Comments on: Mpg or gpm?

By: Eric Wolff

Eric Wolff — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 14:59:07 +0000

I am curious about these solar powered hybrids, but I haven’t had time recently to read up on them. Have solar cells become efficient enough to recharge bateries in a timely manner? could be agreat solution for SoCal. Though I think we already have the solution for everyone, the plug-in hybrid. 40 miles on the battery, everything else in hybrid mode. But how often do you exceed 40 miles a day?

And of course, even better than that, is to live close to work, as Eric does. But alas, my office and Miriam’s office are too far apart for that to be an option.

By: Hao

Hao — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 02:53:12 +0000

Hopefully solar-recharged hybrids will enter the market “soon”. For people who only drive ~12k miles/year in sunny areas (SoCal, for instance?), I would imagine one wouldn’t need to purchase fuel much at all, except for extended road trips and the like.

By: J.P.

J.P. — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 19:10:29 +0000

In the Netherlands I pay € 5,98 a gallon, the next car will be one which might not be available on the US market, a Daihatsu Cuore.

By: Eric

Eric — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 19:53:45 +0000

Good point, but we don’t have good public transport at all. Stinks, in fact, but we live very close to work and play.

I wish we had the public transport system of Germany or Japan. When I lived in Germany I didn’t own a car at all. Neither did my wife when she lived there (before we married). We took bus and train mostly. I only rented a car to go to Bavaria.

Fortunately most of our activities are in easy walking distance (1-2 miles) and my work/school is in bike commuting distance (under 10 miles). I am fortunate that much of my work can be done at home (video & multimedia stuff). Spring through fall I bike to work/school as much as possible (7am classes are my nemesis)

The only problem is that our situation is relatively unique.

By: Eric Wolff

Eric Wolff — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 14:40:14 +0000

- Eric: Yeah, well, when you have reasonable public transportation, you can skip the driving a bit more, eh?

- Kevin z: Of course you are correct that the curve will continue upward, but aren’t you at least a bit surprised that you don’t save more at these high gas prices? Two years ago Consumer Reports projected $5 a gallon gas for 2012, and it still wasn’t worth buying a Prius on strictly financial grounds. We can debate this more when I work out the rest of the math.

- Greg: I’m not so sure that people can’t do algebra so much as they don’t.

By: Greg

Greg — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 03:28:03 +0000

I drove about 45000 miles in about 42 months, and I’ve always had a relatively short commute, so 12000 seems reasonable to me.

If this study really has an impact, though, what it really verifies to me is that people can’t do algebra for themselves.

By: kevin z

kevin z — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 02:30:46 +0000

Over the course of 10 years, the savings would be worth $7,200.

But that the min. because you are assuming the price will not change from $4.50/gal. during that 10 yrs. If you modeled the gas price curve (i’m sure its done, too lazy to Google) and came up with an annual rate of change and then recalculated, the saving would be MUCH high I think.

By: Eric

Eric — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 02:15:58 +0000

12,000 mile/year ?!!!??!?! WTF?
Wow. No wonder my insurance adjuster laughed when we asked if there was a rate for a car that gets driven 2000 miles per year average.