Hummer to produce hybrid H3, which company says gets 100 miles to the gallon

Hummer, the gas-guzzling king of SUVs, has a new model coming out that could turn its image on its head - and leave the Prius in the dust.

The GM-owned Hummer brand has teamed with Raser Technologies to produce a hybrid H3, which the company boasts gets 100 miles to the gallon. That's nearly double what Toyota's blockbuster hybrid gets, and Hummer says its model is better because it's bigger. It holds a whopping 600 pounds of lithium-ion battery packs.

"Most people attack big cars," said Raser Chairman Kraig Higginson. "They say the solution is to buy small vehicles which get better gas mileage. But no, we need a better technology."

The vehicle drew admiring stares Friday on display outside the New York Stock Exchange.

With the macho bravado that typifies the brand, Raser called the H3 a "Chevy Volt on steroids."

It can go the first 40 miles or so on pure electricity. Then gasoline powers its 260-horsepower, four-cylinder engine as well as a generator that recharges the batteries.

Technically, the 100-mile-per-gallon figure applies only to the first 60 miles. Fuel economy diminishes when the engine shifts from electric power to gas, so an 11-gallon fillup will get you about 400 miles, or roughly 36 miles to the gallon.

The H3 hybrid takes about eight hours to fully charge in a standard outlet, and half that in a 220-volt outlet.

The vehicle will not hit the streets until 2011, but 17,000 people have already gotten in line to place orders. The hybrid Hummer is expected to cost approximately $50,000.

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I hope everything lasts long enough for me to get one of these. :)