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Toyota, Daihatsu and Suzuki team up to unbox some fun-size electric kei vans

The G7 Summit is happening in Hiroshima, Japan, right now and some automakers have taken the opportunity to announce new projects. Toyota, their wholly owned subsidiary Daihatsu, and Suzuki (of which Toyota owns about 5%) made news with a trio of electric micro-vans built to kei car specifications. The battery-electric vans are part of an industry-wide push toward carbon neutrality. Kei-class vehicles, in addition to limited displacement gasoline engines, have strict dimensional restrictions that allow them to navigate the often narrow streets in dense urban areas. They're also privilege to certain tax breaks and parking benefits.  [gallery ids="2474953,2474954"] The engine size rules obviously don't apply to the electric vans, but they will still conform to the size boundaries. Kei vans are often used to solve the "last mile" problem in logistics since they're able to whiz around crowded streets inaccessible by larger commercial vehicles.  Daihatsu, which specializes in kei cars, will build the vans and name their variant the HiJet Cargo. The HiJet name has been a consistent one in the company's lineup since 1960, but these new versions will be front-wheel-drive in contrast to the rear-wheel-drive gasoline variants. Toyota's version will be called the Pixis Van, while Suzuki will be named the Every, a nameplate that's been around since 1982. Aside from the badges the vans appear identical. Range is said to be approximately 200km (124 miles) on a single charge.  The exhibition was held in conjunction with the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association, which former Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda heads. Toyoda stepped down from the top position at the company his grandfather founded in April, but still takes a overseer role as Chairman. Toyoda was criticized for being slow to adopt EVs, and new CEO Koji Sato has emphasized the role of battery-electrics moving forward while still taking a multi-front approach to carbon neutrality with hydrogen and hybrids. These vans were likely in development before Toyoda's retirement, though.

Toyota close to licensing deal with BMW for fuel cell technology

For over a year now, we've been hearing about a potential partnership between Toyota and BMW on everything from sports cars to lithium-ion batteries, but one of the first cooperative projects between these two automakers could bring Toyota's hydrogen fuel cell technology to a BMW vehicle. Reuters is reporting that an announcement is likely to be made as soon as later this week regarding a BMW fuel cell vehicle that could be in production by 2020 with a prototype running around by 2015.
The last we heard of Toyota's fuel cell technology, it was in the FCV-R Concept that we saw at the 2011 Tokyo Motor Show, but there is no word how far along in development this system is. If it does come to fruition, such a vehicle for BMW would build on the automaker's commitment to hydrogen that started with the Hydrogen 7, which unlike a fuel cell vehicle, simply ran on hydrogen fuel rather than converting it to electricity for use in motors. We're definitely interested where this Toyota/BMW tie up could be headed.

2014 Toyota Prius crash test rating drops to four stars

If nothing has changed, then how come something changed? That's the question behind the recent drop from five to four stars in the crash test rating for the Toyota Prius. As you can see on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) website, the 2014 Prius gets four stars overall while the 2013 got five. The two cars are basically identical, so what gives? Toyota says it is not sure why NHTSA rated the Prius a four this time. Starting with the 2011 model year, NHTSA updated its rating system and says in a FAQ that vehicles that had four- or five-star ratings could get lower ratings "even if no changes have been made to the vehicle." Green Car Reports says that the issue is a new set of frontal barrier tests that were conducted on the 2014 Prius last month and that resulted in the first new bits of crash test data for the car in years. The 2012 and 2013 Prius models were rated based on tests done in February 2011 on a 2011 Prius. All of these are variants of the third-generation model. The next-gen Prius is expected in 2015. Jana Hartline, environmental communication manager at Toyota Motor Sales, USA, told AutoblogGreen that the company doesn't quite know what's going on with the drop in crash test scores: There have been no changes in the test standards and no changes in the car, other than minor reinforcement for small overlap crash test which we believe did not compromise integrity. We are not sure why it rated a 4 this time. We are looking at the test results and we are confident the new generation will move back to 5 stars. 2014 Prius still has a five-star rating for the side crash test and four in the rollover test. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.