Why did the flywheel hybrid system by no means catch on for street automobiles?

A question mark has been superimposed over a cutting edge automobile component.

Enlarge / Why did the flywheel hybrid by no means catch on for street automobiles? (credit score: GKN/Jonathan Gitlin)

When a Pace community tv crew interviewed Margo T. Oge, then-director of the Environmental Safety Company’s Workplace of Transportation and Air High quality, through the 10-hour-long 2010 Petit Le Mans Collection race at Street Atlanta, Porsche’s experimental 911 GT3 R Hybrid race automotive held down a top-20 place within the 45-car subject.

The published crew took each alternative to name consideration to the presence of the brand new Porsche. Hybrid road automobiles have been turning into mainstream, and “street relevance” was repeatedly cited by Oge together with vitality independence and low carbon emissions as EPA imperatives.

However, like its equally new Formulation One hybrid race automotive cousins, this particular 911 GT3 R was not a street-going hybrid. This was a “flywheel hybrid.” As an alternative of parallel gasoline engine/electrical motor drive techniques mixed with a battery, the 911 racer paired an inner combustion flat-six cylinder with an electro-mechanical flywheel vitality storage system.

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