TOYOTA is introducing a plug-in hybrid with next-generation lithium-ion batteries in Japan, the United States and Europe by 2010, under a widespread strategy to be green outlined yesterday.
The ecological gas-electric vehicles, which can be recharged from a home electrical outlet, will target leasing customers, Toyota said. Such plug-in hybrids can run longer as an electric vehicle than regular hybrids, and are cleaner.
Lithium-ion batteries, common in laptops, produce more power and are smaller than the nickel-metal hydride batteries currently used in hybrids.
The joint venture that Toyota set up with Matsushita, which makes Panasonic products, will begin producing lithium-ion batteries in 2009 and move into full-scale production in 2010.
Toyota also said it was setting up a battery research department later this month to develop a battery that can outperform even that lithium-ion battery.
The car maker, which leads the industry in gas-electric hybrids, has said it will be selling 1 million hybrids a year sometime after 2010.
Hybrids reduce pollution and emissions linked to global warming by switching between a gas engine and an electric motor to deliver better mileage than comparable standard cars.
"Without focusing on measures to address global warming and energy issues, there can be no future for our auto business," Toyota President Katsuaki Watanabe said. Developing breakthrough technology was critical to allow Toyota and other auto makers to continue to grow while avoiding damage to the environment, he said.
The Prius, which has been on sale for more than a decade, recently reached cumulative sales of 1 million vehicles. Including other Toyota hybrids, the company has sold 1.5 million hybrids so far around the world.
Toyota said it is also working on fuel cell vehicles, which produce no pollution by running on energy produced when hydrogen combines with oxygen in the air to produce water.
It is also improving mileage of all its models, including gasoline engine and clean diesel vehicles, it said.
It plans to set up more environmentally friendly factories that will produce fewer carbon gas emissions and develop production techniques that require less energy, using solar energy and planting trees, Watanabe said.