Production of Chevrolet’s Volt was supposed to be limited to 10k units this year, a target GM has already set its sights on surpassing. With 2012 volume projections now reaching 25k units, the next step in The General’s quest to prove that the Volt is a viable vehicle is a staggering goal: doubling its 2013 production target from 60k to 120k units of production. According to Bloomberg, GM has not officially announced the 120k volume goal and may not build that many Volts in 2013 at all, if energy prices and supplier challenges don’t allow it. And though supplier issues could well leave the goal out of reach, even if GM is able to ramp up production to fulfill its 120k unit goal by next year, there are no signs yet that the market will support those production levels. After all, GM is essentially banking on the kind of volume-to-price niche that BMW has taken years to cultivate with its 3 Series… which starts at prices slightly below the Volt’s $41k, and still moved fewer than 110k units last year.

When Chrysler let slip at the Detroit Auto Show that it would be offering a hybrid version of its 300 sedan by 2013, we automatically assumed that the Pentastar was going back to its Hemi-based Two-Mode V8 hybrid system, jointly developed by GM, Chrysler, BMW and Mercedes. Not so, it turns out. That billion-dollar drivetrain has been relegated to poor-selling hybrid SUVs, and it’s already being considered a dead-end by at least the German firms who helped develop it. Instead, it seems that Chrysler has gone to the government for a hybrid system, and will adapt a hydraulic hybrid system developed by the EPA.

Bloomberg reports that Toyota’s engineers have reached an “advanced stage” of research on a new “induction”-type electric motor which holds the promise of freeing the Japanese automaker from dependence on so-called rare-earth materials. These elements, including neodymium and dysprosium, are used to strengthen the magnets used in traditional electric motors and generators, and are crucial to the production of everything from electric and hybrid cars to wind turbines and guided missiles. China currently controls over 90 percent of the world’s supply of rare-earth materials, and has recently cut exports quotas, raising tensions between China and Japan.

Lexus entered the „premium compact“ segment today by launching their CT 200h hybrid hatchback in Japan. They could call it CT 200hhh – as in harmonious hatch hybrid. We’ll get to the harmonious in a minute.

“Prius has become to hybrids what Kleenex is to tissues and Levis are to jeans.” So said Bob Carter, group VP and general manager of Toyota U.S.A. With so much brand power, it would be a waste to have only one Prius. From now on, Toyota has three. The Prius received a bigger and a smaller sibling, with the idea towards creating “a modern family with a Prius for everyone.”

GM has invested $5 million in the Powermat wireless charging start-up, and they want to use the technology “to charge its soon-to-be-launched Chevy Volt hybrid electric car,” Businessgreen reports. They report from the UK, so they shall be forgiven the “soon-to-be-launched” this one time only. But to charge a Chevy Volt?

Yo, wazzup?`Want to get your hands on Russia’s first homegrown hybrid, yo? All you need to do is get yo sorry azz over to Moscow, dat Russia for you, yo. According to Itar-Tass, the Russian yo-Auto company shows their “yo” hybrid at the yo-mobile pavilion in downtown Moscow from January 2 through 11. Yo, dat’s right.

They say that “everything sells at a price,” but right now no amount of money will buy you a Fisker Karma. And, according to a leaked internal email obtained by Fiskerbuzz.com, the price of the Valmet-built luxury plug-in hybrid is rising.

In 2008, pricing was originally estimated to be around $80,000. This estimate was then more clearly defined in 2009 as an MSRP of $87,900 and has now increased another $8,000 to the final pricing of $95,900 for the EcoStandard model.

Is this price bump in any way related to Fisker’s recently-announced production delay, or is it just bad Karma? Fiskerbuzz pleads for calm:

The Karma’s solar roof, the largest continuous and most highly curved solar roof in a passenger car, was planned to be a $5,000 option. The roof is now standard.

With an MSRP of $95,900 the Karma is within 10% of the originally announced MSRP of $87,900 announced in 2009 – an incremental change over the course of two years.

More pricing info and apologia/perspective (depending on how you look at it) after the jump…

Good on Chevy for making this video covering the Volt’s (relatively) complex efficiency calculus. Presenting the Volt’s mileage in a fair and accurate yet easy-to-understand manner has been a challenge for Chevy’s marketing (and its fellow travelers). It’s not as short or sexy as any of the Volt’s actual advertisements, but this video is Chevy’s best attempt to date at giving consumers a brief but accurate picture of the Volt’s real-world efficiency. For more accuracy (and inevitable complexity) check out Consumer Reports’ latest findings on living with the Volt in the real world.

