48 mpg is nice, but hybrids don't add up right now

NEW YORK — Last summer was a good time to be in the hybrid business. Gas prices climbed to new records, and Toyota couldn't make its Prius fast enough as drivers turned their heads with envy at the sight of the gas-sipper's eye-catching sloping roofline.

Just a few months later, pump prices have collapsed, and so too have sales of gas-electric vehicles, which have lost ground along the way to cheaper but still fuel-efficient conventional vehicles.

Paying thousands of extra dollars for a hybrid car when gas topped $4 a gallon wasn't unreasonable because with enough driving, it only took a few years to recoup the added cost. But with the economy mired in a recession and fuel prices at their lowest in six years, pinched consumers seem less willing to fork over the extra thousands of dollars for a car that coaxes just a few extra miles out of a gallon of gas.

At this point, buying a hybrid makes as much economic sense as buying a gas-guzzling SUV did last summer.

"The cost-benefit analysis doesn't support the decision to buy one of these higher-priced hybrids today," said Stephen Spivey, senior auto analyst for the consulting firm Frost & Sullivan. "Obviously, if fuel prices go back up, it's going to be more attractive to look at a hybrid."

Automakers are counting on just that. Toyota Motor Corp. on Sunday unveiled its Lexus HS250h hybrid sedan at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, and the Japanese carmaker plans to introduce a redesigned 2010 Prius on Monday. The Japanese automaker has said gas-electric hybrids are its long-term core powertrain strategy, and by early in the next decade it will launch as many as 10 new hybrid models.

Meanwhile, Honda Motor Co. unveiled its new Insight hybrid, which will go on sale in April and compete head-on with the Prius. The car will be priced lower than the slightly larger, $23,650 Civic hybrid, a sign that Honda is targeting penny-pinching consumers.

"Hybrid is important if it's affordable and it carries the right image," said John Mendel, Honda's U.S. executive vice president. Hybrids have an image of having a high cost to get their technology, he said, but with the Insight, "we'll try to change that paradigm a little bit and say this is hybrid for the masses."

Ford Motor Co. unveiled a hybrid version of the Ford Fusion in November that can go up to 47 mph on batter power alone, and General Motors Corp. has turned out a number of hybrid versions of its vehicles recently, like the Chevrolet Malibu and the Saturn Vue.