Hybrid cars - A preliminary solution or future perspectives?

You are here: Homepage > Search

Hybrid cars - A preliminary solution or future perspectives?

Höhn, Bernd-Robert / Dräxl, Thomas

As long as electrical energy or hydrogen cannot substitute today's fuels due to lack of infrastructure and storage technology, fuel economy of conventionally driven vehicles must be improved to meet emission regulations and to deal with limited resources. Hybrid power trains that combine a combustion engine with a second, usually electric power source, are a promising solution for this challenge. Numerous hybrid concepts are known, but only few have made their way into series production so far. This paper presents an overview of the state of the art regarding hybrid vehicle propulsion, including considerations to be made when designing a hybrid, and an insight into the problem of energy storage. The optimised CVT hybrid of Technische Universität München is described as an example of a power train achieving comparatively high fuel savings with moderate complexity. As a conclusion, an outlook to the future perspectives of hybrids in the context of other alternative propulsion systems is given.