Toyota’s Prius Hits a Million

It’s taken just a little bit over a decade, but Toyota has done it. Last month Japan’s largest automaker hit the million unit mark for the Prius; total accumulated sales hit 1,028,000. What makes things especially interesting is the rate at which Prius sales are escalating, given the rising price of gasoline and future forecasts.

Toyota estimates that in the process of producing both the first and second generation Prius, it’s saved 4.5 million tons of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere. Toyota has been producing the Prius since 1997, but it remained a Japanese domestic product up until 2001. In 2004, Toyota introduced the second generation Prius, which is still on sale today, and a third generation model is expected to debut at the next North American International Auto Show in January of 2009.

It isn’t just the Prius that’s proven to be a landmark in Hybrids for Toyota, however, as the automaker actually sold its millionth hybrid last year, counting all the other hybrid models under the TMC umbrella. These include the first and second generation Highlander Hybrid, the Toyota Camry Hybrid, and Lexus’ range of luxury hybrids starting with the RX 400h, as well as the GS 450h and LS 600h.

Toyota believes in the power of the hybrid, and hopes that it can sell a million hybrid vehicles per year, every year, starting in 2010, and in order to accomplish this plans on offering every vehicle it makes with a hybrid drivetrain as an option by 2020.

Toyota sold a little over 429,000 hybrids last year, showing that while there’s still a ways to go, its goal is achievable, especially since the Prius is still a newcomer to many important world markets, such as China and South Korea.