Is it necessary to plug the batteries of hybrid cars to the power grid to re-charge them?

Question

If this is the case then the impact on fuel crisis will be minimal.

Answer 1

no

Answer 2

The hybrids you see on the road today recharge their batteries through something called "regenerative braking" which stores energy in the battery every time you decelerate your car.

You don't need to (and there is no way to) plug your car into the electric grid.

That said, the next generation of "green" car is going to be a plug-in electric vehicle or hybrid like the Chevy Volt or Plug-In Prius. Even when getting electricity from a coal power plant, plug-in cars pollute less (and cost less to run) than a gasoline engine acording to studies, but with electric cars you get the added bonus of being able to run cleaner as the electric grid gets cleaner!

In fact, owning a plug-in electric car and a sufficient amount of solar panels on your roof means you can get around without polluting at all!

Answer 3

There are no commercially-available plug-in hybrids on the market so far. (So you cannot plug a hybrid in, other than the same gas station pump that most other regular/conventional cars use.) The hybrid battery is recharged either through regenerative braking (kinetic energy from coasting/slowing down spins a generator to make potential energy in the battery) and/or by taking excess power from the gasoline engine (use the gasoline engine as a generator) to recharge the hybrid battery. There is no plug. No charging off the mains/local electric supply.

Some hobbiests and aftermarket companies have been altering a few hybrids (Prius, Ford Escape Hybrid/Mercury Mariner Hybrid) to make them plug-in capable. Typically this requires adding additional hybrid batteries, besides the ability to charge off the mains.

For more information, check out http://www.calcars.org/vehicles.html

For cost reasons, unless you are a fleet owner or other high-mileage driver it probably will not be worth the cost of the PHEV conversion for you. (Conversion pricing is high due to startup costs and low volumes, besides the pricing of the needed additional battery packs.)

To note, converting to a PHEV (plug-in hybrid electric vehicle) does not reduce the vehicle's range. It gives the owner the option to recharge the (newly added larger) hybrid battery pack at night (cheap electricity and off-peak electric load which would otherwise be lost). The vehicle would run for a certain distance (longer than stock) on the stored electric power alone, and when the battery pack is depleted to a certain point the vehicle reverts back to its original hybrid self and runs on a combination of the gasoline engine (which will also recharge the battery) and the electric motor. A PHEV would add a greater all-electric range to the existing hybrid, besides the ability (but not the requirement!) to plug it into an electric source.

Answer 4

There are plug in hybrid cars

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And to use the avaliable electric would be a diesel or gasoline savings

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And in parts of the world that savings is noticeable

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Europe fuel prices are in the UK $9.53 USD a gallon and the Neatherlands is hitting close to $11.00 USD a gallon the United States is only $3.89 USD a gallon

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So depending where in the world you live is where you want to recharge your battery and save the most

money

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Answer 5

No, they do not need to be plugged into the electrical grid. The new ones coming out have that option. The impact on the fuel crisis would actually be huge. grid electricity is far more efficient than the energy produced by internal combustion, and electric motors are more efficient than standard combustion ones. So by plugging into the grid, we would be using far less energy, and the energy we do use has the possibility of being generated by sustainable sources.