The inside of the Orion VII hybrid diesel bus looks pretty much like that of a regular bus, though it has somewhat fewer seats and makes far less noise. San Francisco plans to put dozens of the Orion VIIs on the streets by next year.

The Sprinter, a plug-in hybrid delivery vehicle built by DaimlerChrysler. The company hasn’t committed to mass-producing these, but it is conducting tests in California. Plug-ins get far better gas mileage, especially below 40 miles per hour, than regular cars and even other hybrids because they mostly run on electricity.