Every time I read about gas prices in Europe, I'm reminded how various groups in the US advocate raising gas taxes as a method to push people into more efficient electric vehicles, hybrids, fuel-cells, hydrogen ICE, etc.

And then I wonder: Why do people think it would work here when it hasn't worked in Europe ?

There are plenty of technologies -- from li-ion batteries to aluminum oxidation hydrogen on demand -- that are reported as viable if gas reaches $5 gallon.

Well, it has been higher than that in Europe for a long time now, yet these technologies are not being widely adopted there. So what gives ? Why haven't the high taxes on petroleum fuels in Europe ushered in alternatives ?

It may not have pushed them to alternatives but it has had an impact on their overall fleet economy. I think we are now seeing the beginning of the switch and part of that is the perception that gas prices may never come down again.

We should not complain about higher oil prices. It is a blessing because it creates better incentives for the development of green alternatives. Let’s hope peek oil starts really soon (maybe it has already) and let it be a slow one so that we don’t experience dramatic increases in the oil price. A gradual increase with $10 more a year for a couple of years just like the gradual increase we have seen the past 5 years. That will be perfect for the environment and for the economy. The past increase from $20 to $60 did not affect world growth, at all, and neither will an increase from $60 to $120 if it takes 6 years. This would leave plenty of time for people and companies to adapt.

Democracy is a European invention and it is very much alive and still doing well in Europe.

Fuel taxes in Europe are equal for fossil fuels and bio fuels therefore we still need higher gasoline prices to make bio fuels truly competitive. Automotive grade lithium batteries has barely been invented and introduced into the market. They will come like the Think is evidence of but they will be expensive at least $35000 for the super mini Think car that compares with a $15000 gasoline car. To justify this price differential we need much higher gasoline prices or much lower battery prices. It will be a bit of both that will do it.

Kirk:
I think the answer is Big Oil controls the politicians; In the U.S. its campaign contributions and false real estate deals, etc. In Dictatorships its a plain pay off. And, I'm sure it ain't any different in Europe. The idea has always been to control the energy market and they have been very successful at it; however, Lately the worldwide demand for car fuel has lessened their control because market forces now figure into the pricing equations.

It is interesting to discover that We import gasoline; I didn't know that and it helps to understand how the demand in Europe will affect the price we pay here. We are now not only competing for raw oil but also for the finished product, gasoline, directly with Europe.

And all the while our Congress and President stand around debating other relative minor issues and taking directions from Big Oil and Big Auto. God help Us!

Kirk ,

your answer lies with the big car manufacturers , who are in league with
european governments who take nearly 80 % of the pump price in tax ,
then you have the european free press who depend on our great car
industrys for 40 % of their advertising revenues , and who are all to
quick to pour scorn on any kind of alternative fuelled car unless its
biodiesel or ethanol the list just goes on ............
And meanwhile more and more people get sicker and sicker
living in our smog filled diesel utopia , more and more poor guys get
killed putting the meat on the bush familys table ,and according to
the latest news the world slides futher and further towards the point of
no return !
But never mind its only about 210 days to christmas !

Cervus ,
Try living and cycling around in present day europe , its no fun,
look at the figures for young children , with onset of cronic asthma !
somthing is not right , meanwhile our goverments keep taking the cash
from road fuel !

Kirk -

as Lambreja and Patrick have already pointed out, around 50% of new LDV registrations in Europe are diesels. The shift to diesel is the main reason Europe#s fleet average fuel economy has actually improved since the mid-'90s, albeit by too little.

Also, diesels have historically had serious pollution side effects. The new wall-flow DPFs will eventually all but elminate PM emissions from vehicles. However, NOx limits are still 3x those for gasoline cars and won#t be tightened until Euro 6 (2014).

