The problem is that supplier is developing more or less this on it's own and trying to sell it to manufacturers. The manufacturer then assembles all the parts as Lego blocks, so the additional cost of the hybrid system is directly the additional cost of the end product. Building the full hybrid system from the ground up (Toyota, Honda, Renault...) can result in the cost saving elsewhere, for eg. transmission. Instead of transmission there are some simple gears, but of course you then need two MGs. You save on the mechanical cost and complexity but you add value through higher cost of electric part. In the end you end up in similar price range, even if full hybrid cost a little more it also offers more and is more reliable (less moving parts). The consumer will have the last saying and I think the consumer can value and chose the superior technology even if it costs 5% more.

Ouch, those Amps are huge, if the battery is in the back and motor in front, what kind of cable will you need? Are those high voltage orange cables really that more expensive? I'm a little puzzled, Toyota has run the cost down so much, that the price of their hybrids are getting in the "normal price" region. No matter how much this "bolt on" system costs it already costs too much. The right way of hybridisation is engine and transmission simplification. I don't know how this 3rd party "bolt on" solution will survive, a full hybrid drivetrain should be made from the ground up, IMO the only way to keep costs low.

Opel is in PSA group (Peugeot, Citroen), nothing to do with VW.

VW is producing 10 milions vehicles per year, it WILL take the long time for EVs to take the ICEs place, no mater what. It certainly is better to develop ICE further than just leave it where it is. But I'm questioning this 48V systems on top of already complicated DI Turbo ICEs with DCT gearboxes. In the end this will not come out as a cheap and simple system. I'm advocate of strong electrification and mechanical simplicity, new Corolla hybrid is already cheaper than Golf TDI DSG alone, what will this 48V system add? Toyota system is proven to last, where the DSG gearbox isn't really a synonym for reliability and how long will that 48 V li-ion battery last? A lot of unknowns in terms of reliability. Then there is driving experience, the VW 48V system is already available in Audi and I'm not exactly reading pleasant reviews about it. The 48V system is not strong enough to provide instant throttle response and in the name of fuel saving this system shuts off the engine when coasting, so a turbo engine will have even more lag than it already does. Yes speculation, I know, we will just have to wait and see how Golf does it.

Consumption is important if you are comparing a car that emits majority of CO2 in the production cycle and very little under driving (EV) and a car that is easily prudeced and then emits tons of CO2 when driving (diesel). If you take very small consumption for both, diesel will benefit, if you take higher consumption, EV will benefit. EV has benefits beyond CO2 emissions, EVs will be getting cleaner with cleaner electricity, diesel car will get dirtier and dirtier through it's life cycle. Not to mention maintanance and regulation of thousands of small tailpipes, compared to one big chimney in power plant. After all an averege car on the road is 10 years old, ask your self how does that DPF work on car that old and what does a normal do when they face the problems with EGR, DPF... Or cars that consume more oil or have their injectors just a little outside of parameters. People don't intentionally modify their cars to be rolling coal, but when the problems arises there are many "experts" that will fix the problem for a little fee to the wallet but a big fee for enviroment.

Peter_XX, the figures of "in use CO2" are too low, probably the NEDC numbers. 111 g CO2 from TDI means 4.2 l/100 km, this too low for Golf TDI, real world data from 400 sample size shows a consumption of 5.5 l/100 km, that is 145 g CO2. For the EV they are probably also to low, but then again there are countries that don't burn so much coal for electricity than Germany. On the other hand CO2 of diesel or petrol both with 40% thermal efficiency engines will be around the same in hybrid application, so why not just take the Prius 4.5 l/100 km (real world 240 sample size), that gives you 105 g CO2 tailpipe emissions. Calculation of tailpipe CO2 are really easy, just take the consumption: 1 Liter Petrol burns to 2,33 Kilogramm CO2 1 Liter Diesel burns to 2,64 Kilogramm CO2

Ever heard of Pulse & Glide? Traffic is never at fixed speed, there are always accelerations and decelerations, even if the small one, there still are. And also at the fixed lower speed Toyota hybrid will first use battery, when battery is depleted the engine will come on and force charge it, when battery is at certain level the engine shuts down and again drives in EV mode. Of course at times when the engine is ON, it uses more fuel than it would normally use for propulsion alone, but engine efficiency under load is so much better, that this comes out as fuel saved .

Toyota sold 1.5 milion hybrids last year, that should make it over 15%, not 11%.

I will believe it when I see it available for sale.

.. I think he ment larger capacity

It will be really interesting to see how this 48V systems work out in real life. I have my doubts, particulary how this will work with conventional AT and not assisting in propulsion when engine is OFF and transmission in N. IMO, there will be a considerable lag in throttle response from this conditions, no way around it. As for the price point, Focus 1.0 ecoboost with powershift transmission is already very close to a Toyota Corolla 1.8 hybrid, with 48V system it will be even closer. It's very simple win for the Toyota when choosing the two.