Call me a cro-magnon cave dweller, but whenever I read these “car of the future” stories, I am reminded of a discussion I had with a Volkswagen engineer, some time in the late 70s. I was a wide-eyed copywriter and believed anything.

“I am working on the car for the year 2000,” the engineer announced.

“Wow! What will it be?” the wide-eyed copywriter asked in awe.

Russia has complained long and bitterly that Western firms refuse to share technology with its home-grown auto industry, but now the billionaire owner of the New Jersey Nets has introduced Russia’s first home-grown hybrid cars in hopes of proving that Russia can compete in the global car industry. But, according to the WSJ, the launch of the brand known as “Yo” (“ë” in Russian) was not without its problems

Mr. Prokhorov said he intends to “break the stereotype saying Russia can’t produce good cars,” even though an executive needed three attempts to successfully start the prototype car with a mobile phone using a remote-start feature.

But then what do you expect from a Russian-built prototype of a hybrid car that’s set to cost only $10k?

This morning General Motors held a press conference at its Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly plant to announce that the Chevy Volt was in production, on sale, and will start shipping today. The Volt goes on sale in seven initial markets, with a national rollout in early 2011. Export sales will begin late next year.

While there were a number of journalists in attendance (including, significantly, a noticeable number from Japanese news outlets) and though there was some news to be made, this particular dog and pony show was more of a pep rally than anything else. Hundreds of assembly line workers from the plant attended the event and the speakers frequently praised them. When GM North America president Mark Reuss walked in before the event started, he made a point of congratulating each member of the GM management team that was in attendance. Ron King, UAW president, was busy so Gary Bernath stood in. He went out of his way to praise the locals at all the GM facilities involved in the Volt project, and he thanked Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and other elected officials.

Bloomberg reports that the General Services Administration has increased the percentage of hybrids in its fleet purchases from about one percent to at least ten percent since President Obama took over. And you better believe that the government isn’t buying the same hybrids that American consumers are.

The U.S. government buys hybrids almost exclusively from Ford and GM. It bought only 17 Prius models and five of Honda’s Civic hybrids in the past two years. Chrysler Group LLC stopped making hybrids in 2008 after about two months of production.

The government purchased about 64 percent of GM’s Chevy Malibu hybrid models and 29 percent of all Ford Fusion hybrids manufactured since Obama took office in 2009, the data show. GM stopped making the Malibu hybrid in 2009 after lack of consumer demand. GSA also bought about 14 percent of Ford Escape hybrids.

According to Bloomberg’s math, a quarter of the hybrids built by GM and Ford since Obama took office have been purchased by the government. And the fleet buys weren’t cheap… for taxpayers or the automakers.

Isn’t it great to have the government as your biggest shareholder? Makes for good photo-ops. For the second time, Barack Obama went behind the wheels of a Chevy Volt, with the world press in attendance. Actually, it was the Volt’s European twin, the Ampera.

The Prez. had to weigh national security and time at the NATO summit in Lisbon against checking out the range extended Opel, and the Opel won.

Did you know that the Volt’s most important and priciest ingredient comes from Korea? The Volt battery is made by LG Chem, the battery arm of the Korean company formerly known as Lucky Goldstar. Noises coming from Korea indicate that GM might be building more Volts than thought. How do the Koreans know that? GM ordered more batteries.

America – the greatest country on earth. At least when it comes to Chevy Volt prices. You think its $41,000 tag is expensive? Wait until you hear what the Europeans will have to fork over for the rebadged Opel Ampera, and the Volt will look like the greatest deal on earth. Especially after subsidies. Ready?

The Germans were always a bit sceptic or downright hostile when it came to the great car electrification. Now they get jolted. Better late than never, says Audi and announces their first Plug-In Hybrid for 2014. Of course, the announcement can’t be done without the usual Volkswagen/Audi brand of heavy hubris.

It’s time four our annual non-SEMA non-coverage post. You know where to go and find it, but this tastefully customized Prius refuses to be ignored. Shall we guess what those front end scoops do to the Prius’ carefully refined aerodynamics. Ah, but that carbon fiber hood will offset enough weight to mitigate any loss of efficiency from the body work. Admittedly, the Prius C&A Custom Concept had a strong challenger for TTAC’s annual SEMA non-coverage winner:

In a former life, I had worked a bit with J.D. Power. I knew them intimately. We had our issues. This is one of the few times I wholeheartedly agree with them. “Future global market demand for hybrid and battery electric vehicles may be over-hyped” is the conclusion of a new J.D.Power study, titled “Drive Green 2020: More Hope than Reality.”

