Well, I can toss in a few bits and pieces. In the US, the Prius gets you lots of goodies from the government as far as tax breaks and other allowances, such as using the commuter lane solo. Why? Because its very environmentally friendly, and not just in mileage, after all, you can actually get close with a diesel VW in mileage, the thing is the soot and other pollutants from the diesel.
As to the battery, I suspect that it'll get better in the future, but right now, the cost isn't the labor, but the batteries themselves, look at the price on a good car battery, and then imagine this thing needing just six of those, and you get the picture, since its likely quite a bit more(an electric Ford Ranger pickup in a book I've got on electric cars needed around 24 car batteries). This of course assumes that Toyota wasn't stupid enough to integrate any of the electronics into the batteries. Having worked in auto parts, the industry will offer a dealer alternative once the market is there, and consider the acceptance of hybrids, that'll likely be less than five years.
Will Toyota put the hybrid drivetrain in more vehicles? Yes, currently production is up, costs are down on the new Prius as they learned a lot from the first one, in fact, supposedly its cheaper and easier to build one of these than a gas powered car, just the electric parts cost a lot more. Also they're working towards making it possible to replace the regular drivetrain with a hybrid, which really isn't hard in a front drive car, since the engine and transaxle are already installed as a package, so it'd be a matter of installing a different package. The rumor I heard said that they'll offer hybrid versions of their next generation small to medium cars, although bigger cars and most trucks'll require an uprated version of this drivetrain.
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As to the battery, I suspect that it'll get better in the future, but right now, the cost isn't the labor, but the batteries themselves, look at the price on a good car battery, and then imagine this thing needing just six of those, and you get the picture, since its likely quite a bit more(an electric Ford Ranger pickup in a book I've got on electric cars needed around 24 car batteries). This of course assumes that Toyota wasn't stupid enough to integrate any of the electronics into the batteries. Having worked in auto parts, the industry will offer a dealer alternative once the market is there, and consider the acceptance of hybrids, that'll likely be less than five years.
Will Toyota put the hybrid drivetrain in more vehicles? Yes, currently production is up, costs are down on the new Prius as they learned a lot from the first one, in fact, supposedly its cheaper and easier to build one of these than a gas powered car, just the electric parts cost a lot more. Also they're working towards making it possible to replace the regular drivetrain with a hybrid, which really isn't hard in a front drive car, since the engine and transaxle are already installed as a package, so it'd be a matter of installing a different package. The rumor I heard said that they'll offer hybrid versions of their next generation small to medium cars, although bigger cars and most trucks'll require an uprated version of this drivetrain.