Fuel-saving hybrid vehicles will probably peak at roughly 3 percent of the total U.S. market by 2010, says a new study from the forecasting arm of J.D. Power and Associates.

Roughly 88,000 hybrids were sold in the United States in 2004, accounting for about one-half of 1 percent of total vehicle sales.

J.D. Power expects the number of models to expand to 38 by 2011 -- 17 cars and 21 trucks and sport utility vehicles -- but that sales will plateau that year at about 535,000, or roughly 3 percent of the U.S. market, largely because the vehicles cost $3,000 to $4,000 more than comparable nonhybrid vehicles.


Read the entire article here.

 

Hi Jason:

___It depends on pricing. We both know pack prices will come down as it is only a matter of time. When it does, the premium will more then likely be $1,500 - $2,000 by 2010. The items I saw at the Chicago Auto show are leading us towards this inevitability imho.

___Good Luck

___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net

 

I understand that Jason was not stating his own opinion on whether J.D. Power's prediction might be on track. He was only leading us to their article to begin the discussion.

I agree that I disagree with them. I think the squeeze has begun on regular gas vehicles. They are reaching the end of their possible technological advances that would be required to decrease emissions and increase efficiency to the level that California is demanding in the next few years. Hybrids of all kinds (don't count out diesel) and brand new configurations will buy time until fuel cells and/or hydrogen come to the market well past 2011. In the meantime I think consumers will have no choice but to migrate to hybrids in the same way they left behind the road boats of the 1970s - 1980's.

Just my opinion.

Mike