big manfucturers need to wake up and smell the coffee, surely it's not beyond their ability to offer the public desirable EVs with models continuously improving in capabilities and/or reducing in price.
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gorr 2:09PM (7/05/2009)
Toyota and honda are the last ones having accepted to not construct and sell for cash green cars. They accepted after the usa and germans to stay with suffocating, polluting petrol for money and protection. they are own now by nobody and they just watch peoples losing their money and breating air at the pumps while all the rest of the working devises like electric power plants and airplanes and ships destroy the air and the economy. The more you pay incompetants, the faster they return against you thereafter. If they don't return against you then they try to destroy everything, like they do now by oppressing the taxpayer, the consumers, their wifes, the air, the economy, etc. Toyota, gm, honda, the perfect criminals leaded by scientifics and politicians projects, LOL. They are zero in their own engineering and commercial business. Almost anyone with 10 000 to 100 000$ can build a green car. Them on the opposite are charging billions in taxmoney to japanese goverments and their own consumers to offer perfect sh*t cars.
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Nick P. 2:13PM (7/05/2009)
How come Kim Adelman and his team ( http://evworld.com/EVWORLD_TV.CFM?storyid=1719 ) are able to convert a *2005* Prius to drive at least 67 mph in electric only mode and Toyota can't?
Watch the video where he mentions that the car is totally able to do it with a new battery pack and modified software -- and he's not pushing it too hard either.
This proves that Toyota has designed this car (and drivetrain) to be able to scale very well into a long range plug-in hybrid, but are just enabling feature slowly until competition (Nissan, Mitsubishi) forces them to do otherwise.
Toyota is not getting a single cent from me until they stop their foot dragging. Tesla are the only ones going full throttle with pure EVs.
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