Mercedes-Benz wins race to build first Lithium-ion hybrid

Sip fuel with your latte
With the electric motor working as a starter, the engine can be shut off at speeds below 15km/h and instantly spun back up when it's time to go back onto petrol power. Working together, the petrol and electric powerplants generate 220kW of power and 385Nm of torque. Mercedes-Benz claims pretty good combined fuel economy of 8.1L/100km; a significant improvement on the 10.2L/100km figure returned by the S350, upon which the S400 BlueHybrid is based.