MIRL develops Taiwan's first hybrid mini car model

Taipei, March 8, 2004 (CENS)--The Mechanical Industry Research Laboratories (MIRL) under Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) recently demonstrated the island's first hybrid-engine mini car model that can save on fuel by 40% compared to traditional combustion-engine counterparts.

MIRL said that the mini hybrid car model has undergone a series of real-road tests and proved that its fuel consumption will be 40% lower than a traditional gasoline-powered counterpart in terms of a 150 kilometer driving trip.

Bill Tsai, managing director of the MIRL, said that the new hybrid model represents a new milestone and revolutionary product in the development of the island's pollution-free vehicle industry. Tsai added that most industrially advanced nations have been engaged in developing energy-saving and pollution-free transportation vehicles in recent years and Taiwan has initially achieved the "energy-saving and low-pollution" goal by developing the hybrid-engine mini car model.

According to Tsai, the hybrid mini car model adopts an integrated propulsion solution to combine a 275cc gasoline-powered combustion engine and a 6 kilowatt (Kw) high-efficiency motor/lithium-ion battery system. The mini car can run at a maximum speed of 100 kilometers per hour, Tsai said, though the propulsion system emits relatively mild horsepower.

MIRL's technical service division director Lai Chin-si said that the hybrid mini car uses gasoline as major fuel, but the propulsion system uses propulsion force output from the electric motor in low-speed driving. For high-speed driving, Tsai added, the gasoline engine drives a power generator to charge the batteries. Such hybrid solution, Lai said, could achieve high environment-protection, energy-saving, and convenient (for battery recharging works) effects.

After real-road tests, Tsai said, the hybrid car model can run 25 kilometers by consuming only one litter of gasoline. MIRL will continue to improve the hybrid propulsion system to achieve an even-lower emission and a battery life of over 80,000 kilometers in the future.

According to Tsai, the new mini car also has several energy-saving functions, including that the gasoline engine can automatically go off when the vehicle is waiting for the green traffic light and can start running with the electric motor power; and that it can collect electricity from the brake system etc.

Able to run about 150 kilometers with only six litters of gasoline, Tsai claimed, the hybrid mini car model is expected to become a major transportation vehicle in urban areas and promise unlimited sales opportunities as a result.

MIRL currently is planing to cooperate with some auto body parts makers to commercialize the hybrid vehicle as soon as possible. The prices for such new vehicle, MIRL said, would be about 20% higher than a gasoline-powered traditional counterpart but the saved fuel costs would be higher than the car price, MIRL said.