[ExI] Fuel efficient car for anywhere but America

[Alfio Puglisi]

On Sun, Apr 10, 2011 at 9:50 AM, BillK <pharos at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Sun, Apr 10, 2011 at 7:05 AM, The Avantguardian  wrote:
> >
> >
> > http://www.greencar.com/articles/vw-polo-bluemotion-tops-70-mpg.php
> >
> >
> > This car runs on diesel, has a top speed of 109 mph, has lower CO2
> emissions
> > than a Prius,on and gets a whopping 70 miles to the gallon.
> >
> > So here is a riddle for you:
> > Why can't we get this in North America?
> >
> >
>
>
> Because you've been naughty and don't deserve it!     ;)
>
> No, really it is because
> 1) US gas prices(including tax) need to double to get nearer to
> European prices before economical cars become a significant user
> demand.
> 2) The very economical European cars tend to be too small for US
> preferences.
>
> This article is from 2008 and there are now in 2011 many standard
> production European cars (diesel or hybrid) that will get over 70 mpg
> on mixed city / freeway driving (called combined cycle mpg). You have
> to adjust for US gallons, though, by dividing by 1.2.   So 70 mpg
> European = 58.3 mpg US - quite a difference!
>

This is correct, but note that the greencar.com's article used American
gallons: 3.8 liters/100 km translates to 62 mpg, so the 48 city / 74 highway
is valid for the US. There may be some difference in the standards used to
calculate the fuel consumption, though.
What you call the "European" gallon is actually the UK gallon, which is
unknown to us continental southerners. Actually, most people don't even know
that some kind of gallon is used this side of the atlantic pond :-)



>
> Use
> <http://carfueldata.direct.gov.uk/search-by-fuel-economy.aspx>
> to search for over 50 cars with better than 70 mpg (European).
>
>
> BillK
>
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