Detroit, MI — As with the Consumer Electronics Show this year, the annual North American International Auto Show had its fair share of green technology - both real and conceptual - on display.

Although the majority of new additions to the cleaner-car market are hybrids, companies are stepping up their work on all-electric vehicles, with some only a couple years away from launching zero-emission rides.

Ford Motor Company announced at the show plans to increase its investment in electric-vehicle technologies in Michigan to nearly $1 billion.

Building on an earlier commitment to spend $550 million to upgrade an existing truck-manufacturing plant in Wayne, Mich., into a state-of-the-art facility for building small vehicles like the just-announced global Ford Focus, Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. yesterday pledged $450 million to produce electric vehicles and batteries in the state.

Toyota announced plans to capitalize on the success of its Prius hybrid vehicle with a "family" of Priuses, including a concept compact-hybrid car unveiled at the Detroit show.

The FT-CH (pictured above) is one of eight new hybrid models that Toyota plans to launch in the coming years as a way of achieving its goals of selling one million hybrid vehicles per year early this decade.

In a statement released at the auto show, Toyota Motor Sales president Jim Lentz said, "Within the next 10 to 20 years, we will not only reach peak oil, we will enter a period where demand for all liquid fuels will exceed supply." Calling for the reinvention of the automobile a century after its development, Lentz said also that hybrids are the most successful reinvention of the car yet achieved.

In addition to the new family of Prius hybrids, Toyota plans to begin sales of plug-in hybrids and all-electric vehicles in 2012, and fuel-cell vehicles in 2015.

Audi's second electric concept car, the e-tron, (right) can hit 0 to 62 miles per hour in under six seconds. Weighing in at 2,976 pounds, the e-tron has two electric motors with a combined output of 150 kW. It also sports an operating range of up to 155 miles per electric charge, thanks to lithium-ion batteries located behind the passenger compartment and ahead of the rear axle.