Filed under: Hybrid, Hatchback, Toyota, Electric

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Want some data sharing with your car sharing? On Thursday, Zipcar added eight Toyota Prius plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) to its car-sharing fleet. The plug-in Priuses, which are not available for purchase until 2012, will be accessible to Zipcar members in Boston, MA, Cambridge, MA, San Francisco, CA, and Portland, OR. Zipcar's newest additions are part of a broad pilot program aimed at assisting Toyota in obtaining real-world data prior to the plug-ins' 2012 launch. On the flip side, Zipcar hopes to analyze the use of plug-in hybrids and assess the potential for a broader fleet rollout.

Back in 2009, Zipcar teamed up with the city of San Francisco to test a plug-in Prius. That car, which utilized a plug-in conversion kit provided by A123 Systems, offered up to 40 miles of pure electric range. The battery-only range of Toyota's plug-in Prius is limited to 13 miles, but Scott Griffith, Zipcar's chief executive officer, points out that "approximately one-third of our reservations are made for trips equaling less than 13 miles," which implies that those jaunts could be made in a Prius PHEV without using a drop of gas, as long as there's enough time to rechage between rentals.

Like all of the other hybrids in Zipcar's fleet, the plug-in Prius can only be reserved by the hour, with sixty minutes of seat time costing approximately $7.00.

[Source: Zipcar]Continue reading Zipcar gets Toyota Prius plug-ins ahead of the car's official launch

Zipcar gets Toyota Prius plug-ins ahead of the car's official launch originally appeared on Autoblog on Mon, 31 Jan 2011 13:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.



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