Toyota’s yet-to-be-unveiled 2010 Prius will have a bigger engine and a higher top speed, but improvements to CO2 emissions and fuel efficiency will take a backseat. While the company has plans for a hyper-efficient plug-in version of the Prius by 2011, the standard model will make relatively few upgrades to its environmentally-friendly features. “It will be cleaner, with CO2 emissions below 100gm per kilometer,” said Miguel Fonseca, a Toyota managing director. “We could have gone lower but, instead, we have chosen to give the Prius better performance.”
French analysts have concluded that the wild popularity of gasoline-hybrid electric vehicles in the United States could potentially hinder development of more sustainable and advanced green vehicles.