Electric hybrid ‘car of the future’ visits Nogales area

Retired Sgt. Major Jerry Asher wheels around Arizona in a Toyota Prius hybrid, packing an extra battery and preaching a message to “kick gas” in favor of electric power.

Asher recently retired from the U.S. Army in Washington, D.C., and moved to Bisbee, he said. Now he’s on a new mission to convert America to plug-in cars. He has driven his 2005 Prius, dubbed “Spirit of DC,” to 48 state capitals and five Canadian provinces, and now he’s launching a “Plug-in Arizona Tour,” he said.

Spirit is a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV). With a 110-volt inverter and solar panels on the roof and hood, the car can get a boost for its battery from the sun or any electrical source.

Asher drove to Nogales High School on Tuesday, plugged in the battery outside the automotive shop and gave Ruben Verdugo’s students a look at the future.

“This country is about life, liberty and the pursuit of wheels,” Asher told the students. He urged them to “kick gas because your future depends on it.”

Asher never opened the hood to show the engine. Instead, students gathered around the rear of the car and checked the large battery pack.

It can be charged with “American homegrown electrons, not OPEC-related molecules of oil, on regular household electricity,” Asher said.

If a hybrid is converted to a PHEV, it can reach a top speed of about 52 mph in electric mode before the gasoline engine takes over. This enables the car to run much longer on electricity, Asher said in an interview. When the juice from the larger pack is used up, Spirit reverts back to driving like a regular Prius hybrid.

This translates into gas mileage of up to 100 miles per gallon, Asher said. On a recent trip from Bisbee to Phoenix, the Spirit averaged 56 miles per gallon, he said.

“Electric motors are more reliable than internal combustion engines,” Verdugo told his students. Then he asked them what performance meant to them.

“Is it how fast can you get from point A to point B?” he asked. “If gas mileage is important to you, this is it.”

“Spirit of DC” has two meanings �“ “direct current” and “drive carefully,” Asher told the students. How you drive has a big impact on gas mileage. If you slow down before a stoplight, this keeps a hybrid car in the cheaper electric mode, he said.

“Fuel is going up,” said student Sergio Jimenez. He told the Nogales International he was researching hybrid vehicles for his senior project. “We have to find an alternative fuel source.”

Right now, only the Toyota Prius can be converted to a plug-in, Asher said in an interview. Other vehicles could be modified to run on electric mode. He proposed a government-funded “cash for conversions” program as a follow-up to the “cash for clunkers” program.

Employees at the Santa Cruz County supervisors’ office share a Honda Civic hybrid for driving on the job, said Supervisor John Maynard. He encouraged the county to buy the car in 2004, when a state energy conservation grant paid half the $22,000 cost, he said.

The Honda gets 45 to 50 miles per gallon, Maynard said. Off the job, he drives a Toyota Prius hybrid.

Horne Ford in Nogales has sold a “handful” of hybrid cars to “environmentally conscious” buyers, said Tony Griffin, owner and general manager. Currently, he has one hybrid Escape SUV and one Fusion, a five-passenger sedan, on the lot.

The hybrid versions of those cars cost $5,000 to $6,000 more than the gas-engine models, Griffin said. “This technology will definitely get cheaper. The plug-ins are coming from every manufacturer, so it’s just a matter of time before they get here.”