Underscoring that it plans to be one of the most fuel efficient fleets, Hyundai confirmed that it expects to reach America's new fuel economy standard of 35mpg by 2015. That means the Korean car manufacture would reach the target 5 years before the compliance is required.
"We believe we have the engineering resources and the confidence to reach our target by 2015," said Hyun-Soon Lee, president of the Hyundai-Kia corporate research and development division, in a statement. "
Hyundai is determined to be the industry leader in fuel efficiency. The Korean car-maker recently confirmed that it plans to introduce a Sonata hybrid to the U.S market in 2010. However, it is clear that Hyundai doesn't expect to lean too heavily on hybrids to meet the tough fuel economy targets that many other car manufactures have bitched are too stringent.
Hyundai said it is working on petrol direct injection, eight speed automatic transmissions, dual continuously variable valve timing and other fuel saving technologies in the race to meet the fuel economy rule early.
The Korean car-maker is already on track to pull ahead of other manufactures in the fuel economy race. The auto industry averaged 26.6 mpg in the 2007 model year for light vehicles sold in the United States, compared with Hyundai's 29.4 mpg. Only Toyota and Honda are slightly ahead of Hyundai in the fuel efficiency of their fleets.
No comments:
Post a Comment