Wrt to alternatives, note that Audi built the first hybrid electric production car (the Duo) back in the '90s, before the Prius even existed. It failed in the marketplace, as did later attempts at super-frugal cars with conventional ICEs (e.g. A2 with all-aluminium body, Lupo 3L). BMW collaborated with the German Space Agency on hydrogen-powered ICEs. All of these flopped in the market for a variety of reasons, including immature technology, mediocre value for money, a still-balkanized car market, etc.

But most of all, they failed because European consumers are much more reluctant to be early adopters of new technology than US consumers are. Over here, you don't get bragging rights for voluntarily making a purchase for some purported common good. Europeans detest free riders, so if something needs to be done about energy security, global climate or any other collective asset, they expect the state to step in and force everyone to do their part. That's a big psychological difference to the US and, why European car makers are doggedly sticking to the tried-and-true strategy of incremental improvements.

In the past few years, some of the most notable have been advances in turbocharging, variable valve trains and direct injection. The fact that the US cannot refine enough gasoline for its own use is working against the introduction of these fuel-saving strategies on A/B/C segment vehicles in Europe, which arguably should be running on gasoline rather than diesel. As indicated, compensating by harmonizing fuel taxes between countries and between these two fuels is proving very difficult.

The upshot is that Europe has to import finished diesel from iffy places like Iran just so virtually the entire US LDV fleet can run on gasoline.

Its also worth pointing out that we, certainly in the UK are paying LESS for our gasoline than the Americans just now.

At 95.9p/litre the retail cost before tax is 33.26p/litre.

At $1.98 -> £1, thats $2.49 per US gallon.

In most US states gas taxes are rarely $0.5/gallon so when gas is $3+ per gallon then the pre tax price is cheaper in Europe.

I'd guess that the pre tax price of gas in the US averages about $2.70/gal right now.

So we may pay more in taxes, but we're giving less to the oil companies.

And as someone else has alluded, if the European consumer ever figures out that our high petrol prices are being caused by exporting refined gasoline to the US, then expect to see some major complaining.

It would be interesting to see what our politicians reactions would be to that one.

I drive a very fuel efficient car (petrol fuelled) and I'm beginning to resent the fact that we're not befitting from surplus gasoline refining capacity in Europe as most folk have switched to diesel, simply because inefficient Americans are bidding up the price to import finished product.

The yanks are lucky that we've even got this spare export capacity. If we hadn't changed our light fleet to diesel in the mid-late 90's we wouldn't be exporting nearly as much gasoline and then prices would be even worse.

Andy

High fuel taxes in Europe stem from the enormous influence of the mass transit lobbies, the powerful clout of the environmentalists and and especially the strength of the anti-car movement over there. Yet...they don't seem to be any better off at this point energywise.

There are several reasons that people in Europe don't drive electric or other non-petrol vehicles massively:
1) Dont't believe in that our high tax charges on transportation fuels are used to force customers to switch to more env-friedly energy sources - it's a smoke. That taxes are essentially necessary for social-blown budgets and it's clear that any significant apperance of non-petrol transportation energy sources will be heavily taxed as well, so there's no long-term benefit from switching.
2) Euros are accustomed to make use of public transportation and Europe is denser populated that US. That causes higher usage of public transport, including electric trains.
3) Cars in Europe are smaller and have lower fuel consumption and annual mileage so the overall fuel expenses are lower that would be for US transportation style for the same fuel prices.
4) Alternative fuels are extensively used - particularly in Poland there's vaste LPG-fueled cars fleet. Also, I also could notice great usage of rapeseed oil for diesel heavy trucks - not counted in official reports and completely illegal because this oil is not taxed for transportation usage.

Andy:

Because of massive switch to diesel cars, European refineries have surplus gasoline refining capacity. So they just utilize it, selling gasoline to US, rather than keeping it idling. In long run it will probably change, because slowly adopting in EU taxation according to CO2 emissions will decrease price difference between gasoline and diesel. Also, direct injection gasoline engines are catching-up with higher thermal efficiency of diesel engines.