Toyota is announcing today that it will bring two electric cars and a plug-in hybrid to the U.S. in 2021.
Toyota is laggard when it comes to all-electric cars
Toyota has not yet launched a fully electric vehicle outside of China.
Despite the fact that the company announced an acceleration of its electric vehicle plans last year, the Japanese automaker has focused on hybrid and fuel cell vehicles and often dispenses with battery-powered electric vehicles.
Last year, Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda gave a rant about battery electric vehicles at an annual meeting and spread misinformation about electric vehicles and said it was not a good idea to push for massive electrification.
Two new Toyota EVs
Today, Toyota announced that it will finally bring fully electric vehicles to the US:
“Toyota Motor North America (TMNA) announced plans to debut on the US market this year, three new electrified models – two BEVs and one PHEV.”
Bob Carter, Executive Vice President of Sales at TMNA, commented on the announcement
“We continue to be leaders in electrification that started with the pioneering launch of the Prius almost 25 years ago. Toyota’s new electrified product offerings will give customers a variety of powertrain options that best meet their needs. ”
The Japanese automaker did not elaborate on what these new electric vehicles will be, but has been talking about working on a fully electric SUV recently.
In the same announcement, Toyota also revealed an internal study that stated that plug-in hybrids have the same impact on the environment as a fully electric vehicle:
“The GHG of a currently available BEV model and the PHEV model are practically the same in road performance when taking into account the pollutants created by the production of electricity for the average US power grid used to charge batteries.”
They released the study’s source code here.
Electrek’s Take
I am always happy to see more electric vehicles hitting the market, but I feel that Toyota is really dragging on in this reluctant launch of these vehicles.
It’s crazy. They can’t even avoid an electric car job in the same ad about bringing two new electric cars to the US.
Yes, plug-in hybrids can be very efficient in some use cases, especially if you limit yourself to less than 30 miles a day, but we all know that it’s a compromise and, ultimately, all-electric vehicles combined with electricity renewable production is the way forward.
If Toyota still doesn’t see that, I’m concerned about the company’s future.
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