Apparently, people are really starting to see the benefits of owning a hybrid car. According to figures released this week by Toyota, sales of the iconic Toyota Prius, the first hybrid to be mass marketed, have now surpassed the 1 million mark. From January to April 2008 dealers sold 66,100 Prius units, a pace that, should it continue, will bring end of the year sales to 198,300 an increase of 7.9% over 2007. Currently overall sales are smaller in Japan and Europe, but climbing at a faster rate than in the North American market, which is suffering fallout from the weak credit market and anxieties about recession.

Since the Prius was first launched in 1997, cumulative sales of the gas-electric hybrid have reached 1.028 million as of the end of April 2008. It is estimated that use of the vehicle over the past ten years has accounted for a decrease in global carbon dioxide emission of 4.5 million tons.

For the first four months of 2008 there were 24,200 Prius sales in Japan, an improvement that should generate a 24.5% increase over 2007 for that market by the end of the year. In Europe, Prius sales in the first four months reached 14,200 units, a projected increase of 32.3 percent over 2007 by the end of the year.

Toyota has a stated goal of selling 1 million hybrid vehicles per year by the early 2010s. Many are getting Priuses due to the fact that it can really be customized to utilize electric power. This means that you can actually charge the car as would a cell phone. There are still many that aren’t completely sold on the whole hybrid-car thing however, with these abovementioned number, things are really changing fast.