Toyota Planning Three New Green Models in 2012
If you’re looking to go green when you buy your next car, Toyota wants to give you plenty of options.
“Toyota plans to introduce three new-to-market green vehicles in 2012,” writes Automotive News. “A battery electric vehicle, a plug-in version of the Prius and an as-yet-unveiled variant of the Prius will arrive in U.S. dealerships in the first half of 2012.”
Left Lane News says, “Although no details were given on the Prius variant, it is believed to the long-rumored Prius Alpha model. Based on the current Prius, the Prius Alpha is said to be a more people-friendly MPV version of the dedicated hybrid.”
“Also joining the regular production stream in 2012 will be the Prius plug-in hybrid,” reports Autoblog. “A test fleet of those vehicles is already being deployed and consumers will soon be able to monitor the progress of those vehicles on Toyota.com/ESQ. Toyota has equipped the test fleet with the capability to stream real-time data about the vehicles including usage patterns and fuel efficiency. The data is being used by the engineers at the head office in Toyota City as they prepare for the production version, but a portion of it will soon be posted publicly on the site.”
As for the battery electric vehicle (BEV), Left Lane News speculates it “could be an electric version of the Toyota iQ, which will be making it to our shores as the Scion iQ. Toyota showed an electric version of its iQ at the 2009 Detroit Auto Show.”
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