Editor’s note: This is part of a series of articles peeking into clean car industries and car manufacturers of China, India, South Korea and Germany. Please send comments and suggestions using our Contact page or by leaving a comment at the end of this article.

Ashok Leyland is one of India’s largest commercial vehicle manufacturing companies and is a part of the Hinduja Group. Ashok Leyland is based in Chennai, India and focuses mostly on the medium and heavy commercial vehicle segment of the market. Enjoying healthy market share and a full range of offers from 18 to 52 seater passenger transport buses, Ashok Leyland is on a steady run towards being a market leader. In fact, eight out of every ten state transport buses running across India are manufactured by Ashok Leyland. Of late, it has entered into a joint venture with Japan’s giant, Nissan as it tries to penetrate the Light Commercial Vehicle (LCV) market.

Among many other goals, Ashok Leyland aims to expand its operations to penetrate into overseas markets. Included in the company’s plans is to acquire smaller car manufacturers in China and in other developing countries. In fact, recently, it has acquired the Avia truck line from Czech Republic. Called Avia Ashok Leyland Motors s.r.o., this will give Ashok Leyland a channel into the competitive European market. According to the company, in 2008 the joint venture sold 518 LCVs in Europe despite tough economic conditions. Furthermore, the company will expand its product offers into construction equipment, following a joint venture with John Deere. Newly formed in June 2009, the John Deere partnership is a 50/50 split between the companies. The company says negotiation is progressing on land acquisition, and the production plans are in place. The venture is scheduled to start rolling out wheel loaders and backhoe loaders in October 2010.

Aside from the full expansion planned for the company, Ashok Leyland is also paying close attention to the environment. In fact, they are one of the companies showing the strongest commitment to environmental protection, utilizing eco-friendly processes in their various plants. Even as they thrust into different directions, Ashok Leyland maintains an R&D group that aims to uncover ways to make their vehicles more fuel efficient and reduce emissions.

In fact, even before laws were placed on car emissions, Ashok Leyland was already producing low-emission vehicles. Back in 1997, they have already released buses with quiet engines and low pollutant emission based on the CNG technology. In 2002 it developed the first hybrid electric vehicle. Ashok Leyland has also launched a mobile emission clinic that operates on highways and at entry points to New Delhi. The clinic checks vehicles for emission levels, recommends remedies and offers tips on maintenance and care. This work will help generate valuable data and garner insight that will guide further development.

When it comes to the development of environmentally friendly technologies, Ashok Leyland has developed Hythane engines. In association with Eden Energy, Australia, Ashok Leyland successfully developed a 6-cylinder, 6-liter 92 kW BS-4 engine which uses Hythane (H-CNG,) which is a blend of natural gas and around 20% of hydrogen. Hydrogen helps improve the efficiency of the engine but the CNG aspect makes sure that emissions are at a controlled level. A 4-cylinder 4-litre 63 KW engine is also being developed for H-CNG blend in a joint R&D program with MNRE (Ministry of New and Renewable Energy) and Indian Oil Corporation.

The H-CNG concept is now in full swing, with more than 5,500 of the technology’s vehicles running around Delhi. The company is also already discussing the wide-scale use of Hythane engines with the Indian government. Hythane engines may be expected in the near future, but these may not be brought to the United States as yet.

Ashok Leyland’s partnership with Nissan is also focusing on vehicle, powertrain, and technology development listed under three joint ventures. With impressive investment, the joint ventures will focus on producing trucks with diesel engines that meet Euro 3 and Euro 4 emission standards.

In the coming years, Ashok Leyland also has some hybrid trucks and buses in store for its market. The buses and trucks are set to feature a new electronic shift-by-wire transmission technology as well as electronic-controlled engine management for greater fuel efficiency. Ashok Leyland focuses on improving fuel efficiency without affecting automotive power, and the vehicles will have a 5% improvement on fuel efficiency. Ashok Leyland is also developing electric batteries and bio-fuel modes.

Ashok Leyland – Efficiency Innovations to India’s Medium and Heavy Commercial Vehicles is a post from: CleanCarTalk

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Mitsubishi Fuso Truck & Bus Corporation (MFTBC) has sold ten hybrid trucks to an Irish company. The Fuso Canter Eco Hybrid is the first series-production hybrid truck to be sold in Europe. The customer is Ireland’s leading utility company, the Electricity Supply Board (ESB) in Dublin. ESB plans to use the vehicles for customer service and for infrastructure maintenance in Ireland. The Irish Government has granted a special permit for the Japanese hybrid trucks.

