Toyota’s delivery bot uses stereoscopic vision and laser rangefinders and speech recognition to find its way through a sea of cubicles. [UberGizmo]

On the final day of Gizmodo’s tour of Japan courtesy of Toyota Australia, our hosts took us for an inside peek of Tsutsumi. The plant is special for a few reasons. One, it’s in Aichi in Toyota City. We kid you not, there is actually a place called Toyota City, and it’s a real city with suburbs and the rest, not just some lame attempt at making a Toyota plant sound cool. Toyota City is about an hour outside of Nagoya. The plant is also special for it’s sustainability initiatives. When we say sustainable we really mean it. Aside from that, the plant is also special for it’s green initiatives that pretty much blow everyone else’s out of the water (pretty much, some other companies are as good or better).

Tsutsumi is massive. Let’s not beat around the bush. How big? Well, we didn’t get any exact measurements, but we did get this fact: The plant has 50,000 square metres of photovoltaic solar panels. That’s the equivalent of 60 tennis courts of solar panels alone. You can imagine the size of the plant itself then. It’s the main producer of Toyota’s Prius model and also produces Camry, Corolla and other models specific to Japan.

Walking inside the massive buildings (yes plural, there are a fair few of them) is like walking into Santa’s workshop, if he were building Toyota cars. The walkways take you from the very beginnings of production to the very end. You go from seeing hundreds of workers running around with trolleys filled with parts to workers starting the finished cars and driving five metres to the end of the production line. Within a few buildings a box of parts suddenly becomes the shell of a car which then grows with the addition of engines, gearbox and other internal parts before getting seats and fittings, doors, a spray job, mirrors and wipers and then a brief test.

Each worker literally has only a few minutes to finish their job. The production line only stops in emergencies. For example, the wiper guy: He has a box of wipers for all different models. A model arrives, it moves slowly through his area while he picks the correct wipers, attaches them to their sockets, winds them tight, tests they are fitted correctly, checks a few other parts and then moves on to the next car on the line.

Issues do occur though, and when they do, the worker with the problem has a button to push that sounds a yellow alarm. It sounds the alarm and shows up on the monitors around the plant. It’s a problem that won’t stop the line. Managers have a quick consultation about the problem and often it can be resolved without stopping the production line. In severe cases there is a red alarm. Again, it sounds a different tune and shows up on the monitors. It has happened before but it’s only for serious cases. It’s a well-oiled machine now, excuse the terrible, terrible pun, so red problems are quite uncommon.

More impressive than its Swiss coordination is the plant’s green credentials. It’s one of the most impressive environmentally friendly manufacturing plants in the world. Since 1990 the plant has managed to cut its CO2 by 50 per cent. This is how they did it.

Last year it installed those 60 tennis courts worth of solar panels. The total output of the panels is 2000kW, which is equal to the average consumption of 500 households. Sure, a manufacturing plant sucks up a lot more juice than 500 households worth, but it’s a bloody good start and there is a hell of a lot more. But just in case you’re wondering, this alone also reduced the plant’s carbon dioxide emissions by 740 tonnes per year, effectively saving 2500 drums of oil if we take a drum to be 200 litres. It’s also rather appropriate, being that the Prius is a hybrid and this is the Prius production plant. It effectively makes the plant a hybrid plant. These solar panels create about half of the electricity that the plant needs to operate. The other 50 per cent comes from gas co-generation.

Another cool thing is that the exterior of the plant’s buildings are covered in photo-catalytic paint. This breaks down airborne nitrogen oxides (NOx) and sulfur oxides (SOx). All 22,000 square metres of the assembly plant exterior is covered it in. Toyota has even painted one Prius with it. They would like to be able to sell Prius with this kind of paint but it’s extremely expensive and only comes in white so at this stage isn’t going to work. To put the effect of this paint in layman’s terms it has the same effect as planting 2000 trees, cleaning the air by producing oxygen in sunlight. Toyota also planted 50,000 trees at and around the factory in 2008.

Since Prius production began in 1997, the plant has reduced the amount of waste going to landfill by 82 per cent and has instituted plans to achieve complete elimination of incinerated waste. They have also begun a water-recycling programme that has cut water discharge into surrounding waterways by 50 per cent. What’s more, the water they do discharge is five times cleaner than that in the waterways anyway.

