Hybrid SUV Reviews

After 6 years of losses nearing $260 million dollars, Elon Musk and Tesla Motors may have finally turned the corner. Following last month’s Initial Public Offering (IPO) that raised $226 million, it now appears that Tesla has struck a deal with the mighty Toyota.

You may recall our excitement back in May, when we reported on Toyota’s plan to create a hybrid version of the current RAV4 sport utility vehicle. We estimated the price of the hybrid RAV-4 to be around $30,000 and fuel economy to come in somewhere around 32-35 mpg.

The 2010 BMW ActiveHybrid X6 is one of the most unusual vehicles currently available on the hybrid market. While most other full-size hybrid sport-utility vehicles are oriented towards using their battery-powered electric engines to help ease the pain felt at the pump by owners of these heavy automobiles, the ActiveHybrid X6 instead focuses purely on putting performance first.

On my way to work this morning a pulled up to a stoplight directly behind what I thought was a hybrid Chevrolet Tahoe. Upon closer inspection, I discovered it was instead their flex fuel model. I’d seen the Flex Fuel logo/badge thousands of times on a handful of SUVs but I’d never researched how they compared to other cars in terms of cost and fuel economy. I wasn’t exactly sure what “flex fuel” even meant or how these models differed from conventional  engines and hybrids. Knowing that you can purchase all three options in the 2010 Chevy Tahoe, I decided to take a closer look to compare and contrast the benefits of each.

For the past several weeks a leading headline in local and national news has been flooding. Flash floods in Nashville, Tennessee, northeast Nebraska, Arkansas, and most recently in France and China have reminded us of the dangers associated with rapidly rising waters.

Where do we go from here? If you read the article last week about 2010 hybrid sport utility vehicle prices, you know that your total number of hybrid SUV options has decreased over the past two years. We lost green versions of the Durango, Aspen, and Vue - the Tribute might as well be gone, and rumors are now circulating that Ford may kill their Mercury brand, meaning the hybrid Mariner could also soon be history. With all these hybrids being discontinued, readers may be wondering what the future holds for hybrid crossovers and SUVs.

Hybrid sport utility vehicles have been around for about 5-6 years now (the first was the 2005 hybrid Ford Escape that went on sale in 2004) and while there once were several more to choose from (including the hybrid Dodge Durango, hybrid Saturn Vue, hybrid Chrysler Aspen and the hybrid Mazda Tribute), you still have a decent selection to consider today.

In news and blog discussions last week were claims and denouncements of a possible plug-in hybrid electric sport utility vehicle (PHESUV) being developed by Land Rover. It has been a while since Land Rover and “hybrid” were side-by-side in any credible news stories. In 2008, the English car manufacturer debuted a “diesel-hybrid” concept SUV at the Detroit Motor Show. Since then, nothing else on the matter has materialized although a report on their website indicates that Land Rover is still gauging public, dealer and media response. Based on the recent success of other luxury hybrid SUVs, my vote is for LR to send this one straight to production. 2013 appears to be the target, so again we wait.

Late last year we blogged about how close the race was for the top selling hybrid SUV of 2009. If you read it, you might recall that the Ford Escape hybrid was in the lead but barely managed to hold on to the top spot. The Lexus RX 400h was nearly 20% behind Ford with only three months to go but made a strong push to finish only about 300 vehicles short of first place (a 2% difference). And the Toyota Highlander hybrid also closed strong, rounding out the top 3. You can read the thriller yourself at 2009 Top Selling Hybrid SUVs.

General Motors pulled back the curtain on a Chevy Volt SUV at Auto China 2010 (here) this week. The 5 passenger crossover concept is currently known as the Volt MPV5 and measures 7 inches longer and 7 inches wider than the original Volt sedan we’ve been hearing about for many months. It went on display to the news media today, and is generating quite the buzz.

Where do you go online to get your hybrid car and SUV information? For many people, automotive websites and search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo! have been their main source of news, reviews and data. For the past ten years or so, bookmarking our favorite hybrid sites, subscribing to RSS feeds, and typing search queries have been become the norm. The way we do our online research is now beginning to change.