Toyota And Honda Face Off In Obama-Regulated Hybrid Battle

Toyota has just brought out their new Prius, and they’re trumpeting their 80,000 Japanese orders in the face of Honda, who are their big rivals in the sector with their brand new Insight. The Insight was briefly the top-selling hybrid last month, but the Prius now looks set to overtake it (though without revving too hard, of course).

It’s being launched at the perfect time, as today Obama announces new regulations on emissions and fuel economy – cars will have to average 39mpg by 2016 across the range of models offered by any one company, trucks 30mpg. It’s important to note that distinction – not every car will have to be 39mpg, but rather cars across a fleet must average that amount, meaning that the likes of GM can still build gas-guzzlers as long as they’re also building hybrids and electrics that drag the average up. We’ll have to wait to see the small print on this, but hopefully the average applies to the cars that have been sold, rather than just constructed.

The fuel efficiency savings will hopefully be enough to persuade the US public to start buying the greener vehicles anyway. So how do they match up? The Insight has in its favour a sub-$20,000 price tag and some cool Night Rider light up displays that tell you when you’re driving efficiently; the Prius is roomier, gets more miles to the the gallon, and has a solar panel on the roof. In terms of styling, Honda have got rid of that Tron-like wheel arch from the first edition and replaced it with boring regular wheels; the Prius is a bit pointier and spunkier. Each also come with smugness as standard.

The Prius also has Lane Keeping Assist, otherwise knows as the “Drunk Driver’s Friend” – it keeps the car within the lane when concentrating on keeping within the white lines becomes too much of a drag. Unfortunately MSNBC noted that: “Left to its own devices, we found that it would, within a couple corrections, begin to bounce from one side of the lane to the other at too great an angle for the system to correct and the car would barge into the adjoining lane”.

The Prius also has the better, and crazier, ad campaign. Its TV spot features a landscape made entirely from part-time actors undulating into beatific greenness as the Prius passes, though I’m not sure about the message being given that the car helps melt snow:

Allied to that are “living billboards”, made of flowers, being erected alongside Californian motorways, plus these Teletubby-like installations: “Oversized solar flower sculptures will be placed in highly interactive areas such as public parks. These sculptures, which include free Wi-Fi access, will serve as seating environments and charging stations for people to recharge their spirits as well as their mobile phones and laptops.” Jeez, this is second only to Innocent smoothies in the cutesy-poo stakes.

But let’s not mock too hard, because this is undeniably good technology. Less wonderful is the just-announced “EcoBoost” technology from Ford, which is a gizmo put into fully petrol-powered cars to make them seem, rather than actually be, less planet-raping. It’s a turbocharger that allows you to accelerate without burning as much fuel as before: “Ford boasts that its new V-6 with EcoBoost delivers V-8 power using far less gas.” It looks like Obama isn’t going to let the Big Three get away with this being their gesture towards environmental friendliness.

Posted by Ben Beaumont-Thomas in Green Rush | May 19, 2009 2:11PM |