Germans going green this time

It is great to hit the road in a grand SUV, but some of us have a hard time when it comes to investing in a vehicle that has been touted as “gas guzzlers” by environmentalists.

The good news is: soon you are going to get the best of the both worlds - a SUV based on hybrid technology. With the Porsche Cayenne hybrid to be rolled out by the end of 2009, the German auto industry, at last, has something up their sleeve to make environmentalists happy.

German car makers have always been considered one of the finest manufacturers in the industry. But in the recent years, the Japanese car makers were seen to grossly outpace them in the matter of international repute. The German automobile industry lacked in a vital area of manufacturing; they failed to cut down on the dependence on the fossil fuel engine.

The European car makers as a whole have come under the close scrutiny of the Environmental police tightening the rules on CO2 emissions amidst growing pressure from the environmental lobbyists.

In fact, the Greenpeace staged a demonstration before the Porsche plant holding the company responsible for building cars they labeled “climate pigs”. (The present Cayenne model with its conventional six-cylinder engine, consumes 12.9 liters on average. That makes Cayenne SUV one of the worst emitters of CO2.)

All these acted as catalyst for Porsche’s decision to turn green: Porsche revealed that they are on their way of developing a hybrid drivetrain for its Cayenne SUV. Cayenne in its Hybrid avatar is designed to drastically cut on fuel consumption and going to achieve average fuel consumption of 8.9 liters (2.35 gallons) per 100 kilometers (62 miles), claims Porsche.

The engineering of the Cayenne hybrid combines an electric motor and battery with a standard combustion engine in order to cut fuel consumption. The technology is being co-developed with Audi and Volkswagen AG. The hybrid powertrain is being designed to capture energy from braking and use it to drive an electric motor. The expected speed of the vehicle is going to be up to 120kmph with the gas engine first taking over at high speeds. This is no doubt an impressive figure.

Porsche says it plans to unveil the Cayenne hybrid in 2009. This new hybrid is sure to encourage the other European manufacturers get started in making a greener world.