Ford is to offer eight vehicles rated 40 mpg or more by year-end 2012, the company has announced.
The Detroit giant says that figure is twice the number it had on sale last year and more than any other full-line automaker in 2012.
Ford also said it is tripling its electrified vehicle production capacity by 2013, growing its electrified vehicle lineup to six models – including the all-new C-MAX Hybrid (pictured). The compact hybrid utility vehicle, which arrives this fall, is expected to achieve 47 mpg, at least 3 mpg better than the Toyota Prius, Ford says.
Ford is also ramping up production of its fuel efficient EcoBoost engines. By 2013, the company expects to be producing 1.6 million such engines annually – almost 100,000 engines above its original target.
The new Taurus with 2.0-liter EcoBoost is now certified by the EPA at a best-in-class large sedan for city and highway fuel economy. At 32 mpg the vehicle is more fuel-efficient than the 2012 Chrysler 300, Chevrolet Impala, Dodge Charger and Toyota Avalon. Compared to smaller vehicles, the Taurus 2.0-liter bests V6 models of the Honda Accord and Toyota Camry, with comparable power, Ford says.
In other Ford news, Nokia has announced that the auto company’s research organization will use the Nokia Location Platform to advance innovation for smart and connected vehicles, as demonstrated by the Ford EVOS concept car. The Nokia platform features scaleable cloud services and application programming interfaces that allow software components to communicate with each other.
The Ford EVOS concept car attempts to show how car-based cloud services go beyond internet access and traffic-enabled routing. For example, Ford’s concept car “learns” driver behavior to control, improve upon and personalize vehicle performance, the company says.
Another area of Ford’s research is designed to optimize hybrid powertrain efficiency. The Nokia Location Platform could automatically regulate a car’s powertrain as it travels through established or driver-specified “green zones.”
Ford has reduced the amount of energy used to produce one vehicle in its manufacturing facilities by 10 percent from 2010 to 2011, and by 22 percent in the last six years, according to the company’s 2011 corporate sustainability report. Following the strong progress made on energy use in manufacturing, Ford has announced plans to reduce usage another 25 percent on a per-vehicle basis by 2016, based on 2011 levels.
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