This is America man… you can have your electric car and your freedom too.

There’s no doubt about it, the Chevy Volt sounds best when you’re just selling the concept. And no wonder: the concept came was born of Bob Lutz’s unique insight into the American psychology… not to mention a psychologically-charged desire to rub the Prius’s nose in some mud. But what nobody seems to be pointing out is the fact that the flip side of being “all things to all people” is fundamental compromise. And in the case of the Volt, the risk is that it won’t be as good of an electric car as the Leaf and it won’t be as good of a gas-powered car as any other hybrid. If GM’s pitch that Volt equals EV plus Freedom doesn’t take, the car will go nowhere fast… so how does the first attempt strike you?

Although the finished product works well enough, it’s also becoming increasingly apparent that the Volt missed two key project goals. GM’s oft-stated promise that the Volt would achieve 50 mpg in CS mode is history. The fact that GM felt the need to optimize the fuel consumption of the Volt by using premium (required, not just recommended) indicates how rather inefficiently its serial-predominant hybrid system works. It’s not a matter of ragging on about that; it’s just a surprise to those of us who argued endlessly which system (serial or parallel) was more efficient.

And now another long held Volt assumption is deflated. Based on GM statements made during the Volt’s long development, the universal understanding was that the Volt would use 8 Kwh of its 16 Kwh battery pack to achieve its 40 mile AER goal. It now turns out that 10.4 Kwh will be utilized. Sounds like small potatoes, but there are three not insignificant consequences as a result:

We live in annoyingly ideological times, in which people get worked up about gay marriage, Christopher Bangle, or what religion their neighbor belongs to. This is foreign to me. If it works for you, then go for it, I always say. You like some wheels, you buy ’em; if you don’t, don’t.

So, it’s hard for me to understand what the fuss is about the Chevrolet Volt. It’s just a car, for Pete’s sake! On the other hand, I am a notorious gearhead and can appreciate the importance of what seems to be a totally new automotive concept. It’s new, but does it point toward the future? Let’s discuss it.

My initial self-appointed assignment was to come up with a comprehensive cost analysis of the Volt in comparison to the Prius and other vehicles. I first took this on two and a half years ago, and the results from that gazing-into-the crystal-ball exercise are actually still remarkably accurate, except for the Volt failing to meet its then-promised 50mpg fuel economy. The task, given the infinite variables, is essentially impossible, and thankfully, I was forwarded a link to this Electric Car Calculator. It’s far from perfect, given that it doesn’t account for depreciation, finance costs, leasing, maintenance, etc. What it does do is allow you to input your driving regime, both weekdays and weekends, electric and gas costs, and come up with a comparison for overall fuel costs with your choice of another vehicle; a good start:

While we are all waiting for Ed’s report on the Volt, let me waste some of your time by mentioning that GM will introduce the thing in China some time in the second half of 2011. They already concede that it will be a flop.

Toyota, king of the hybrids, won’t sell their first plug-in hybrid before 2012. But they already have their kind of a perception gap. The car will be able to go 23km (14.29 miles) on battery alone, then, the ICE engine will kick in and start making electricity. However, research shows that only a few people know about the electric-only feature. Or do they care at all?

Tomorrow your humble Editor boards a plane for Michigan, en route to a date with the Chevrolet Volt. TTAC has followed the Volt’s bumpy road to production-readiness since Bob Lutz decided that the Prius had to be “leapfrogged,” and we’ve tracked every change to the Volt’s mission, message and mechanical blueprint along the way. And though cars don’t exist in a vacuum, giving the Volt a fair review will require us to leave a lot of this contextual baggage at the door.

Porsche has made much of its hybrid drivetrain development efforts, pointing out that its founder helped create the world’s first hybrid drivetrain one hundred years ago. But thus far, the talk has centered on Porsche’s “rolling hybrid laboratory,” the 911 GT3R Hybrid, and the Hybrid Cayenne, with the plug-in 918 Hypercar lurking across the horizon. But, Porsche’s development chief Wolfgang Duerheimer tells Automotive News [sub]

In the future, we will have hybrid drive in every model line

First up will be a Panamera with the Cayenne’s hybrid V6 drivetrain, arriving sometime next year. Duerheimer won’t give a timeline for hybrid versions of the 911, Boxster and Cayman, but he does admit that hybrid drivetrains aren’t the only way for a sportscar firm to shave off the 41 grams of C02 per kilometer that Porsche needs gone by 2015.

