The view on the lifestyle in oil-rich UAE is oft portrayed from the helipad at the Burj Al Arab, or at the largest mall in the world where shopping escapades are a matter of duty rather than necessity and by the cars these shoppers roll in, which are usually gas-guzzling monstrosities. There is some truth in that, but there is also an appreciable resident population that drives small-displacement vehicles, take public transport, cycle and even walk to work and school; there is also a thriving sub-culture that engages like-minded citizens on forums and blogs on green cars.
That brings us to our point about hybrids and how they are making a scene locally. Let’s start with the question: what exactly is a hybrid? In general terms, a hybrid car is one that combines two sources of propulsion, usually an internal combustion engine coupled with an electric motor. The electricity that powers the motor comes from a battery that is charged by either plugging it into a regular wall outlet at your home or by means of regenerative braking, a technology that converts heat energy, generated by braking, into electricity. This sounds a bit like a theory class at engineering school and even sci-fi to some, but how a hybrid consumer benefits will spark an interest in all.
To begin with, hybrids are quieter on start-up because they run the electric motor and, because you use the gasoline motor in combination with the electric motor, the fuel economy that the car delivers in the city is comparable to that delivered on the highway. Rough estimates indicate that hybrids offer a 30-40 per cent improvement in fuel economy over their petrol-engine counterparts. Also, owning a hybrid makes for a great coffee table conversation, if you’re looking at it from a lifestyle perspective.
In 2008, on an experimental basis for a year, the RTA added 10 Chevrolet hybrid vehicles to their fleet — 5 Tahoes and 5 Malibu — and, in 2013, they added 20 hybrid Camrys to their fleet of taxis. Besides government-owned fleets, there is also a multitude of private-owned fleets in the region. And it is a given that if your fleet operates in an urban area, hybrid cars are the right option. They are not only better for the environment by measure of their fuel economy but by their emissions also; they are also better for the bottom line of the business. All of which are reasons to sleep better at night, if you are the owner of such a business. But somehow private companies have failed to capitalise on this.
So hybrids make commercial sense, but how about the individual owner? The resident population doesn’t have the exposure to such technology, as ownership of a hybrid is seen as more of a lifestyle choice and even automobile manufacturers are pitting the hybrids in the more expensive luxury segments.
Lexus alone offers 4-hybrid variants (namely, the CT 200h, the LS 600h, the GS 450h and the RX 450h), Porsche has done it with the Cayenne S hybrid and Panamera Hybrid, BMW with the ActiveHybrid 7 and Mercedes with the S400 Hybrid. But to the middle-class, people who benefit greatly by ekeing the extra kilometre out of their tank, hybrids are completely unavailable.
Ironically, the most commercially and environmentally successful hybrid is the relatively affordable Toyota Prius, which has also now become the fifth best-selling car in the world — only it hasn’t seen the local showroom yet. Even other successful green cars, like the plug-in hybrid Toyota Prius C and the all-electric Honda Fit, are within the budget of the working class but can’t be purchased here. These are the cars that need to be imported here by local dealers.
There are concerns over the hybrid’s battery life, how it will be disposed, how hot weather affects its longevity... But these are questions that will only be answered by inducing such technology in our everyday lives, albeit in small measure.
Maybe in the near future, the hybrid will catch on or maybe it won’t, but one thing is sure: we need to make our choices swiftly, for we are literally running out of fuel.
- See more at: http://www.khaleejtimes.com/wknd/wknd_article.asp?xfile=/data/wkndotherstories/2013/September/wkndotherstories_September10.xml§ion=wkndotherstories#sthash.1PEOFmON.dpuf
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