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Toyota Going 100% Hybrid By 2020
autofan1 writes "Toyota's vice president in charge of powertrain development, Masatami Takimoto, has said cost cutting on the electric motor, battery and inverter were all showing positive results in reducing the costs of hybrid technology and that by the time Toyota's sales goal of one million hybrids annually is reached, it 'expect margins to be equal to gasoline cars.' Takimoto also made the bold claim that by 2020, hybrids will be the standard drivetrain and account for '100 percent' of Toyota's cars as they would be no more expensive to produce than a conventional vehicle."
GM today announced plans to begin planning the development of a new hybrid platform. A GM executive was quoted saying "Toyota has really got a jump on this whole 'hybrid' thing, but we're on it!" The new platform, due out in 13 years is expected to compete against the current Prius. Only time will tell if this risky endeavor will be a wise one.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
If the other car manufacturers are smart, they'll build less fuel efficient cars. Then by 2020, there will be no more gas and Toyota's invesment in hybrids will be useless.
Badass Resumes
I'm still waiting for my Mr. Fusion , that will enable me to power my vehicle on ordinary household garbage! After all, it's the only power source that's capable of generating the 1.21 Gigawatts of electricity necessary to run the Flux Capacitor in my DeLorean! ;-)
If you've ever driven Toyota you should know that it doesn't make cars, it makes lifeless soulless appliances, sort of fridges and sofas on wheals.
That's why going hybrid will not damage its qualities.
Sorry Toyota, in my 30s I'm not old enough to drive your vacuum cleaners
GM, Chrysler and Ford announce that they'll transition to "thinking about possibly getting some of those battery-rechargey cars" into production by 2015.
Where the heck do you live? I've never seen anywhere (except for Germany) where pedestrians obey walk signals.
"even if every single American nuclear power plant had a Three mile Island style meltdown all in the same year",
Do you know what happens in a Three mile Island meltdown? The core becomes so hot that it literally melts down through the earth. As it goes deeper and deeper, steam shoots out of the ground all around the power plant. Keep in mind this is radioactive steam that would kill you if you were to be in contact with it. This is for a radius of miles, not close in... I think the environment would cry a lot more if it was saturated with life killing doses of radiation for the next 10,000 years...
Here's a quote from a Time article outlining this phenonoman
"Though the accident was a type of core meltdown, the ultimate nuclear power nightmare, U.S. experts also called it a burnup. Meltdowns technically occur in reactors containing pools of water. When the water boils away, the molten core sinks into the earth in the so-called China syndrome, a term used by scientists, and popularized by the 1979 movie of the same name, that mordantly suggests that the radioactive mass might plunge all the way through the earth. The Chernobyl plant had no such pool, by contrast, and engineers expect the reactor to be consumed by intense heat."
article
I've read Slashdot for the last 5 years, and now I start posting... Go figure
When will they wise up and use my idea for a wind-powered car?
You see, you replace the engine with a turbine, and that turbine charges a battery. All you do is charge the battery the first time, and that starts you going. when the wind flows through the turbine, it charges the battery, keeping you going.
It's brilliant! Really!
We're all going to die. i intend to deserve it.