Since the recession, I’ve been paying attention to my finances. I’ve re-negotiated my mobile phone plan, changed gas and electricity suppliers and cut my pay-tv package down. I then started to look at driving costs. I re-negotiated my car insurance, but the real saving was in fuel costs. How do I cut the use of an expensive commodity? I did contemplate changing my little 6 year old Toyota Yaris for a hybrid. Whilst I was doing the math, a story was emailed to me.

TTAC’s long been used to playing the “heel” of the auto journalism world, and sure enough, our skeptical approach to the Chevy Volt is already renewing accusations that TTAC “hates GM.” For the record, this accusation doesn’t fly. We have the tendency to obsess on GM because that company’s rise and fall is the most compelling story in the automotive world. To read GM’s history is to watch a person claw their way up a cliff by his bootstraps, and upon reaching the top, spend the next several decades strangling himself with the very same bootstraps. I challenge anyone who is interested in the world of cars to look away from that.

In any case, our Volt coverage has focused thus far on dispelling myths, so in the interest of seeking the truth everywhere, I thought we should take a moment to make a few Volt myths of our own. After all, despite planning to build only “10-15k” Volts next year and 60k in 2012, Automotive News [sub] says

And even though my personal and professional obligations to the truth make me the worst marketing candidate ever, I may just have an idea of where to start…

Given the controversy of the Volt (earned or not), GM is being closely watched from all angles. Some people think that GM hasn’t changed. Others think that this may delay GM’s IPO. But, ironically what hasn’t changed, despite the witch-hunt of GM’s owners, is Toyota’s unwavering support of GM.

If the recent flap over the Volt’s drivetrain has taught us anything it’s that A) GM’s internal-combustion-assisted plug-in is more complicated than we thought, and B) GM is fine with simplifying its complex reality in order to make it appear as attractive as possible. Which is just fine: they’re the ones trying to sell a $41k car, and as such they’re entitled to do what they can to make it seem worth its many shortcomings. What the automotive media needs to take away from the brou-ha-ha isn’t necessarily that GM’s hesitance to bring forward “the whole truth” is an intrinsically big deal (let’s just say this wasn’t the first time), but rather that knowledgeable writers should focus on explaining the Volt in ways that are both comprehensible and fully accurate. In this spirit, the most important question isn’t “what should we call the Volt?” but “how efficient is the Volt in the real world?”And on this point, there’s plenty of room for some truthful clarification.

The autoblogosphere is agog at the revelation that the Volt’s gas engine occasionally powers its wheels. The GM-created “category” of Extended-Range Electric Vehicles (EREV, or E-REV) as uniquely epitomized by the Volt is suddenly revealed [by Motor Trend via GM] to

[have] more in common with a Prius (and other Toyota, Ford, or Nissan Altima hybrids) than anyone suspected.

So, why did the putative “Father of the Volt” (aka “Maximum” Bob Lutz) tell the car’s primary fan site gm-volt.com that the Volt was born because

My desire was to put an electric car concept out there to show the world that unlike the press reports that painted GM as an unfeeling uncaring squanderer of petroleum resources while wonderful Toyota was reinventing the automobile, I just wanted something on the show stand that would show that hey we’re not just thinking of a Prius hybrid here, we’re trying to get gasoline out of the equation entirely.

?

As GM finally begins to let journalists drive its Chevy Volt, the two-year-long trickle of bad news about the project is turning into a raging torrent. The latest bit of bashing: InsideLine claims that, in direct contradiction to GM’s hype, the Volt is in fact powered by its gasoline engine under certain circumstances.

At the heart of the Volt is the “Voltec” propulsion system and the heart of Voltec is the “4ET50” electric drive unit that contains a pair of electric motors and a “multi-mode transaxle with continuously variable capacity.” This is how GM describes it:

“Unlike a conventional powertrain, there are no step gears within the unit, and no direct mechanical linkage from the engine, through the drive unit to the wheels.”

The 4ET50 is, however, in fact directly bolted to the 1.4-liter, four-cylinder Ecotec internal combustion engine. When the Volt’s lithium-ion battery pack runs down, clutches in the 4ET50 engage and the Ecotec engine is lashed to the generator to produce the electric power necessary to drive the car. However under certain circumstances — speeds near or above 70 mph — in fact the engine will directly drive the front wheels in conjunction with the electric motors.