If you’re one of those people who thinks Toyota makes boring soccer mum cars, then you’re certainly entitled to that opinion. We certainly can’t say that the new Corolla or Camry sent shivers up our sports car loving spines (the Lexus LF-A might have though) but we have to bow our hats to Toyota’s energy saving ways.

Spectators can also watch the action via a 60-inch Sharp LCD that’s mounted to the back of the truck.

“We’ve taken the idea of what would it be like to take an off-road vehicle and still be able to play your favourite video games in remote locations,” said David Williams, a Toyota marketing planner.

Totally silly, but props for going completely over the top. The licence plate holder even says “My other car is a Warthog”. Lots more pics and info at: [Jalopnik and PickupTrucks]

Unsurprisingly, the global financial crises played its part. Forget about seeing every manufacturer and its cheap spin off company releasing a hybrid or commuter 600cc car – they didn’t. In fact, they didn’t do too much all up. We’re not saying nothing happened, plenty did, but by comparison to past Tokyo Motor Shows, there was a lot of empty floor space. It even led one hack to tell us that he had never seen so many “invisible cars”. For bad joke reasons that hack will remain unnamed.

It couldn’t be helped though, and by comparison to the Sydney or Melbourne Motor Show, the Tokyo version was gigantic. Indeed some may say it’s a bit silly to have a Sydney AND Melbourne Motor Show annually when we are such a small country and big car markets, such as Germany, alternate their motor shows between cities. But anyway, it was about the cars, not the politics.

Being that Japan is the centre of the technological universe (kind of), it wasn’t surprising to see a tonne of kooky designs and concept vehicles. But lets play it straight and mention only what is interesting to Australia and what we may possibly see on our shores some time in the future.

Toyota
As some of you may have read, we were in Japan courtesy of Toyota Australia, but it’s not because of this that makes us mention them first. They truly did have the most significant launches during the Show. Three that made us prick our ears up and give them our attention. Firstly the FT-86 sports car. It’s the first sports car that Toyota has developed in hell knows how long. The last one we saw was probably the MR2 and a lot of people have been waiting for the next time Toyota threw its hat into the sports car ring. The FT-86 was developed with the help of Subaru, which Toyota owns a small stake in. It will be powered by a 2.0 litre Boxer engine but other details are still sketchy at this stage. It’s still a concept car but we hear it will be released within three years at a cost of between $50,000 to $80,000 Aussie big ones.

Toyota also showed off its Prius Plug-in Hybrid as well as the FT-EV II. With the Prius Plug-In think Prius, add a plug to the front. You can charge it fully in around 3 hours. Hit the links for more info on each.

Mazda

Surprisingly Mazda didn’t make such a big splash this time at the Tokyo Motor Show. Being that Mazda has already recently refreshed the 2, 3 and 6 line-up down under, there was never going to be a huge amount that would catch the eyes of Aussie journalists. In terms of concept vehicles, the SMH went as far as to say, “On the surface it appeared as if Mazda was doing its bit for the environment by recycling concept vehicles.” They were referring specifically to Kiyora concept vehicle, which made its debut at the Paris Motor Show in ’08. You may have seen it on the cover of Popular Science magazine some months back. The one on display in Tokyo had a new motor in it though which some believe will be the new puller in the next Mazda 2. It’s said this new engine can out do the Prius in terms of fuel efficiency despite being petrol based rather than a hybrid. Sounds good if Mazda can pull it off. 2011 is the scheduled date of release.

Honda

Honda has already spent a lot of money on fuel-efficient technology. The tangible result is the FCX Clarity, a hydrogen based car, which is already on test in California via lease plans at US$600 per month. Unsurprisingly Honda was showing off the car at the Tokyo Motor Show. The hydrogen powered fuel cell electric vehicle gives off absolutely no emissions, just water vapour. It also has so much safety technology that it makes Volvo look stupid. Honda also showed off the CR-Z, a new version of the iconic CR-X but a little less Lakemba and a little more Woollahra. For non-Sydney residents that would be a little less speed and noise and a little more environmentally friendly (electric based). It’s the world’s first petrol-electric sports car. If you just can’t wait for it hop into a Civic Hybrid, that will have to do for now.

