By Nick Chambers •
August 1, 2008
According to a survey commissioned by Cars.com during July, about 50% of US consumers don’t believe that Obama or McCain has a magic rabbit up their sleeve that will lower prices at the pump any time soon
Turns out, 50% of people in the US are wiser than I thought: there is no quick fix or simple solution.
Another interesting result from the survey: 48% of consumers don’t see McCain or Obama as having a particular advantage when trying to work with the auto industry to bring more fuel efficient or plug-in vehicles to the market in the future.
By Nick Chambers •
July 30, 2008
Enova Systems and IC Corporation have delivered a plug-in hybrid diesel electric bus to Denali National Park for use in carting visitors around the pristine wilderness.
The bus (similar to the one pictured above) has a GVWR of 27,500 pounds, carries up to 38 passengers and uses up to 70% less fuel than a similarly equipped conventional bus — so if the bus got 10 mpg with a conventional engine, it could get 30 mpg using Enova’s hybrid system.
By Nick Chambers •
July 10, 2008
The PLX Kiwi dashboard computer plugs into your car and provides real-time info on how your driving habits affect gas usage — and how to correct them for maximum fuel efficiency.
There are lots of gas saver devices out there that claim to help you increase your car’s fuel economy. Most of them are of questionable effectiveness — to put it mildly — relying on such things as magnets, mini-tornadoes, and fuel tank pills. I’ve covered some of them in a previous post about potential fuel saving scams.
The sheer number of such questionable gas saving devices makes it difficult for the average person to distinguish the effectiveness of any single one of them. It also instills a general feeling of distrust that any of them could actually work.
By John Ivanko •
July 2, 2008
Like the rest of nature that evolves remarkably to stresses in the environment, people will be able to adapt to high gas prices. Really. In many parts of Europe, people are paying upwards of $7 - $8/gallon of gas.
Things will change here in the USA. These changes will sometimes more difficult for some than others. More of us are already using public transportation, riding bikes — even moving closer to where we work or pressuring employers to offer flextime (to avoid rush hours) or telecommuting from home. In part thanks to the mushrooming energy costs, how much of business was done in the period of relatively inexpensive oil and other fossil fuels will morph into a new model of business model where energy costs are front and center.
Another trend: the explosion of people starting their own green business as an ecopreneur, operating their business without destroying the planet or exploiting people. Energy conservation and efficiency are often the very DNA of these enterprises. Eventually, the politicians in Washington DC might realize that opening up ANWR merely delays the reality that we need to cut our addiction to oil, for climate’s sake. We need to get back to 350 parts per million of carbon dioxide to maintain some degree of climate stability. Burning more oil, coal or natural gas is not the way.
By Nick Chambers •
June 26, 2008
Revetec, a little known company from the Gold Coast region of Australia, may be on to something huge: they’ve created an engine that is 50% smaller, 50% lighter, has 50% lower emissions and is cheaper to manufacture than a conventional internal combustion engine of the same horsepower. Oh yeah, did I mention that it doubles the fuel economy too.
What that means is a car like the 2007 Toyota Yaris, which is rated at 40 mpg on the highway, would get 80 mpg with a Revetec engine.
This isn’t some hoax… They have a prototype which has been attached to an actual vehicle and independently tested to substantiate their claims.
Editor’s note: Think a hybrid car is your only option for achieving significant gas savings? Think again: our friends at Low Impact Living point out several alternatives to investing in a new Prius. This post was originally published on Tuesday, May 27, 2008.
When I filled up my car this weekend with $4.09 gas (choke, gasp, sputter), I was sure glad I have a Toyota Prius and won’t have to fill up for another couple of weeks. But I hear from a lot of folks that they think they can’t afford a hybrid and they have to hang on to their sub-20 MPG cars. That got me to thinking about ways to find affordable hybrid options so folks can save money and reduce their contribution to global warming. Here is what I’ve found.
Buy a used hybrid! The Honda Civic Hybrid is probably your most affordable choice, as they are quite a bit cheaper than my beloved Priuses. (What is the plural of Prius? Priuses? Pri-i?) The Civic Hybrid gets 40-45 MPG and is a great all-around commuter car. I searched and found a 2005 Honda Civic Hybrid with 49,000 miles for $16,000 in Los Angeles. I found a 2006 model in Kansas City with 52,000 miles for $18,000. The only Toyota Prius I could find in LA for under $20K had 79,000 miles on it! You might also try looking for Ford Escape Hybrids– there seem to be many of those available around the country. You can search for used hybrids in your city by clicking here.
The White House has outlined their plan to increase fuel efficiency standards to 35 MPG by 2020, a move that will save Americans an estimated $100 billion in fuel costs.
The mandate was outlined in last year’s energy bill in December, but this proposal gives a boost to the timeline by requiring the mileage of passenger vehicles to average 31.6 MPG by 2015. That’s up from today’s average of 25 MPG (which I can’t help but mentioning is identical to the mileage of the original Model T Ford).
When I sat down with Enterprise Rent-a-Car’s VP of Corporate Responsibility and Communications Pat Farrell, and Christine Conrad, VP of Public Relations, in January, both spent a fair amount of time talking about the company’s large fleet of greener vehicles: hybrids, flex-fuel vehicles, and higher-mileage cars. As a couple of commenters noted on those posts, though, finding the greener car you want may be a challenge. Enterprise’s Dan Miller, general manager for Atlanta, also heard these concerns from their customers (particularly corporate accounts), so he decided to do something about it. Now, Atlanta residents wanting to rent either a hybrid or higher-mileage (28 mpg or higher) vehicle from the company know where to go: one of the area’s four “green” branches.
Each of these branches carries stocks about 100 cars, and about 60% of the vehicles at each branch consist of greener vehicles. In a short call last week, Pat (and colleague Lisa Martini) told me that these branches are not focusing on flex-fuel vehicles, as the fueling infrastructure in Atlanta doesn’t support their widespread use. He also noted that Miller’s decision was based on “the need for green in Atlanta” because of the high amounts of traffic congestion, as well as customer demand for the vehicles. He stressed throughout the call, though, that this was a “grassroots” decision: Enterprise sees itself as a “confederation of local operations (owner Andy Taylor’s phrase), and Miller’s decision reflects any local managers ability to manage his/her fleet to meet local needs. He expects that other regional managers will be watching developments in Atlanta closely.
Ypsilanti, Michigan is in the outlying suburbs of Detroit and is, itself, a city with a long automotive heritage going back to the Tucker Torpedo and Kaiser Motors and extending to a present day Ford assembly plant and the last Hudson dealership in the country and an Automotive Heritage Museum. But now, a local couple have embarked on a different direction towards automobiles, encouraging drivers to embrace a new mindset with a website called DriveSlowly, which they are unveiling for Earth Day.
Despite our hopes and best plans, sometimes we still have to drive. And while that high-end, high-performance hybrid remains out of our budget, we’d still like to do better with the vehicles we have. One way to accomplish that is by just driving a bit more slowly.
By Jennifer Lance •
February 24, 2008
Winner of a Shell sponsored contest and Guinness Book of World Records holder, this 1959 Opel got 376 MPG! At other contests sponsored by Shell, they achieved 49.73 MPG in 1939, 149.95 MPG in 1949 with a 1947 Studebaker, 244.35 MPG in 1968 with a 1959 Fiat 600, and 376.59 MPG in 1973 with this 1959 Opel.
Sources:
Race-cardrivers.com
It’s the only one we have
Treehugger
