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Introducing effective technologies to reduce carbon emissions in the transport sector is a critical issue for automotive manufacturers to contribute to sustainable development. Unlike the plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs), whose effectiveness is dependent on the carbon intensity of grid electricity, the solar hybrid vehicle (SHV) can be an alternative electric vehicle because of its off-grid, zero-emission electric technology. Its usability is also advantageous because it does not require manual charging by the users. This study aims at evaluating the economic, environmental, and usability benefits of SHV by comparing it with other types of vehicles including PEVs. By setting cost and energy efficiency on the basis of the assumed technology level in 2030, annual cost and annual CO2 emissions of each vehicle are calculated using the daily mileage pattern obtained from a user survey of 5,000 people in Japan and the daily radiation data for each corresponding user.

In recent years, automakers have been developing various types of environmentally friendly vehicles such as hybrid (HV), plug-in hybrid (PHV), electric (EV), and fuel cell (FCV) vehicles to help reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. However, there are few commercial solar vehicles on the market. One of the reasons why automakers have not focused attention on this area is because the benefits of installing solar modules on vehicles under real conditions are unclear. There are two difficulties in measuring the benefits of installing solar modules on vehicles: (1) vehicles travel under various conditions of sunlight exposure and (2) sunlight exposure conditions differ in each region. To address these problems, an analysis was performed based on an internet survey of 5,000 people and publically available meteorological data from 48 observation stations in Japan.