[amit]

Came across this report from Connecticut State University and the writer claims that the Toyota Prius Hybrid is actually more damaging to the environment then the Hummer! To me though, the article sounds more like a yankee project to defame Toyota.

Here are some quotes from the article:

Prius is partly driven by a battery which contains nickel. The nickel is mined and smelted at a plant in Sudbury, Ontario. This plant has caused so much environmental damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has used the ‘dead zone’ around the plant to test moon rovers. The area around the plant is devoid of any life for miles.

The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles. The Hummer, on the other hand, costs a more fiscal $1.95 per mile to put on the road over an expected lifetime of 300,000 miles.

I do agree with the report that it's takes almost 5 years just to recover the premium paid to BUY the Prius.

Full article : Prius outdoes Hummer in environmental damage.

[ajmat]

Not sur about the Hummer part but saw a similar report that a diesel Mercedes was environmentally more freindlier than a Prius in terms of life cycle costs

[sajo]

Yes, a small diesel is any day better than most electric/hybrid cars. All the electric cars do is transfer the pollution from the car to the power generation plant.

[sbasak]

You can find a lot more counter arguments here
Back Room: Priu$ Worse Than Hummer

[theMAG]

Does the writer work for Hummer PR?

On a more sober note, the question not answered in that article is while this Sudbury plant has killed the environment around it, is it from just the 1000 tons of nickel produced for Toyota or does it also supply other companies? If its the latter, then the Prius need not have its 'environmentally damaging" associated with it tooth-and-nail.