Filed under: EV/Plug-in, Hybrid, Honda
Honda president, CEO: plug-in hybrids "unnecessary," don't reduce emissions
While GM and Toyota have shown interest in making plug-in hybrids, Honda probably won't do PHEVs if Takeo Fukui has anything to say about it. And Takeo probably does have something to say about it, considering he is Honda's president and CEO. Honda is the second largest hybrid car maker, after Toyota, but Takeo thinks plug-in hybrids like the Volt are just electric vehicles with an "unnecessary" gas motor with no "real advantages." Takeo says he could make one in two years but don't think it will "reduce emissions." Here are some of his quotes from a Reuters article out today:
"My feeling is that the kind of plug-in hybrid currently proposed by different auto makers can be best described as a battery electric vehicle equipped with an unnecessary fuel engine and fuel tank. ... I'm not sure what kind of real advantages they [plug-ins] would have. ... I don't think that [plug-ins] will contribute to the global environment or to reducing carbon dioxide."
Honda recently stopped selling the Insight
[Source: Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Reuters]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Tim 10:33AM (10/23/2007)
Some lead and others follow but the race never ends.
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jcwinnie 10:52AM (10/23/2007)
Honda is renown for superlative design, so this is other than typical nay-saying from Detroit. (BTW: Ricky has yet to come around; the Board muzzled his continually shooting down plug-in hybrids.
What I would surmise is that Honda is ahead of the game with PEM fuel cells and wants everybody on the Honda Hydrogen Home Highway. Where President Takeo errs is thinking there will be enough time for people to switch to a Hydrogen economy.
The smarter path is to build range extenders as an option. You want PEM fuel cell, it will cost you umpity-scrump yem; you want HCCI, it will cost you fewer dollars; you want a diesel that can run on E100, even less Euros.
But it is all modular, so you can swap whichever for the other, while many running of mega-joules from the Grid, Alfonzo of the Outrageous Tie!
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Gary 10:54AM (10/23/2007)
Is that a typo in the last paragraph?
"Honda recently stopped selling the Civic hybrid..."
I thought they stopped selling the Insight but were still selling the Civic Hybrid.
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jcwinnie 10:59AM (10/23/2007)
Correction: Mainly running on
e.g., PHEV20, PHEV40 or PHEV60 depending upon how deep your pockets
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Snowdog 11:09AM (10/23/2007)
I like the idea of PHEV once we have near perfect batteries, but with current technology you are paying even more cents/mile than conventional hybrids or gas cars once you factor a very expensive battery replacement. Well that and I currently rent, so I don't have a place to plug in.
Stopped selling civic hybrids??? Info???
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Snowdog 11:09AM (10/23/2007)
I like the idea of PHEV once we have near perfect batteries, but with current technology you are paying even more cents/mile than conventional hybrids or gas cars once you factor a very expensive battery replacement. Well that and I currently rent, so I don't have a place to plug in.
Stopped selling civic hybrids??? Info???
Attempt #2
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Tom (Honda Salesman) 11:25AM (10/23/2007)
It is a typo. Honda hasn't discontinued the Hybrid Civic, but has discontinued the Hybrid Accord and Insight.
For the model year 2009 Honda is supposed to have a small dedicated hybrid for the U.S. Market.
In Honda's position statements they feel that Natural Gas and Hydrogen are the most logical technological progressions. They have come out strongly against E85 and said that they will not offer a flex fuel vehicle.
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Lascelles Linton 11:27AM (10/23/2007)
Gary, Yes, thanks, changed. I meant to write only selling.
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Stéphane Dumas 11:40AM (10/23/2007)
#7 Tom, Honda will offer a flex-fuel vehicules but however only for Brazil currently.
http://www.autobloggreen.com/2007/10/21/honda-offering-flex-fuel-civic-and-fit-in-brazil-only/
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Karkus 12:04PM (10/23/2007)
I think Mr. Fukui has a good point -why add all the complexity and cost of an ICE and fuel tank to a fine electric car? Take the Volt - it's a limited range EV with an ICE backup. But if you take out all the weight/cost/complexity of the ICE/fuel tank and add some batteries in its place, you would end up with an EV with a decent range.
In the US, people seem to have concerns about doing road trips, where an EV would run out. However, I think the typical European and Japanese driver isn't so worried about that, and a 100 mile (or 50 or 200 or whatever) range seems OK to them. Also, considering that most US families have (at least) 2 cars, having one medium range EV and one regular car would seem to work fine for 99% of the cases. So why make a PHEV? - just to soothe the irrational fear of the US consumer? Unfortunately, that seems to be the case - a lot of people, especially in the US, buy stuff because of some fear (whether it's real or not) that some marketing people/the news/the govt told them to be worried about.
So now it appears that neither Honda nor Toyota are that excited about plug-ins, while GM is tooting the horn about the Volt (I'll believe it when I see it). Given their track record on hybrids, I think I'll believe the Japanese over GM on their opinions on HEV vs PHEV vs EV.
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scatter 12:10PM (10/23/2007)
What an odd comment to make. Clearly he needs to be briefed on the benefits of EVs quite urgently. Unless it's an attempt at a smokescreen (although I can't see how it could be). Bizarre.
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BlackbirdHighway 12:27PM (10/23/2007)
I'll be sure to wave at the Honda dealership as I drive by in my Tesla.
