Recently, people have been talking a lot about different environmental issues such as the worldwide phenomena of global warming, climate changes, different types of pollutions, flora and fauna conservation, large-scale deforestation activities and sustainable energy. All of these issues, I would personally say that sustainable energy has the largest impact on our daily activities. Since a few years ago, every vehicle owner has been thinking thoroughly about coping with the fuel price hiking in the market. So, I certainly believe that now is the best period for us to look at possible and practical solution. Terms such as hybrid vehicle might pop up in our minds while thinking for the best answer. Oh, even our senior post an article about electric car which is very much related to hybrid technology.
So, what about this hybrid vehicle? Hybrid vehicle refers to vehicle that is powered by more than one power source. Technically, hybrid vehicles can be categorized into two classes; series hybrids and parallel hybrids.
Series hybrids have a gas engine that powers the generator. The generator then charges the batteries and powers the electric motor. The gasoline engine doesn't power the vehicle on its own. The electric motor runs all the time and the gas engine comes on only when needed. This vehicle gets better mileage around town, where the electric motor is doing most of the work.
The parallel kind has a fuel tank for the gas engine and batteries for the electric motor. Both the engine and the electric motor can turn the transmission and power the vehicle. The small gas engine runs the car and the electric motor comes on when needed to boost power. This is typically needed for increasing speed, merging and passing other vehicles.
Lately, various designs of hybrid cars are showing up in the market which indirectly giving a sign of positive commercialization in the future. From small and compact electric cars, evolving to” spacious and sporty sedan car” and then reaching to super sport cars, most of the developed cars are gaining increasing interest from potential buyers worldwide. Furthermore, the main benefits of hybrid vehicles (i.e. able to reduce fuel cost and air pollutant emission) are also strring up the interest.
If you are enthusiastic about cars as well as the future of our environment, or at least you love to look at green engineering, it is worth to look at some of the available design of hybrid concept cars and recently launced hybrid cars in current market.
NISSAN LEAF (NOW ON SALE)
PROTON EMAS CONCEPT CAR ( MALAYSIAN FUTURE CAR =) )
PORSCHE 918 SPYDER HYBRID SUPER CAR (HYBRID SUPER CAR WITH ELECTRIC PLUG-IN)
VOLSWAGEN ELECTRIC MILANO TAXI
TOYOTA 3RD GENERATION OF PRIUS HYBRID
Looking at the pictures above, the hybrid technology is offering promising alternative for building "a car for tomorrow". Car manufacturers are currently applying different technology adaptation on various category of hybrid cars which seems to be very practical. It is indeed a great effort towards greener world as well as sustainable mobility. Even though the technology offered is not yet perfect, I strongly believe that continuous development of advanced hybrid technology would provide impressive efficiency at affordable price, improved equipments and thus able to significantly reduce the dependence on fossil fuel to power our vehicles. Let's hope that the benefits of hybrid vehicles would really outweigh the cost.
