Lightning Hybrid Cars

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Some companies are light years ahead of others by adding a little black box to their fleet vehicles.

A little black box the size of a Zippo cigarette lighter is plugged into a port below Chris Williams’ steering column. It lets him know how he’s doing behind the wheel and lets his employer make the company’s drivers safer and more fuel-efficient.

Williams, group leader of special projects for EnCana Corp.’s U.S. division, was surprised by his first driving report, delivered to his e-mail from the wireless device.

“I always said I thought I was a really good driver until I started receiving my scorecard,” said Williams, who works in the energy company’s Dallas office.

Williams, determined to improve his score, quit hitting the brakes so hard. He went from eight incidents of hard braking per hour in July to 3.3 in September. His overall score rose from 80 to 96 on a 100-point scale.

That’s the kind of improvement EnCana hopes to see as it rolls out use of the device that began as an experiment in Dallas and Denver, where the company financed a driving pilot project for the city.

“We saw some very positive results and felt like this was something we wanted to do divisionwide,” EnCana spokesman Doug Hock said.

The Canadian-based oil and gas producer is interested in saving gas, cutting pollution and, most importantly, keeping drivers safe, Hock said. “We had a vehicle fatality in Texas early this year,” he said.

EnCana teamed up with Denver last year in what was believed to be the first-of-its-kind experiment to test whether drivers could reduce emissions by adjusting their driving styles. The company gave the city a $400,000 grant for the project, which included 160 city vehicles, 240 private vehicles and 30 EnCana employees.

City officials said the results showed a 10 percent drop in vehicle emissions and overall better driving, including a 35 percent decrease in idling.

Denver-based Cartasite Inc. provided the telemetry technology to transmit data from the vehicles over the Internet. The company provides real-time tracking of vehicles and remote equipment, including offshore drilling rigs, for corporations.

The equipment Cartasite used for the pilot project included three brick-sized boxes and antennas in the car.

“We knew we wouldn’t be commercially viable unless we could reduce the technology,” said Cartasite CEO David Armitage.

A Chinese company repackaged the technology into a little black box named Rover — Realtime Onboard Vehicle Evaluation Reporting. The device tracks hard braking, rapid acceleration, speeding, idling, fuel efficiency and the amount of nighttime driving.

The company provides the service, including the device and drivers’ weekly scorecards, for $1.50 a day.

EnCana is expanding the service to all its U.S. vehicles — 575 total in Colorado, Louisiana, Texas and Wyoming.

Hock said a test run of 50 company vehicles in Texas over the summer showed an overall 35 percent reduction in idling time, resulting in a weekly $8.30 savings in fuel per vehicle. Hard braking dropped by 20 percent and the percentage of drivers deemed aggressive — initially 7 percent — was negligible at the end.

Some employees were concerned about “Big Brother” looking at their scorecards, Hock said. But EnCana is interested in tracking driving trends companywide, not focusing on individuals, he said.

“The individual data is really for that person for self improvement,” Hock said

Source AP Denver;
By JUDITH KOHLER
Associated Press Writer

So the long waiting lists and high prices for the Toyota Prius and Honda Civic Hybrids have turned you off a new hybrid? Don’t worry because used hybrids are now starting to hit the market and it may be a great chance to grab a bargain. There are some very important things to take into consideration before you jump into a used hybrid however.

Given that hybrids are new to the used car market, they have been somewhat of an unknown quantity. Figures from Kelley Blue Book are now showing that the depreciation of hybrids is significantly more than other used cars, with the Prius holding only 58% of its value after two years and 41% after five years, and the Civic Hybrid holding 60% after two years and 43% after five years. This compares to the gas-engined Civic which maintains 66% of its value after two years and 50% after five years. The good news is that buying a used hybrid will save even more money over buying a new model, however the depreciation continues and when you go to sell it, you will lose more than other vehicles on the road.

So why is the depreciation on Hybrids so high? There are a few factors at work here.

Firstly, the cost of replacing hybrid batteries is much more than other car batteries. The batteries on a hybrid store the energy that has been produced through regenerative braking, and use it when the car is running on electric. These need replacing after 8-10 years or 80,000 – 100,000 miles and it is a big investment, costing between $2000 and $5000. If you buy a hybrid car that is ready for a battery change, you may be slugged with a replacement cost that makes the savings of buying a used hybrid redundant.

Another important consideration is that hybrids are still more expensive to maintain because there are a lot fewer mechanics that are qualified to repair the completely different mechanical system. On the other hand, overall maintenance should be less than a regular gasoline car due to the reduced stress on the engine and the brakes in a hybrid.

The computer system of a hybrid is extremely sophisticated in order to manage the two engine systems and switch between them at the appropriate times. This relies on a system of sensors throughout the car and a central computer, and like all computers, things can easily go wrong. If the used hybrid is outside of its warranty period for computer maintenance, this could end up being an extremely expensive investment to repair it.

Finally, the insurance of a hybrid car is higher than other cars due to the high cost of maintenance.

