Green Car Advisor

Italdesign

February 23, 2009

Italdesign Says It Will Unveil the World's Fastest Hybrid at Geneva Show Next Month

ItaldesignHybridConceptSket.jpg Italdesign announced today that it intends to unveil "the fastest hybrid in the world" at the 2009 Geneva Auto Show held next month and the automaker released a sketch of the vehicle (above ).

Italdesign is withholding the name of the speedster, but it claims the car can reach 62 miles per hour in less than four seconds on its way to a top speed of 186 mph.

What's more, the automaker claims the car can travel 31 miles on a quarter of a gallon of gas. That's 124 miles per gallon. Dang!

But wait, there's more. Italdesign swears that the vehicle emits just 0.18 pounds of carbon dioxide per mile. By way of comparison, the current generation Toyota Prius emits twice as much CO2 at 0.37 pounds per mile.

To develop the vehicle's hybrid powertrain, Italdesign teamed with Frazer-Nash Research, an offshoot of the British automaker that specializes in such advanced technologies as hybrid and electric vehicles and composite materials.

An insider said the body is made of aluminum and carbon, while the chassis itself is made of carbon-fiber. The powertrain consists of an electric-drive system mated to a "medium-powered" engine.

We suspect we'll need to wait a couple of weeks for further details.  

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