A Hybrid Technology That Can Pay for Itself

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"Addressing the central limitations of chemical batteries was critical to creating the Extreme Hybrid," Furia explained. "Batteries work best when they provide a slow, steady flow of electricity. Offering enough power for fast acceleration is difficult and damaging to batteries, and this is especially true as batteries become deeply discharged."

"The most common solution is to employ many more batteries and simply shallow-discharge them, which is impractical for all but expensive, exotic vehicles. Instead, the Extreme Hybrid accesses AFS Trinity's long history of developing Fast Energy solutions for NASA, the U.S. Department of Defense and others. At the heart of this new Fast Energy technology are patent pending control electronics to cache power for short periods in ultra-capacitors and provide this power in bursts for all-electric acceleration that is better, in many cases, than the internal combustion engine of the host vehicle," Furia said. "Until the Extreme Hybrid, hybrids have resorted to gasoline to satisfy acceleration demands." According to Furia, one reason carmakers have resisted plug-in hybrids has been reports of some isolated, but troubling fires involving lithium batteries in laptops that were pushed beyond thermal limits. "All devices through which currents are drawn experience some resistive heating, including all types of batteries. Batteries can be safe if they avoid excessive resistive heating. By using ultra-capacitors as pools of rapid energy," Furia explained, "the proprietary control electronics of the Extreme Hybrid not only keep the batteries within safe resistive heating limits, but also extend battery life. We regard XH technology as an important safety breakthrough, which is a critical factor in making Extreme Hybrids practical now." "Gasoline mileage is calculated by using average American driving patterns estimated by the U.S. Department of Transportation and simulating the EPA combined urban/highway driving cycle of the host vehicle operating only with its conventional hybrid drive train. In 2003, the U.S. Department of Transportation reported that 78% of Americans drive less than 40 miles a day. On those days, drivers of Extreme Hybrids will need no gasoline at all even driving an SUV," Furia said. "Say someone drives 40 miles a day 6 days a week and 100 miles the seventh. That's 340 miles a week. The first 280 are electric. The next 60 miles use gas. That's 340 miles on a little more than two gallons of gasoline for the week, assuming 32/29 urban/highway mileage in the host unmodified hybrid SUV. Although this translates into 170 MPG, we use a more conservative 150 MPG to take into account that mileage will vary depending on where and how a car is driven, but we are comfortable that 150 miles per gallon of gasoline is a good number." ABOUT AFS TRINITY AFS Trinity is a privately-owned Delaware corporation headquartered in Bellevue, WA, that is developing Fast Energy Storage and power systems for vehicular, spacecraft and stationary power systems utilizing batteries, ultracapacitors, and flywheels. The Company has conducted programs with private and government organizations including DARPA, NASA, the U.S. Navy, U.S. Army, U.S. DOT, California Energy Commission, Oak Ridge National Laboratories, Lawrence Livermore National Labs, Lockheed, Ricardo, Mercedes and Honeywell. Although AFS Trinity is not currently using flywheels in systems that are designed for consumer cars, it is actively engaged in developing flywheel power systems for Formula One Racing (F1) and is currently also engaged in developing such a system for one of the world's top F1 teams. American Flywheel Systems, Inc (AFS) received the first patent ever given for a flywheel battery in 1992 and merged with Trinity Flywheel Power to create AFS Trinity Power in 2000. AFS Trinity and Ricardo, Inc. have a Technology Partnership Agreement by which Ricardo is assisting AFS Trinity as a preferred customer and is installing into passenger vehicles AFS Trinity's Extreme Hybrid drive train technology, technology which is the subject of ongoing AFS Trinity U.S. and international patent filings.

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