Dave Hermance presentation

[tochatihu]

I did not take notes on this, but here are a few points remembered. Maybe someone else who attended will add some more.

He recounted the history of how Toyota got into Prius, and where they intend to go in the future with hybrids.

He made a major case for EPA fuel efficiency being changed to emphasize gallons per X miles, or gallons per year, or dollars per year. And that a few mpg variation at 40 or 50 mpg is much less significant than at 20 mpg.

He took a lot of questions from the audience, and I only remember one in particular. He was very dismissive of EV button retrofitting and said that it WOULD void the warranty. None of us raked him over the coals of Magnuson-Moss.

I asked about the catalyst, high-sulfur gasoline, and emissions, and got the most straightforward response I had yet heard: Fuel sulfur will partially poison the catalyst, and this effect is only partially reversible after switching to low-sulfur fuel.

After the presentation I asked privately about the 2003-2004 brake light switch problem and he had not heard of it yet. How do you like that?

He arrived in a hybrid Lexus and to my surprise, had no interest in trading straight across for Tochatihu, the road-tested 2001.