Hybrid Car

High Gas Prices Make Hybrid Cars a Reasonable Venture

Across the nation and around the world, Gas Prices continue to rise. Well over the $4.00 mark with expectations of reaching $5.00 a gallon in the near future driving a hybrid car is now a responsible fuel efficiency and money saving idea.

The Toyota Prius hybrid car sells for an average $22,939 while a comparable gas powered Camry sell for $19,231. However the Toyota Prius Hybrid is more fuel efficient and consumes less gasoline. With Gas prices well over the $4-a-gallon mark you travel farther on a gallon of gas then non hybrid cars. You can save a significant amount at the gas pumps.

So, which is the better deal: The more expensive car that is cheaper to operate, or the less-expensive car that drinks more gasoline?

It’s the Toyota Prius - but only if the buyer keeps the car for longer than three years, according to Edmunds.com, a Web site with resources for car buyers. In the Prius vs. Camry example, it takes three years for the hybrid’s fuel savings to pay back the premium paid to buy the Prius instead of a comparable gas-powered car.

The Prius example comes from the latest study released by Edmunds that determines the length of time it takes to recoup the premium paid on costlier Hybrids. The findings: The rising price of gas is making Hybrids more financially attractive by reducing the amount of time required for fuel savings to pay back the so-called hybrid premium on many models.

In addition to the Prius, analysts found that the Nissan Altima, General Motors Yukon, Toyota Camry and the Mercury Mariner were among hybrid vehicles that offered relatively quick paybacks.

Imagine the surprise of seeing he new Toyota Prius sitting in the neighborhood garage with a yellow industrial-strength power cord coming out of hybrid car’s back end and snaking around to a 120-volt electrical outlet. This is the New Plug In Hybrid. This could be the future of Hybrid cars in general

The future, if Toyota and a few other car makers have anything to say about it, will see a lot more of these cars. Technological hurdles on the cost and efficiency of hybrid-car batteries will have to be overcome, but in the past couple of weeks, two major developments seemed to encourage the possibility that these cars may actually get built and sold to the public.

The Natural Resources Defense Council and the Electric Power Research Institute, an electrical power industry group, said widespread use of plug-in Hybrids, which use little gasoline, would help the environment and reduce oil consumption.

Hybrids at UC

Less than a week later, Toyota said it would provide two factory-made Prius plug-in Hybrids to the University of California - at campuses in Berkeley and Irvine - for a two-year test on U.S. roads.

The Chronicle’s own test drive the other day showed that the plug-in Prius is much like the regular plugless one sold in Toyota showrooms, but with a few tantalizing exceptions. By far, the most arresting (or non-arresting) detail is when you start out driving the plug-in. The car is absolutely silent - that’s the electric motor - but when you move down the street, it continues its silence (the regular Prius turns on its engine soon after takeoff).

By now, however, you’re not caring about electric-this, gasoline-that. You are mesmerized by a dashboard-mounted instrument whose digital readout shows your gas mileage leaping from 54 mpg to 145 mpg to 421 mpg to 999 mpg, depending on how much of a lead foot you are.

Normal hybrid cars - if such a vehicle can be called normal - get down the road using a combination of electric motor and gasoline engine. In the Prius, the nation’s most popular hybrid, the electric motor is powered by nickel metal hydride batteries. That car gets an average of 46 mpg, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

In the plug-in hybrid owned by Felix Kramer, here in Redwood City, those original batteries have been replaced by some 4,000 lithium-ion batteries, which are twice as powerful as the old batteries.

Kramer’s car is the showpiece of his homegrown plug-in hybrid organization, the California Cars Initiative, a 5-year-old nonprofit that extols the virtues of plug-ins - the car is emblazoned with decals touting its 100-mpg-plus capabilities.

The car, a 2004 model, was converted by Energy CS, in Monrovia (Los Angeles County) at a cost of about $15,000. Energy CS is one of a handful of firms in the United States and Canada converting Priuses in to plug-in Hybrids.

Kramer loves to open the car’s hatchback and show visitors the bright red board covering the batteries. Glued to the board are photos of Kramer at various enviro events - here with Bill Clinton, there with Al Gore.

Kramer is evangelical in his bid to get people to know about these cars, and he has become well known through his public appearances and his Web site.

While we were tootling along Alameda de las Pulgas, Kramer’s cell phone rang. He picked up, listened and then said politely that to get a full answer to the question, the caller should consult Kramer’s Web site ( www.calcars.org ).

“How do I get one?”

“Most of the phone calls are, ‘How do I get a plug-in hybrid?’ ” Kramer said. “The calls used to be, ‘What is it?’ Now they’re, ‘How do I get one?’ or ‘Why aren’t the automakers making one?’ ”

In downtown Redwood City, the car, with its 100 mpg decals, gets noticed.

A man who gave his first name as Blake (no last name, please) said of the Prius, “I think they’re great if you drive a lot. I pretty much ride a bicycle, walk, take Caltrain.”

Blake’s companion, Jim Zaccanti, from Darby, Mont., when asked whether he would buy one of these cars, said, “It’s not worth it. I could buy 20 years’ worth of gas for that.”

Back at Kramer’s house, he took a look at the “control displacement unit” on the dashboard to determine the car’s overall mileage during our outing.

“A bit over 122 miles per gallon,” he said with a smile. Then he got out of the car and plugged it back into the wall.

Some people are worried about the potential high cost of a hybrid car Repair. No need to worry if you go with the extended warranty most manufactures offer. With rising gas prices many over $3.00 a gallon the hybrid car is an economical and environmentally smart decision.

Recent Triple-A reports the national average for unleaded gas is $3.03 a gallon. The price of gas isn’t going down anytime soon and the conscientious switch to a hybrid car might be your best option.

“If your goal is low fuel costs, good for the environment, the economics of it, then, yes, a hybrid would probably fit just about anybody’s pocketbook,” says Leo Rea with Savannah Toyota in the state of Georgia

Leo’s been with Savannah Toyota for 19 years – long before hybrid cars and gas prices above three dollars. “We had seven or eight Prius’ on the lot prior to that and they went away in a matter of three or four days,” says Leo.

He adds most people drive to his dealership already looking to buy a hybrid car because they’ve done the research. But others aren’t too clear on what they are and do. “It has two power sources. It has a conventional gasoline engine then it has a large electrical engine and they’re mated together. And you have a large, high powered batter that powers the electric motor,” says Leo.

In other words, it cuts down how much you pay for gas. “You fill this car up and you got a range of about 600 miles on a tank of gas,” says Leo. That means you can drive from Savannah to Atlanta and almost all the way back without filling up again.

The cars also look pretty much like any other one, but there is a price difference. “For example the cost of our base model Prius is about $22,000 dollars,” says Leo, which costs more than other cars its size.

“If budget wise the Hybrid’s not in your pocketbook, you should certainly look at those other small cars. The simple fact is that we all – everybody that drives is gonna have to start making some sacrifices. Either we’re gonna have to stop driving as much as we drive or we’re gonna have to start thinking more about carpools. We’ve got to stop burning so much fuel and find alternative fuel measures,” says Leo.

He also told us if you’re worried that repairs for a hybrid might cost more, he says many come with an additional warranty for eight years and 100,000 miles.