The Lotus Ethos is a 2-door hatchback from Lotus, built from 2010, as electrification stopped being an experiment and the crossover took every market. Under the bonnet: 1.2 liter three-cylinder flex-fuel capable petrol engine. Donato Coco drew it.
Where it came from
The Lotus Ethos is a fully plug-in hybrid concept car that was unveiled at the 2010 Paris Motor Show as the "Lotus CityCar". The vehicle was developed by Lotus Engineering, a separate division from Lotus Cars.
The CityCar has a lithium battery pack with an all-electric range of 60 km (37 miles), and after the battery is depleted the 1.2-litre petrol engine kicks in to help with charging, allowing the car to run more than 500 km (310 miles). The concept car is designed for flex-fuel operation on ethanol, or methanol as well as regular petrol.
Under the skin
Power comes from 1.2 liter three-cylinder flex-fuel capable petrol engine. It weighs 1400 kg. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
In context
Its contemporaries in the catalogue — the Nissan Leaf, the Lexus LFA, the Jeep Grand Cherokee — show what else the money bought that year. Nearby in the Lotus catalogue sit the Lotus 100T and the Lotus 101.