Based on its commitment to innovation and original technology creation, Honda is working to help address the world’s environmental challenges including global climate change, emissions reduction and energy sustainability through a comprehensive, portfolio approach that involves both advanced powertrain and energy technologies for the near and longer terms. This includes further improvements to gasoline engine fuel efficiency, including the expanding use of hybrid technology; the development of viable alternatives to gasoline, including natural gas and the hydrogen-powered fuel-cell electric car; and advanced energy production and distribution technologies including solar cells, co-generation systems and more efficient means of producing renewable biofuels.

Improving Fuel Efficiency

• Over the past 33 years, Honda has maintained its position as a fuel-efficiency leader, including 24 years at the top of the EPA’s automobile fuel-economy rankings. American Honda had the highest EPA fleet-average fuel economy of any automaker in model year 2008, the last year for which full and final production data is available.
• Honda is committed to further advancements in internal combustion engine efficiency, with a focus on the broad application of technologies such as VTEC™ and Variable Cylinder Management™ (VCM™); and with the expanded application of pinnacle technologies like Honda’s Integrated Motor Assist™ (IMA™) hybrid system.
  • The most affordable hybrid available on the road today – the five-passenger Honda Insight – utilizes an interactive Ecological Drive Assist System to help enhance customers’ fuel-efficient driving capabilities.
  • A new hybrid: the two-seat CR-Z will expand Honda’s lineup of hybrid vehicles in 2010 by offering consumers a balance of good fuel economy with sporty driving characteristics.
  • Second-generation Variable Cylinder Management™ (VCM™) technology – with three-, fourand six-cylinder operation – is being used in the Accord V6 Sedan and Coupe, Pilot SUV, Odyssey minivan (most models), and the all-new 2010 Accord Crosstour and Acura ZDX crossover-utility vehicles.
  • Extensive use of advanced materials such as aluminum and high-strength steel that improve fuel economy while allowing engineers to meet other critical targets such as vehicle safety.

Reducing Emissions

• Honda has led all automakers in the introduction of vehicles that meet or exceed increasingly stringent exhaust emissions regulation.
  • First gasoline-powered LEV, ULEV, SULEV, and AT-PZEV vehicles introduced to U.S. consumers.
  • For model year 2010, all Honda and Acura vehicles meet or exceed U.S. EPA Tier 2 Bin 5 emissions standards on an individual model basis, without the use of fleet averaging.
  • Honda has been a leader in the application of overhead valve (OHV) 4-stroke engines to its powersports and power equipment product lines. All model year 2008 and newer Honda motorcycles, including competition models, and all Honda power equipment lines use OHV 4-stroke engine technology.

Fuel Cell Technology

Honda has paced the industry in the development and deployment of fuel-cell electric vehicle (FCEV) technology as well as the refueling infrastructure that will be required to take it to the mass market.

• Honda introduced the world’s first production fuel cell vehicle and first EPA- and CARBcertified FCEV – the Honda FCX – in the U.S. and Japan in October 2002.
• Honda’s FCX Clarity, the successor to the FCX, was the world’s first purpose-built FCEV and the first to be manufactured on a dedicated production line.
• The FCX Clarity, with Honda’s compact and efficient V Flow fuel cell stack, achieves performance on par with a four-cylinder, five-passenger gasoline-powered sedan but with three times the fuel efficiency and an operating range of 240 miles.
• Honda has been leasing its fuel-cell electric vehicles to fleet and retail customers in Southern California since 2002 in the world’s first large-scale retail initiative for FCEVs.
• Honda R&D is advancing technology for the use of renewable energy in the production of hydrogen (see Solar Cell).

Natural Gas-Powered Vehicles

• Natural Gas - Honda has sought to establish a pathway from gasoline to gaseous fuel alternatives with its natural gas-powered Civic GX, the only natural gas-powered passenger car for retail sale from a major automaker in North America.
• The Civic GX reduces tank-to-wheel CO emissions by 25 percent (versus a comparable gasolinepowered compact car) and is certified as an Inherently Low Emissions Vehicle (ILEV).
• In fiscal year 2009, American Honda added 11 new Civic GX dealers for a total of 129 dealers I 33 states, including four new dealers in California and the addition of dealers in Utah.

Advanced Cleaner Energy Research

• Honda’s efforts have gone beyond developing new vehicle technologies. Honda has focused its research and development resources on the creation of new sources of cleaner power to provide the energy required for future mobility.
  • Solar Cell - Honda-developed photovoltaic solar cells significantly reduce the energy and CO2 emissions in the manufacturing phase¹. Honda subsidiary Soltec, Ltd. began mass production of Honda solar cells at its new Kumamoto factory in October 2008. Honda is utilizing the cells in an array at Honda R&D Americas Los Angeles headquarters, where solar energy is used to extract hydrogen from water for refueling the FCX Clarity in a virtually carbon-free energy cycle.
  • FFVs - Honda has developed a flexible-fuel system that enables engines to operate on either 100 percent ethanol or a wide range of ethanol-gasoline fuel mixtures. In late 2006, Honda began sales of a flex-fuel Fit and Civic sedan in Brazil, where the energy-efficient production of bioethanol from plant cellulose such as sugar cane has gained in popularity.
  • Bio-fuel - To address the need for more efficient means of producing bio-ethanol in other regions of the world, Honda R&D and the Research Institute of Innovative Technology for the Earth (RITE) are researching new technology to produce ethanol from soft-biomass, a renewable resource of plant-derived material. The company has set up an experimental production facility at its Wako, Japan R&D campus to further study the market potential of this technology.
  • MCHP - Honda in partnership with Climate Energy, LLC, is marketing a micro-combined heat and power cogeneration (MCHP) appliance called freewatt™ to residential customer in the Northeastern U.S. The freewatt system generates electricity and heat for the home with an approximate 30-percent reduction in energy use and associated CO2 emissions.

¹ compared to conventional crystal silicon solar cells.

Source: http://www.honda.com/newsandviews/article.aspx?id=4038

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