The Mitsubishi Fuso Canter Eco Hybrid features a parallel hybrid system, which combines a conventional clean-burning diesel internal combustion engine with an ultra-slim electric motor/generator, advanced lithium-ion batteries and a high-efficiency automated mechanical transmission. Together with regenerative braking, the Fuso Canter Eco Hybrid medium-duty truck achieves up to 30% better fuel economy in delivery applications and also produces significantly less emissions than the standard diesel-only model.

With the order from Ireland and another order from Australia, also for ten Fuso Canter Eco Hybrids, MFTBC is for the first time delivering a Fuso hybrid truck to customers outside of Japan. MFTBC is planning to expand its hybrid trucks business into targeted export markets starting in 2010. “Building on the success of the Canter Eco Hybrid in Japan, we at Mitsubishi Fuso are clearly pursuing opportunities worldwide,” said Dr. Albert Kirchmann, MFTBC President and CEO. “As the Global Hybrid Center of Daimler Trucks, Mitsubishi Fuso is committed to developing and implementing clean hybrid commercial vehicles. The orders from Ireland and Australia show how strong demand is for these vehicles.”

MFTBC has been marketing the Fuso Canter hybrid truck on its home market since its market launch in July 2006. More than 600 Fuso Canter Eco Hybrid trucks have been sold in Japan to date. The Canter Eco Hybrid light truck features a parallel hybrid system and significantly reduces fuel consumption and emissions.

While the Fuso hybrid trucks are currently showing what they can do in a fleet test in the United Kingdom, the new orders from Ireland and Australia represent the first orders from customers outside of Japan. The truck will be used not only by energy utilities, but also in other sectors including parcel and freight delivery and the food and beverages industry.

“We are proud to bring a vehicle with low emissions, great fuel efficiency and impressive reliability to the global market.This is an important first step in our efforts to strengthen hybrid truck sales, and in 2010 we also will further expand this business into targeted markets outside Japan,” says Kai-Uwe Seidenfuß, MFTBC Vice President of Sales & Service International.

This first order from customers outside of Japan for hybrid vehicles clearly indicates the positive development of MFTBC’s hybrid business. The one-year anniversary of the Global Hybrid Center (GHC) and the market launch of the new, enhanced Fuso Canter Eco Hybrid were further important milestones in 2009. Located at the company headquarters in Kawasaki , Japan , the GHC serves as the worldwide platform for the development of hybrid vehicles for Daimler Trucks.

MFTBC’s involvement in hybrid development is part of Daimler’s Shaping Future Transportation initiative, which aims to achieve a major reduction in fuel consumption and exhaust emissions of commercial vehicles. Shaping Future Transportation comprises work on alternative drive systems for various commercial vehicle brands. Hybrid technology plays a key role in these vehicles, as it can reduce diesel consumption by up to 30 percent, depending on the application.

Based in Kawasaki, Japan, Mitsubishi Fuso Truck and Bus Corporation (MFTBC) is one of Asia’s leading commercial vehicle manufacturers. In 2008, the company sold a total of about 197,700 vehicles including light, medium- and heavy-duty trucks and buses.Daimler AG owns 85 percent of MFTBC shares. MFTBC is an integral part of the Daimler Trucks Division of Daimler AG.

Fuso Sold First Canter Eco Hybrid Trucks Outside of Japan is a post from: CleanCarTalk

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With all the talk about being efficient in our daily use of the cars, we shouldn’t forget about the infrastructure. you know the good old American freeways? It’s all part of the fuel-efficiency problem. We can’t just spend billions on developing better cars while not paying attention to the networks of cement and asphalt roads that our cars run on. In fact if we just change the way we enter highway on-ramps and off-ramps, we’d already be ahead of the efficiency game, regardless of the cars that people drive.

I was talking with my expert transportation and energy friend Tom Bartley the other day, and as usual, we kicked around a lot of ideas. Here’s a low tech solution that can make a big difference at essentially no costs, and it benefits everyone: build on-ramp and off-ramp lanes so that drivers always go downslope to get on the freeway, and upslope to get off.

Yep. It’s free gravitational energy at work. Construction of new highway sections and reconstruction of existing ones can be designed to incorporate downslope and upslope ramps.

It’s pretty straight forward. On acceleration to highway speeds, vehicles can be gravity-assisted by going down to the highway. And on deceleration to exit the highways, vehicles can again be gravity-assisted by going upslope. As one would expect, the concept brings a number of benefits, including less fuel needed to go enter the highway, and less brake use to come off of it. And what about the on-ramps and off-ramps themselves? Well the cost differential and impact to build such features should be miniscule compared to savings realized by vehicles operating in the such environment over the life of the infrastructure, especially for big rigs.

Highway construction projects should consider incorporating this or similar concepts immediately. It’s free energy for everyone.

Increasing Fuel Efficiency Without Hybrids and EVs: Down on On-Ramp, Up on Off-Ramp is a post from: CleanCarTalk

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