100 Miles Per Gallon

Raser Technologies has signed a deal to develop and deliver a 100-mile-per-gallon extended range electric pickup truck for testing by Northern California utility giant Pacific Gas and Electric Co.

The 5-year-old Provo, Utah, developer of electric motors and controllers, says its proprietary plug-in EV system can enable full-size light pickups to achieve up to 140 miles per gallon in city driving and 33 MPG on the highway.

The company's system is a series hybrid, the same kind that drives diesel-electric locomotives and giant cruise ships.

It uses a combustion engine, but only to power an on-board generator that produces juice for an electric drive system. A 3-D animation on Raser's website offers an excellent look at how the drivetrain works.

The system to be used for the pickup combines a powerful 200-kilowatt electric traction motor and 700-volt lithium-ion battery system with a 100 kilowatt generator powered by a small 4-cylinder gasoline engine, said Raser spokesman Robert Putnam.

The batteries, initially charged from a home or commercial outlet, store sufficient energy to enable a full-size pickup or SUV to achieve up to 40 miles of all-electric drive before the combustion engine kicks in to generate power to keep the vehicle moving and recharge the batteries.