By Rick Pettinato

With the ever-increasing gasoline costs and the constant turbulence in the Middle East, people and governments alike are searching for ways to reduce their reliance on petroleum products.  Over the past few years, gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles have been making their way into popular markets and finding a home among both the environmentally conscious and the ultra hip.

The first gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles can be traced back to the late 1800s.  Dr. Ferdinand Porsche developed a hybrid that used a gasoline engine that spun generators to provide power to electric motors in the hubs of the wheels.   In 1905, a patent was filed by an engineer named H. Piper for an electric motor-assisted gasoline engine which could reach speeds of 25 miles per hour.

In 1997, the first mass produced hybrid vehicle, the Toyota Prius, went on sale in Japan.  The Toyota Prius gets over 60 miles per gallon of gasoline in city driving. The demand for these cars right now is so high that there is up to a six month waiting list to purchase one.  Estimates say that by 2007 there will be at least 20 new models and sales will jump to over 400,000.

The concept of hybrid vehicles has been around for hundreds of year, but the technology used in the current line of cars is still new and being re-developed constantly. There are two main ways that hybrid vehicles work.  First, the “mild” hybrids use their electric motors to give the combustion engines a boost when accelerating or climbing hills.  The vehicle is never powered solely by the electric motor.  The electric motor is used to recharge the battery during braking, capturing energy that would normally be lost as heat.  This technology is used in the Honda hybrids like the Insight, Civic, and Accord.

The other type of hybrid vehicle is a “full” hybrid.  These vehicles are powered solely by the electric motor at low speeds and in stop and start traffic.  The batteries are replenished by the combustion engine when the car is braking or coasting.  When the car hits a certain speed, the combustion engine automatically starts and takes over the propulsion of the car.  This technology is used in the Toyota Prius and the Ford Escape Hybrid.

Hybrid vehicles do have a few issues, however.  The biggest problem with hybrid vehicles has been their stigma as slow and small.  Many people compare them with electric cars, not realizing that they are, indeed, fast and sporty.  The Honda Civic and Accord hybrids, for example, have almost the same performance and feel as their all gasoline counterparts.

The world faces a lot of problems today, climate change, air pollution, and oil dependence. In the coming years, hybrids will play an important role in addressing these issues. Whether this new technology will deliver what it promises or whether it become a quandary for automakers, consumers, and policymakers — We’ll just have to wait and watch.