Popular Mechanics has just published the results of the first extended test of the Volt, covering 900 miles. The results are spectacularly unimpressive: Three different drivers drove the Volt on three successive days, starting with a full charge. The EV ranges were 31, 35 and 33 miles, for an average of 33 miles. Normal driving styles were employed. That’s well below GM’s endlessly proclaimed 40+ mile range, but not exactly terrible. We’ll save that word for the fuel economy numbers:

Toyota has essentially confirmed that a hybrid Yaris will be built at its Valenciennes, France plant beginning in 2012, coinciding with the next generation. Autocar, which also has a gallery of 2012 Yaris spy shots here, points out that Toyota did not name the new hybrid as a Yaris specifically, but that is the where the Yaris is made, and it fits in with with Toyota’s strategy to expand its hybrid line. In this case, it expands it downwards, in a market segment particularly important in Europe and Japan (pretty much everywhere except the US, actually). It also marks the second Toyota car for Europe to be hybridized without a unique exterior, like the Prius and LH 250 here. Toyota already sells an Auris hybrid in Europe, its Golf-fighter, along with the Prius. The big question: will the littlest hybrid find its way stateside?

Despite the worse than lackluster uptake of EVs in China, and disappointing sales of hybrids in the Middle Kingdom, companies and the government are still convinced that electric cars are the wave of the future. Toyota will join the fray and will introduce an electric vehicle in China, Vice Chairman Katsuaki Watanabe told The Nikkei [sub]. While announcing that Toyota will enter the electric vehicle market in 2012, Watanabe said, “we’re favorably considering a move into China as well.” It’s not that the market is screaming for plug-ins, or even hybrids.

If you want to offer hybrid cars, but don’t have the money / time / run rate / wherewithal to do it yourself, who’re gonna call? Toyota. But who would have imagined that haughty Daimler picked up the phone, dialed 0081, and said: “Let’s talk?” Daimler considers joining the growing list of automakers that source their hybrid systems from Toyota City. Toyota is in talks to provide technology and core components for hybrid vehicles to Daimler, after having been approached by the Germans, says The Nikkei [sub].

I can’t speak for the US market, but in the UK car market there is one segment which I can never see dying. The small, luxury car segment (A.K.A The luxury entry level). This is the area reserved for your Audi A3’s, BMW 1 series’ and, to lesser extents, Volvo S40’s and Mercedes-Benz A-Classes. The reason I believe this segment is more robust than other is because it revolves around one factor which has been around for a very long time. Vanity. In the UK, you have many (and I mean “many”) mid-20’s to early 30 men, who’ve got a half-decent paying job and want to lash out on a car with a luxury make. Very few will go with cars like the Audi A4, BMW 3 series and Mercedes-Benz C-Class, because they either scream “rep-mobile” or “old man”. They won’t go any higher up the ladder because that’ll be too costly. So the small, luxury car segment is perfect for them. The least amount of money for the most amount of badge-snobbery. This is why the BMW 1-series is so successful in the UK, despite being quite a poor car. “I can get a BMW for the price of a Golf? Sign me up!” Well, it seems a new boy is coming to the market. Only this one has a trick up his sleeve…

People have a lot of fears with electric cars/extended range electric cars. Will the government subsidies distort the market? Can manufacturers be able to sell them profitably? Are they really that environmentally sound? But the one which gets everyone is “range anxiety”. Will I have enough juice to get me home? It’s an issue which manufacturers are dealing with in their own ways. GM has come up with their own way of dealing with it; they’re trademarking it: With range anxiety being trademarked, someone just dreams the word, and GM’s lawyers will be on top of him, and make him surrender the illicit dream.

Toyota has been selling many hybrids since they introduced the Toyota Coaster Hybrid EV minibus in 1997. A few months later, they started mass-production of the Prius, and it’s been a runaway hit. In Japan, the Prius is leading the charts. The Toyota hybrid system is available in minivans, SUVs and sedans. Nine TMC-produced hybrid passenger vehicle models and three hybrid commercial vehicle models are sold in Japan. Outside Japan, eight hybrid passenger vehicle models are sold in approximately 80 countries. So far, Toyota has sold 2.68 million hybrids throughout the world. Of course, Toyota is proud of that achievement. But what are they really proud of? That they have saved the world from a huge pile of dangerous dirt.

Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does journalism. GM has been trumpeting the Volt’s 40 mile target AER (all electric range) since it was first announced on January 7, 2007. From that very day three years and eight months ago, journalists and enthusiasts have been asking The Big Volt Question: what is its fuel economy in CSM (charge sustaining mode)? There has never been an answer, except that at the 2007 announcement Bob Lutz “reasoned that…(after the battery was depleted) the engine sipping fuel at a rate of 50 m.p.g.” An early target or a Lutzian wild speculation that GM soon refused to verify or qualify. Ever.

Fast forward to August 24, 2010: gm-volt announces that an astute reader has made a screen capture of an Aol Volt test drive promo video, that indicated that the Volt traveled 16.1 miles after the battery depleted and used .59 gallons, equaling 27.3 mpg. Did anyone really think that was a truly representative fuel economy for the Volt, not knowing precisely the conditions under which it occurred? Note the word “Hints” prominently in TTAC’s story. So far, it’s been the only shred of evidence to The Big Volt Question. But rather than use this fantastic PR opportunity to state a target CSM mileage figure, which could only (presumably) look good compared to that 27 mpg number; GM’s Volt Communications person Phil Colley (pictured above) states it delicately:

Yours ( plugincars,com) and the other stories yesterday and today show a complete lack of understanding of the process and are quite frankly, lazy reporting.

Once upon a time, the Maximum one declared that bringing diesels to the United States would only be possible by the use of urea. You know, the stuff that is is the main nitrogen-containing substance in the urine of mammals. Which can also reduce the NOx from diesel exhaust. Using urea would allow diesels to meet Tier II Bin 5 standards. The Maximum one further decreed that the extra cost of this after treatment system would make diesels prohibitively expensive. (Unless the driver uses man-made urea, but let’s not even go there.) Then, he mentioned the California standards which were way tougher than Tier II Bin 5. This would effectively kill diesels in the US as they wouldn’t be 50 state compliant. Then Volkswagen introduced the TDI Jetta which was 50 state compliant. What made this extra special was that Volkswagen did it without using any urea after treatment. Something which Bob Lutz said wasn’t possible. There was a diesel hurdle that was gone. Who else could be bringing diesels to the United States?

Toyota launched their hybrid Prius in late 1997. 13 years later, Toyota has sold a total of about 2.6m hybrids, says The Nikkei [sub]. That mostly because it is the top selling car in Japan. And also “thanks to government subsidies that favor hybrids over other fuel-efficient cars,” as Automotive News [sub] remarks. Toyota doesn’t want to rest on its laurels.

TTAC has a long, proud tradition of tearing into puffy automotive journalism, so it was not without a little trepidation that I wrote in the comments section of Michael Karesh’s excellent review of Zero To Sixty that

Toothless reporters put execs at their ease… which allows them to say naive or revealing things that toothy bloggers can then rip into. In a weird way, the worse the reporter, the better the reporting (as long as the quotes are then duly digested). As time goes on, I find myself more and more at peace with this evolving media food chain… and TTAC’s place in it.

To be clear, this is not an endorsement of toothless coverage per se, it’s just a pragmatic response to the reality that auto industry coverage will continue to be dominated by PR-approved puff. And this video provides yet more proof that non-threatening journalists are actually the most effective at snagging scoops, even if they’re totally unaware of said scoop. Which is where the bloggers come in.

If you are a carmaker, you need to have a hybrid and maybe even a plugin in the program, or at least on the schedule – whether your heart is in it or not. Even avowed petrol (and diesel) heads such as BMW and Volkswagen are dabbling with electrified powertrains – officially. Where are the last holdouts? In hybrid-country Japan.

“Mazda and Fuji Heavy are pursuing unique growth strategies as they continue to bank on refinements to the international combustion engine, in stark contrast with larger automakers that are rushing to roll out hybrid and electric cars,” reports The Nikkei [sub] to an aghast readership.

Well, the Canadians might not be too big on hybrids, but (surprise, surprise) Eugene has embraced them fully. But when I first ran across this sign, even I was a wee bit surprised. What’s next? Hybrid Massage? Hybrid Organic Market? or will it jump to Plug-In Acupuncture? To get a better picture of what I mean, take the (full) hybrid jump:

In Europe, hybrids are treated as the work of the devil. In America, hybrids are more a statement of political leanings. Japan is downright hybrid-kichi (crazy). Exhibit A: Toyota’s Prius sales.