If its this easy, and works like it should, perhaps this could be retrofitted to every older vehicle on the road today. That would save tremendous amounts of fuel. But I am skeptical.

Their links provide no real details that I could fine. Perhaps just a money pit for investors? Wheres the story/details?

Mark A.,

It looks as if you needed to go back further in time. Ricardo and Valeo first began collaboration on a mild hybrid system in 2002. So, something like the previously noted StARS Micro-Hybrid System, although Rafael was of the opinion that this could not be made into an after market product.

On the other hand, it looks as if the Gates EMD is such a product.

It would be a good thing to offer some sort of incentive for such responsible behavior on the part of taxi fleets in all metro areas.

This might be referred to as "low hanging fruit" or in this case does not do much, but easy to do. Considering how many miles get put on taxis every year, if you could retrofit all of them, you could save quite a bit of fuel.

A fringe benefit of idle-stop technology is that the catalytic converter stays hot, which means it should last longer.

In Europe and many other places (e.g. India), taxis tend to feature diesel engines. Idling those produces NOx and PM except the vehicle is fitted with special exhaust gas aftertreatment systems.

Traffic jams apart, most idling occurs at stop signs, traffic lights and when passenger get in or out of the vehicle. Taxis drivers usually just leave the windows down, but if you want air conditioning service in a vehicle equipped with idle-stop technology, there is a solution: a latent cold store can maintain a controlled climate in a closed passenger compartment for up to 40 seconds after the engine is cut.

..in Europe almost all Taxis/Cab are Diesel and the engine is widley used to warm the up the car during waiting for a customer, at least in winter time. Quite efficent, isn´t it.
So Mercs CDI is just as a heater...