Mitsubishi

It was all about the i MiEV at Mitsubishi land. And it’s good to see them come up with something that could possibly be a winner if it is ever released in the Australian market. The 380 sold like poisoned hotcakes and the end of the Lancer Coupe in the early Naughties spelt the end of the Lancer as every third car you saw in traffic. Since then it has pretty much been average if not bad news for Mitsubishi. Oh yeah, I didn’t mention Colt sales… probably a good thing. The i MiEV, which can already be seen around the streets of Japan is Mitsubishi’s saviour, it hopes. It’s a small car, like the Colt, that has zero emissions, runs quiet (not silent though) and costs about a third of the price for operation by comparison to a similar sized petrol powered car. Being completely electric you can charge it with a power point at home. A complete charge takes seven hours while a quick charge to 80 per cent ca take as little as 30 minutes. Of course, these times depend on whether you are using 100 or 200-volt power supply. Any guesses as to which one takes longer to charge your i MiEV? It really is a great little car. And if you were wondering: Mitsubishi Innovative Electric Vehicle. Don’t ask us about the ‘i’ in front of that though. We don’t know.

And the rest? Well, those that are relevant to Australians, Nissan, Suzuki, and Subaru also came up with a few offerings but nothing that would shatter the earth. Nissan showed off the Leaf zero emissions car. Can you see a trend here? That’s right, everyone that was doing something was doing zero emissions cars… not that there is anything wrong with that. It just gets a tad boring to report on over and over again. Thankfully though the Leaf looks a lot better than the Tiida, despite its name. Carlos Ghosn, the boss of Nissan, went all out to push the Leaf. Without wanting to be mean it must have been nice for him to speak positively about something after the Renault F1 scandal with Flavio Briatore and Nelson Piquet Jr. FIY: Nissan and Renault are in bed, hence Renault being Ghosn’s problem too. Poor guy. But perk up, you just signed Robert Kubica for the 2009 season, that’s bound to bring a smile to your face. Oh yeah, it’s only a one year deal and you just lost double World Champion Fernando Alonso… we’re going to go now.

In terms of Subaru, nothing new really. It was all set to show off its version of the swap talent with Toyota that resulted in the FT-86 for Toyota. But nothing. Not yet anyway, and don’t expect it for a while either. They did show off the concept Hybrid Tourer though which was quite cool thanks to its gull wing design that used two doors for a car easily capable of carrying four. In other words, no rear doors, just one gigantic door on each side. It will use a 2.0 Boxer engine as well as an electric motor that seems like two completely opposite worlds, but if anyone can pull it off Subaru can.

Suzuki had something a bit more interesting than nothing. The Swift hybrid; a plug-in that can go a good 20km on its lithium-ion batteries without needing a charge. The Swift is a nimble little car so should do quite well with Hybrid technology in it.

There was plenty more from peeps that you have never heard of and are only relevant to the Japanese market, and a lot of racing cars and bikes on display too. But in terms of what you may see come 2012 on the great roads of Australia, this would be it.

Damian Francis is the editor-at-large for Australian T3 and contributing technology editor for GQ Australia. He was in Japan as a guest of Toyota Australia and wishes he was in Abu Dhabi last weekend for the final round of the F1. Twilight racing – unbelievable!

Toyota, whose Prius is easy on the environment to drive but horrible on it to make, has engineered a new type of flower to help shoulder some of the damage their factories are spitting out.

The sage derivative’s leaves have unique characteristics that absorb harmful gases, while the gardenia’s leaves create water vapour in the air, reducing the surface temperature of the factory surrounds and, therefore, reducing the energy needed for cooling, in turn producing less carbon dioxide (CO2).

Well, holy shit. That is pretty insane. [Drive via Treehugger]

OK, so when I say ‘tearing up’ I don’t mean Formula 1 style. Being that this is a small room it certainly looks like she has some speed behind her though. The i-REAL leans into its corners for a better center of gravity, allowing her to maintain speed while cornering. It looks pretty cool too. It must be said that the woman test driver is small and is only just fitting in the vehicle. Some of the journos here are going to struggle to get in this thing. I think even I will, and I’m just five foot ten by the old tape.

As we watch her go another Toyota rep explains how the i-REAL works. The vehicle is operated very simply. There are dual joystick controls. Push forward to accelerate and push back to brake. We’re going to assume that you can figure out how to go left and right so we won’t insult your intelligence but telling you the rest of the rep’s speech.

Being that the i-REAL is powered by a lithium ion battery it is virtually silent while moving. A single charge will get you up to 30km and obviously be a hell of a lot better for the environment than a petrol powered car or bike. And being that you can hit top speeds of 30kph, you could actually do 30km in a day without spending the whole day on the i-REAL.

