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Also, I don't believe there's anything magic about the hybrid as an emissions scrubber. X amount of gasoline burned in a hybrid ICE has relatively the same emissions as X amount of gas burned in a ICE without hybrid. You have to burn less gas to make less exhaust, or am I missing something? Getting more power for the same emissions is not going to eliminate any smog, it will just help us make smog faster.
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I belive the hybrid system itself does promote better smog ratings, even aside from after-treatment. The primary way hybrid systems save fuel is by eliminating idling and using the motors in combination with the engine to keep the engien in a more efficient RPM range all the time. Not only are these RPM ranges inherently more fuel-efficient, they are also inherently cleaner per gallon burned than running the engine at idle or near-idle most of the time. As far as I know, this is one of the reasons why the Honda Hybrids with the CVT transmissions have scored slightly better than the manual transmission versions as there is less deviation from the optimal RPM range.