1. I didn't say that diesel engine should stop selling or stop developing. I'm just sceptical that it's a good solution for all cars and to have such a big market share (>40%). This is nothing but anomaly, partly due to lower excess taxes on diesel fuel in Europe, where in reality current market situation in Europe is that core diesel prices are more than 20% higher than petrol. 2. I pointed out volume of fuel, because people tend to buy fuel in liters or gallons and then they compare apples to oranges when they calculate l/100 km or MPG. CO2 emissions are fixed with the fuel consumption and again 1 l of diesel burns to 2.64 kg and 1 l of petrol burns to 2.33 kg. In this regard Prius is still the king of efficiency (4,5l/100 km real world), looking at real world numbers not even plug-in diesel hybrids come close (Volvo V60, MB C 300h, MB E 300h). Hell, those are even no match to Camry hybrid when it comes to total energy usage (electricity + diesel). 3. in theory and in the lab many things are possible, even F1 petrol engine is supposed to be more than 50% efficient, but apparently none of the production engines are. The same with diesel, marine diesel engines may be over 50% efficient but they are huge. In the end it comes down to user experience (UX), preferences and cost, people tend to like turbo diesel torque, low diesel fuel price and other (to me unknown) characteristics. But on the other hand strong electrification can also offer a huge advantage to UX. One thing modern diesel engines lack, even those mild 48V hybrid ones is throttle response.

Well, in the end it comes down to cost. You can have a diesel engine farting roses, but what does it mean for the purchase price and running costs? And to level diesel and petrol you have to account for 13% higher CO2 emissions when burning same volume of diesel fuel (1l petrol burns to 2.33 kg CO2 and 1 l diesel burns to 2.64). It's not all that black and white, latest gasoline engines with 41% efficiency coupled to a hybrid system are already cost competitive to a diesel car with DCT, I don't believe you can make a cost efficient diesel plug-in hybrid, not to mention packaging. Diesel has it's market share and will have it for a long time, but it's only sensible for bigger sized vehicles or cars with almost all highway driving and in my opinion that is no way the 43% of total car market.

Skyactiv-X needs supercharger to work properly, I'm afraid that that will rob the benefited efficiency from HCCI.

Prius has the same packaging for the battery, under the rear sest. Corolla is definitely more conventionally looking, but Prius offers more interior space.

It doesn't really matter if someone else was first or that someone else has a better system. What matters is mass adoption and Toyota is leading the way in this area.

What is this? Year 2000? There were several reports of solid state batteries that can be charged/discharged at over 20C at room temperature. Don't know what is so good about this? Is it easy to manufacture and scale?

Again, EURO6d-TEMP is tested with real driving emissions (RDE) with PEMS, so I don't understand what off-cycle conditions could be. This twin injection is a little puzzling, no one mentioned that one of them is DI and nowhere is mentioned D4-S (Toyota's DI+PFI system). My guess is those two injectors are both in the intake port. Nissan has a similar solution and the say that "This reduces the diameter of the fuel droplets, resulting in smoother, more stable combustion. "

1. 61 MPG is achieved on WLTP, still way more optimistic than EPA 2. Aygo is really, really small car, it won't compete even with the smallest hybrids (Yaris, Honda Fit/Jazz), let alone mid size hybrids. 3. EURO 6d uses real driving emissions (RDE) test procedure, if they can achieve low PM & PN without GPF, that just means the combustion is clean enough because of PFI and possibly other tricks. It will be interesting to see if if Toyota D4-S (direct + indirect injectors) in some of their larger vehicles will need GPF for EURO 6d, I would guess they won't.

I think that more efficient transport of electrons (high conductivity) means higher power and charge rate (C rate). But I don't know what it means if it's 2 times better than Nafion.

The estimate based on NEDC is way out of reality. According to this study average diesel is emitting 117.9 g CO2/km, that means that average diesel in EU is consuming 4.5 l/100 km, what a joke. Manufacturers have been cheating NEDC more and more, every new car had lower consumption on paper but not in reality, but now before WLTP and RDE this game has stooped, because every one want to make the transition with as little diference as possible, so my guess is they stooped "tuning" NEDC 2 years ago, when dieselgate broke loose. Study based on NEDC new car data has nothing to do with reality.

@bhtooefr, Millerized 2.0 B-Cycle TSI engine is supposed to have BSFC of 220 g/kWh: http://www.greencarcongress.com/2017/06/20170627-tiguan.html I would think this 1.5 TSI is in the same ballpark.

@Lad, a hybrid that gets 50 MPG consumes around 40 kWh/100 km of energy from gasoline. Similar EV will consume 18 kWh/100 km. Agree? From this we can have this possibilities: - If EV is 50% efficient then Hybrid is 22% efficient - If EV is 60% efficient then Hybrid is 27% efficient - if EV is 70% efficient then Hybrid is 31% efficient - if EV is 80% efficient then Hybrid is 36% efficient ICEs will be with us for several more years, why not make the best of it? EVs may not need expensive development, but they need resources that we can't easily get for yearly production of 70+ million cars worldwide, that is the reality.

I think Toyota will be OK with their hybrid sales, no other manufacturer will be able to compete with them in the price department. Just give every hybrid a little bigger battery (4-8 kWh), a charger and a nice price tag and they will sell like hotcakes. Who's behind who ... we will see in the coming years, don't take these outlooks for facts.

As far as I understand, the first new battery packs were always made by Panasonic and after couple of years they are then mass produced by PrimeEarth. Prius Prime battery is still made by Panasonic. PrimeEarth was also a joint venture with Panasonic having 60% share, but with Panasonic purchasing Sanyo, they rather sold their stake, because they had too big share of world NiMh production (anti-trust problems). Now they are basically doing the same joint venture all over again, with focus on next generation safer, high-capacity prismatic batteries.