Imagine tearing up the pavement in one of these things while you watch those suckers stuck on the highway in peak hour traffic. Thankfully the 30kph speed will allow you to get away from the school kids that will, no doubt, be hurling eggs at you if you did that.

Being a Japanese invention it isn’t be complete without some sort of quirky bit. And here it is: The back of the i-REAL is a huge LED display that’s completely customisable. You can change it as you would your desktop wallpaper. The lady demonstrating the device currently has multi-coloured flashes shooting across the back of the i-REAL. We’ve also seen flower petals, cherry blossoms, waterfalls and sparks.

The display is all well and good, but can you imagine what would happened if this vehicle was actually released in Australia? I’m picturing displays with “If you can read this you can probably smell that I haven’t showered today”, or “NERDS RULE!”, or “Bite me Neil Armstrong”, or “Toyotas slowly, quietly and environmentally consciously urinate on Fords and Holdens”. Ummm, I seem to have forgotten why I am here. Ah yes, to test drive this thing.

Before I get behind the controls, I must mention the social networking aspect of the i-REAL. Yes, that’s right, social networking. The i-REAL features social networking applications. You can speak to other i-REAL users while you’re on the run and geotag sights and places that you like as well. Potentially you and your i-REAL mates could organise to meet up while you are flying around on one.

And now for the test-drive itself. It has to be said that I’m slightly anxious about using this thing. I have never used any sort of vehicle like this and I know it’s worth quite a bit of money. Luckily the chaps from Toyota are directing the journos as they test them.

The vehicle is quite something. As I first get in, I struggle to get my shoulders comfortable in the tiny seat. Unfortunately we aren’t allowed to just go for it Lewis Hamilton style. An instructor is guiding as around the room and making sure we don’t take flight.

I find the i-REAL simple to operate, with buttons on both armrests of the vehicle. There’s a mode that allows you to get in it, as well as park, walk, and cruise modes. You just press whichever button you need and hey presto, the i-REAL is ready to go. Then it’s just a case of moving the joysticks to go.

The difference between walk and cruise is the position the i-REAL takes when in motion and the speed it can achieve. When you put it in cruise mode the back wheel extends to give the vehicle a lower centre of gravity and a headrest pops out the back. It’s almost like a Formula 1 style driving position.

The i-REAL responds brilliantly to your commands through the joystick offering instant feedback. The only issue is the suspension, or lack thereof. Driving on carpet feels a bit like taking a rally car for a spin. You can feel every bump and grind through the ergonomic seat. If it’s like that on carpet, imagine what it would be like on a pavement!

Having said that though this is an early model and Toyota say that we should expect improvements and developments on the i-REAL. According to Makoto Morita, the i-REAL project manager, we could see these commercially available in four to five years time at a price well under $10,000. What you would use it for is questionable. Aside from the suspension issues, there is no weather protection. But as a vehicle for the airport or mall, it could be fantastic.

In terms of the fun factor though, I get off the i-REAL with a smile larger than Krusty the Clown during a Krusty Burger commercial. It’s pretty awesome.

Damian Francis is the editor-at-large for Australian T3 and contributing technology editor for GQ Australia. He was in Japan as a guest of Toyota Australia.

1) Check out the news of the new Toyota FT-EV II here at SMH.com.au. I didn’t have enough time to write this up with the rest of the stories but it is certainly a great car and a good look at the future and Toby Hagon, who was on this trip with us thanks to Toyota, did a rather good write up as per usual.

2) Be sure to keep looking out for Tokyo Motor Show news next week when a few of the more detailed features will hit the site. While it’s yet to be confirmed it will probably be a detailed rundown of everything at the motorshow as well as my test ride of the i-REAL and a few other bits and pieces of gold.

Enjoy your weekend!

Damian Francis is the editor-at-large for Australian T3 and contributing technology editor for GQ Australia. He is in Japan as a guest of Toyota Australia and thought posting for Giz was pretty cool.

Damian Francis is the editor-at-large for Australian T3 and contributing technology editor for GQ Australia. He is in Japan as a guest of Toyota Australia.

Damian Francis is the editor-at-large for Australian T3 and contributing technology editor for GQ Australia. He is in Japan as a guest of Toyota Australia.