Overall, I'm impressed. Honda has increased the fuel economy of the Civic Hybrid by about 5% to get 50 mpg on both EPA city and highway ratings. Honda's numbers even suggest that the Civic Hybrid and the Prius get pretty close to the same fuel economy in real world driving, but we'll need to wait and see what happens when people get ahold of them.
In addition to increased fuel economy, every Civic Hybrid sold in the US will meet the cleanest emissions standard on the books (other than zero). In other words, they'll meet or beat the emissions performance of any gasoline car on the road. |