Prime Time for Hybrids? ; Consumers soon will have many options. Will they take them?

``Hydrogen,'' they whisper, as though we were Dustin Hoffman in the role of Benjamin in The Graduate. The experts are convinced that our future is in hydrogen-powered fuel cells to provide propulsion for our cars and trucks. But with development still to do on both the technology and the infrastructure, such vehicles won't be commonplace until your unborn grandchildren get their driver's licenses.

But cleaner, leaner vehicles are here now and will roll out in increasing numbers in the coming months and years. They're hybrids, which use an internal-combustion engine and an electric motor to provide power.

So far, such powertrains have been available here only in the Honda Insight and Toyota Prius. But J.D. Power and Associates forecasts that by 2006 American car buyers will buy a half-million such vehicles a year, choosing from among 20 models of hybrid cars, trucks and sport/utilities.

Honda's hybrid Civic (page 19) goes on sale next spring. Ford Escape and Dodge Durango sport/utility hybrids are due in 2003. Dodge and GM both plan full-size hybrid pickup trucks. General Motors' ParadiGM hybrid system works in a variety of cars and crossovers, some of which are due around 2005. Honda recently unveiled the Dualnote concept car that gets 400 horsepower from its 3.5-liter V6/electric motor combination. Toyota president Fujio Cho says his company will produce 300,000 hybrids worldwide a year by 2005 (and there are hints from his company that if the Ford Escape hybrid is a success, Toyota can follow fairly quickly with a hybrid Highlander).

So consumers will have many hybrids from which to choose... but will they?

``So far, the market has been driven by legislation in the United States and Europe,'' says Thad Malesh, an economist and director of the alternative power technologies group at J.D. Power.

Before Sept. 11, says Malesh, that interest was driven by record-setting gasoline prices in the summers of 2000 and 2001, and the prospect of that trend continuing in 2002 and beyond. But in the aftermath of Sept. 11, J.D. Power research reveals new interest from a much larger audience that sees energy security as ...