Fuel-efficient and low on emissions, hybrid cars are the vehicles of the future Drive a hybrid car like Cameron Diaz and Brad Pitt because with environmental concerns over global warming on the rise and the need to reduce dependence on carbon-based fuels urgent, the ministry of finance, in its pre-budget debate, had slashed excise duties from 24 per cent to 14 per cent from 1 April 2008, thus making it possible for foreign automobile manufacturers to launch their hybrid variants in India. Indian automobile manufacturers too are gearing up to storm the market. Mahindra & Mahindra is poised to launch Scorpio-hev (hybrid electric vehicle) in June. Powered by a CRDe engine and an electric transaxle, m&m's Scorpio-HEv can be run on diesel, switched to electric or propelled by both, m&m along-with the Royal Dutch Shell Company is developing hydrogen-fuelled passenger cars and has invested $24.5 million to develop 10 new hybrid vehicles in the next three years. Maruti Udyog's dual fuel strategy, a combination of hybrid and diesel models has seen the Omni and WagonR, together account for 8-10 per cent of its total sales And Tata Motors in collaboration with Indian Space Research Organisation (isro) is poised to launch, a prototype of the world's cleanest vehicle this year that will run on hydrogen and leave behind nothing more than a trail of water vapour. "An agreement for the pilot project to see whether hydrogen can be used to fuel automobiles has been signed," says G. Mad-havan Nair, chairman, isro. "And if we succeed, we can have bulk transportation system." Honda wants to sell its Civic hybrid cars, priced at around Rs20 lakh. US automobile manufacturer Ford is also seriously considering expanding production of its fuel-efficient hybrid car. Toyota, pioneered the hybrid car with the Toyota Prius in the 1990s, but delayed its introduction in the Indian because of high import duties. Hyundai Motor company is planning to launch the compact-sized lpg model, the Elantra, a car that uses both lpg and electricity by 2010. Saving on import bill With car ownership (currently 8 per 1,000) on the rise, demand for diesel too will rise from 52 million tonnes in 2006-07 to about 67 million tonnes by 2011-12, and hybrid cars could help reduce the petroleum import bill. According to recent statistics, there are close to 51 lakh petrol cars on the Indian roads, consuming around 315 crore litres of petrol a year amounting to Rs9,624 crore in the import bill. "If we assume an optimistic scenario of even 5 per cent penetration of hybrids in the next few years, the savings in the import bill would be Rs240 crore per annum (assuming a 50 per cent reduction in petrol consumption by hybrids)," say analysts. A hybrid is a normal fuel-efficient car that has two motors - one electric, and the other petrol-powered. Electric motors use no energy during neutral mode, as they are turned off, and use less fuel than petrol motors at low speeds. Petrol motors do better at high speeds and can deliver more power for a given motor weight. The electric motor does not produce any exhaust, thus reducing smog levels and at high speed the petrol motor charges the batteries while it's running. But the main advantage is fuel-efficiency and low emission. Hybrids are most petrol efficient of all cars - they typically get 77.2 to 96.5 mpg (claimed). Honda's Insight and Civic Hybrid, and Toyota's Prius and Camry Hybrid offer drivers 83, 67.5, 74 and 54.7 miles per gallon, respectively. Nissan's Altima Hybrid (34 mpg), rounds out the group. Keeping environment considerations in mind, the Government of India is considering that at least a million hydTogen-fuelled vehicles hit the roads by 2020. The Steering Group on Hydrogen, chaired by Ratan Tata, under the auspices of the National Hydrogen Energy roadmap has estimated an investment Rs250 billion over 15 years in India to make this achievable. According to Vilas Muttemwar, Union minister for non-conventional energy sources, "the two major initiatives are - the green initiative for future transport (gift) for the development of a hydrogen-powered engine, as well as fuel cell-based cars and buses and the green initiative for power generation (gip) for the development of a hydrogen-powered engine and turbine and fuel cell-based decentralised power generating systems to target 1,000 mw generation capacity by 2020." The high premium price, over 60 per cent may be a deterrent. But with rising fuel prices and growing environmental concerns this could be the dawn of a new era. All one needs is a 230 V plug, switch in and then just swish off.