Given these issues with used hybrids, it is even more important than with other cars to have the car fully inspected before you buy it, to understand exactly what you are buying and what kind of costs you will be up for. Hybrids are still surrounded by a fair degree of hype, so sellers will often be looking to add a premium just because it is a hybrid. To avoid this, be sure to research the true value of the car in Kelley Blue Book and other local selling guides and as with any other used cars, the better your homework, the more likely you are to get a great deal.

About The Author
Danielle Ali Shah is a contributor for Autotropolis, a full-range car buying and research site dedicated to providing car buyers with the information they need to navigate both the new and used car markets.

Visit the author’s web site at:
Autotropolis.com

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VanDyne SuperTurbo, a member of the Rocky Mountain Innovation Initiative’s incubator program, will design, develop and produce a hybrid superturbocharger that can deliver fuel savings of 25 percent in passenger vehicles and heavy-duty engines.

VanDyne SuperTurbo Inc. has just spun out of Fort Collins-based Woodward Governor, where the technology for the superturbocharger was developed during the past four years. The spinoff will bring the product to the high-volume automotive market, which does not fit in with Woodward’s core business lines of aerospace, and power generation and industrial controls. Woodward Governor will retain an equity position in the company.

The superturbocharger technology allows automotive companies to reduce the size of their engines while maintaining performance. Results have shown a 25 percent to 30 percent efficiency improvement for gasoline engines and a 7 percent to 10 percent improvement for diesel engines.

VanDyne SuperTurbo Inc. is effectively a new company determined to develop products that will help manufactures cut the fuel consumption and reduce the carbon emissions of their engines, no matter what fuel they are using. According to local reports, low-volume production is slated for late 2011.

As America continues to face roller coaster prices at the gas pumps and a constant reliance on foreign oil, will that pave the road for hybrid electric cars? It could, if a new survey is accurate.

Around 48 percent of American consumers asked said they would be extremely or very interested in buying a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV), according to a new Pike Research survey.

(Credit: Pike Research)

PHEVs promise better fuel mileage, lower carbon emissions, and less oil dependence than cars that use gasoline exclusively.

These hybrids can typically reach a distance of around 40 miles on a single charge. But that fits well within the needs of many drivers. Around 82 percent of those questioned in the “Electric Vehicle Consumer Survey” drive 40 miles or less per day, and on average travel only around 27 miles daily.

Citing the benefits of electric hybrids, 85 percent of consumers said greater fuel efficiency would be important when picking their next car. Pike estimates that the cost of electricity to charge hybrids would equal around 75 cents per gallon of gas.

Around 65 percent of respondents said they’d be willing to pay a premium price for a hybrid, on average close to 12 percent over the cost of a standard gas-powered car.

The survey found that 79 percent would buy a fast-charging electrical outlet for their homes. But many also expressed the need for charging stations at work and at public places.

Younger people and those with higher levels of education did express a somewhat greater desire for hybrids than did other groups. But overall, interest didn’t differ much among age, gender, income, or education, leading Pike to believe the vehicles should appeal to the mass market.

Among those not interested in plug-in hybrids, 45 percent said they’d want to wait until the technology is more proven, while 33 percent said 40 miles on a single charge would not meet their needs.

(Credit: Peak Research)

Following their market introduction next year, more than 600,000 PHEVs will be sold in the U.S. by 2015, forecasts Pike. A number of auto companies will soon debut hybrids that can drive a certain distance using only battery power, then switch to gas when the battery is drained.

The research firm gathered its findings from a Web-based survey of 1,041 U.S. consumers during the second quarter of 2009.

Other surveys have uncovered similar results. Last year, a JD Power survey found high consumer interest in hybrids, even with their premium price tags.

Source: cnet news

As the figure of merit for fuel economy, the Progressive Insurance Automotive X PRIZE is using MPGe (miles per gallon energy equivalent), defined as:

MPGe = (miles driven) / [(total energy of all fuels consumed)/(energy of one gallon of gasoline)])

MPGe is a simple, well-defined measure of overall vehicle efficiency. MPGe is easy to explain, accounts in a neutral manner for any combination of fuels, and reduces to the familiar MPG in the case of gasoline fuel only.

To make it easier to understand (and get some intuition about) MPGe, the Progressive Insurance Automotive X PRIZE developed a spreadsheet available here. It includes three simple calculators:

(1) Enter the distance driven and the amounts of all fuels consumed – result is MPGe. The formula for this calculation is the one given above.

(2) For the special case of gasoline-electric PHEVs, enter the gasoline usage (MPG gasoline) and electricity usage (watt-hours per mile) – result is MPGe.

(3) For the case of any plug-in vehicle, enter the charging time and the charging efficiency – result, for three different electric circuit types, is the total energy added to the battery, expressed both as kWh and as (energy-equivalent) gallons of gasoline.

This is a hard time for the automotive industry. But it’s also an exciting time of change and innovation. Consumers will soon have a variety of energy efficient and environmentally friendly vehicle choices as diverse technologies and alternative fuels come to market. This diversity will make it harder to evaluate and compare vehicles, and how best to do so is a difficult question. MPGe is not the entire answer, as it must be presented in the context of driving style, frequency, and distance.