Chicago (IL) – ‘Hybrid’ has become a very political term these days: Whether you like it or not and whether it is true or not, it implies low gas consumption, reduction of green house gases and clean(er) air. Most car manufacturers are playing with car concepts, but seriously, would you buy a hybrid Porsche? We caught up with the company to find out if this concept makes sense – and provide background how the Porsche hybrid will work.

 

 

 

If you visited the most recent Porsche press conference, held at the Chicago Auto Show, and you have some knowledge about the company and its products, there were few surprises. Movies about its racing heritage and current successes and a new car: The Cayenne GTS SUV with a 405 hp, 4.8l V8 engine that propels the 5000-pound car from 0-60 mph in 5.7 seconds and a top speed of about 160 mph. It isn’t a great fit for our time from the view of green house gas emissions, but it is what you expect from a Porsche: There’s a certain engine power, acceleration capability and exhaust note that you would be looking for in a Porsche.

Somewhere in the middle of the presentation, Porsche reminded journalists that the Cayenne hybrid is in development. The company’s hybrid idea isn’t exactly new. Porsche announced its intention to bring a hybrid SUV to market back in 2005 and since early January we know that the company will also offer such a drivetrain for the upcoming Panamera sedan. The fact that neither car was in Chicago and there wasn’t anything particularly new about the hybrid, almost sounded like an excuse for the gas-guzzling Cayenne GTS.

In some way, hybrid in its original sense (we’ll leave the ill-fated idea of a 270 hp Honda Accord hybrid out of consideration here) in some way contradicts the idea of the Porsche and its characteristics, right? Or can a sports car run on a hybrid engine and still retain its image of a sports car? Let’s have a closer look.

There aren’t many specs of the hybrid engine available today. What we know is that it is likely to use the current base engine, a 3.6l V6 with 290 hp, and an electric motor with about 46 hp. On the performance side, this car will deliver substantially more torque than the regular V6: Porsche promises about 400 lb-ft at 1800 rpm for the hybrid, which compares to 273 lb-ft for the 290 hp V6. The company also says that the hybrid will be able to tow up to 7000 pounds – the same as other Cayennes.

 

At the same time, Porsche promises that the hybrid will improve fuel economy over the standard Cayenne by about 30% (that is up from a 20% estimate in 2006 and up from a 15% estimate in 2005), which indicates that the car should end up somewhere in the range of 17-19 mpg in the city and somewhere between 24-27 mpg on the highway. Early Cayenne hybrid prototypes hit 24.4 mpg in the US FTP cycle, compares to 17.9 mpg for the standard V6.      

These numbers, however, provide little insight in the true characteristics of the car as well as what a typical Porsche customer Cayenne hybrid buyer can expect from this car. In the end, if you want those fuel savings, you will have to drive the car much like a Toyota Prius and not like a Porsche. So, will this be a performance-focused or a fuel-economy-focused vehicle? Porsche spokesman Dave Engelman as well as vice president of marketing David Pryor gave us a few more details on how this car will fit into the company’s product line and why the company believes Porsche buyers will purchase this SUV.  

 

Read on the next page: "A Porsche hybrid will have to retain all of the driving characteristics Porsche is known for"