And I'm willing to give them a dollar for every pound of CO2 generated by my photovoltaic solar panels.
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Schmeltz 12:55PM (10/23/2007)
Scatter:
"What an odd comment to make."---My thoughts exactly. Honda was initially in front of the Hybrid boom with their Insight. But seeing that be a relative flop as a volume vehicle, they backed off very, very hard on the hybrids push. They brought out a hybrid Civic, and Accord, the former being very good in sales and the latter being very poor in sales, so much that it has recently been cancelled. Meanwhile, Toyota seemed to hit just the right chord at the right time with the Prius. Honda will venture forth again with a dedicated hybrid vehicle in a few years similar to the Prius, but that is about it as far as I know. You don't hear much of Honda bragging up the hybrid business. It's almost like they make hybrids because they have to, since Toyota makes so many, and they wouldn't want to be made to look un-green by a rival. I just never understood Honda's take on the whole hybrid issue. Now we read Honda's CEO is skeptical of plug-ins. It could be a smokescreen as you mentioned, but there actions seem to indicate otherwise. In my observation, it seems Honda would just be happy to infinitely tweak their gas ICE's or improve on the Hydrogen fuel cell, rather than spend more time and energy on hybrids (in whatever form). Different strokes I guess.
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Tony Belding 1:10PM (10/23/2007)
Karkus asks, "Why add all the complexity and cost of an ICE and fuel tank to a fine electric car?"
Answer: Because the ICE and fuel tank can store more energy and cost less than the mass of batteries it displaces, while also being able to refuel quickly from the existing widespread network of gas stations. If pure BEVs could match the cost, range and rapid refueling ability of gasoline, nobody would ever have thought about making a PHEV.
Maybe Takeo Fukui knows something about developments in battery technology that the rest of us haven't heard yet.
Then again, there's the whole question of what consumers actually need, versus what they've been conditioned to think they need. GM have staked out a strategy that says they're not going to try and educate anybody about what kind of car they can really get by with. They are very deliberately planning to give customers what they want, or think they want, or seem to want, whether it makes any sense or not.
It's the same story with the ad where they're promoting their big hybrid SUV. GM feel their customers want big cars, and they are going to deliver big cars, not try to explain to people why they don't really need a big car.
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buckbuck1 2:03PM (10/23/2007)
Why plug ins? They have shorter range, they do not help clean the air, unless you get your electricty from a nucular powered plant.And with electricty prices going up there not cheaper to run. It is just like E85, it is home grown, but everything that depends on corn is going up in price more than inflation costs !!!
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OhmExcited 2:07PM (10/23/2007)
The ultimate emissions do depend a lot on where you live:
http://ohmexcited.googlepages.com/CO2.htm
However, it's almost never a clear negative. The only exception is perhaps a Toyota Prius compared to a coal powered EV, but not by much. In Japan, plug-in EV's would be a clear winner, as their energy generation is significantly nuclear derived.
The real problem is that their battery suppliers do not have the type of technology that A123 has that makes series hybrids feasible. And they don't see EV's with Tesla type battery packs as profitable.
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GreyFlcn 3:27PM (10/23/2007)
Actually a coal powered Prius PHEV, and a normal Prius run about dead even in emissions per mile.
http://greyfalcon.net/plugins3
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Tim Russell 4:06PM (10/23/2007)
Schmeltz, Honda didn't get hybrids right to start with. The Insight while a real fuel miser is a very quirky looking car with only 2 seats. The Prius on the other hand looks diffrent from a regular car so everyone knows what it is but has the space and utility of a regular car. Utility and everyone can tell I'm green design won the day. The Civic hybrid looks like a Civic until you see the wheels and badge. Honda my have a winning formula with a dedicated hybrid that is closer to the Prius in utility. My .02 cents on that.
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Tony Belding 9:29PM (10/23/2007)
Evan, I'm not sure if you got the full import of what I was saying. Yes, GM are responding to what consumers want, and that's commendable up to a point -- but there should be some role for educating and influencing consumers in a positive direction too.
Up to now the Big Three in the USA have been actively goading their customers into buying the bigger, more expensive, and therefore more lucrative products. They spent millions on advertising and other promotions, convincing people to buy Hummers and Excursions to haul their groceries. Then they turned to regulators and legislators and shrugged helplessly: "There's nothing we can do about it! We're just making what the people demand!"
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Joseph 9:30PM (10/23/2007)
I agree with Honda on this. The PHEVs being displayed right now aren't all that far from a full-electric car.
Honda does have a strange position on alt. fuels. I think the reason Honda made the Insight was to reaffirm themselves as the greenest, most fuel-efficient automaker and to beat the "race" to put the first hybrid on the roads in America. Honda acomplished their first purpose, but not thier seconds. Toyota instead got the claim to fame on the greeness of their cars.
I don't think Honda honestly thought hybrids were the future. And the fact is, they're not; they're an intermediate between EVs and gasoline. PHEVs such as the Volt and Prius PHEV are huge leaps in between the two, veering off more towards EVs. So Honda thinks that if you're gonna make a PHEV why not just make the battery pack larger, drop the engine, and have it all electric.
I think it is very strange of Honda to think Natural Gas is the future. Can someone clraify this for me. Does Honda think it is a good intermediate step for the future? It is understandable that Honda says FCVs are the future, as do practically all car companies.
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