I drive a big old Suburban with a 5.0 liter engine (growing up, it was a 350 cubic inch) and a lot of times, I am by myself. Yup, not exactly politically correct from an environmentalist viewpoint (doesn’t matter that my home is a passive solar home, or that my former home in MA was an active solar house (hot water and space heating).
That big blue beast is anathema! Some would say I am committing a crime against Gaia (the name for the Earth in a religious sense), that I am being selfish, burning all that gas all by myself, violating some as unwritten carbon tax law. Stating that it is paid for doesn’t seem to make any difference – when talking to those really into the environmental causes, I should be held responsible to go out and spend my hard earned money just to buy a gas efficient car – better still – a hybrid! Think Prius!
For these folks, it makes no difference that the economics of this just don’t play out. Looking at a gas powered car and its hybrid cousin carefully, you can see right from the get go that you are paying a premium for that enhanced gas economy. If the price of gas continues to drop, one might never recover the additional cost of "going green".
And, to back that up, comes this report (H/T: The Corner – National Review Online)
It’s easy to focus exclusively on gas mileage when making an environmentally conscious car choice. But there’s more to the story.
CNW Marketing Research Inc., an Oregon-based auto research spent two years collecting data on the energy necessary to plan, build, sell, drive and dispose of a vehicle from initial concept to scrappage. They call it a dust-to-dust analysis of the environmental impact of a car.
You may be surprised if you thought hybrids were the obvious winners.
"The Honda Accord Hybrid has an Energy Cost per Mile of $3.29 while the conventional Honda Accord is $2.18. Put simply, over the “Dust to Dust” lifetime of the Accord Hybrid, it will require about 50 percent more energy than the non-hybrid version, CNW claims."
And you may do a doubletake after reading this:
"For example, while the industry average of all vehicles sold in the U.S. in 2005 was $2.28 cents per mile, the Hummer H3 (among most SUVs) was only $1.949 cents per mile. That figure is also lower than all currently offered hybrids and Honda Civics at $2.42 per mile."
Basically, when considering all relevant variables such as materials, fabrication, plastics, carpets, chemicals, shipping, and transportation, gas mileage turns out to be significantly less relevant than many people assume.
Yup, a HUMMER is better than a Honda!!!! In trying to save energy, these pious people (or ignorant of all of the facts) who think that they can look down their collective noses down at me (even in my 4 cylinder Saab) have a bit of groveling to do.
Again, things are not always what they seem….
