"A SUV That Gets More Than 100 Miles Per Gallon and Reduces Emissions is Targeted"

MPG numbers are meaningless for PHEVs, as there is no agreed-upon test procedure. It's just marketing smoke and mirrors.

"A SUV That Gets More Than 100 Miles Per Gallon and Reduces Emissions is Targeted"

I didn't see any mention that the vehicle was to be an SUV in this article, the previous article, or the link. Is it mentioned somewhere else?

Harvey D said (above) that the MPG numbers are meaningless. He is 100% correct.

You could buy a PHEV and then on the way home you stop and pour in literally "one gallon" of gasoline.

Then you plug it in everynight for the rest of your life.

Assuming that you never drive beyond the "electric driving range" of the vehicle on any given day - the gasoline engine would never kick in.

Then, lets say 10 years past and you decide to sell the car with 10,000 miles on the odometer.

Does that mean you got 10,000 miles to a gallon?

No - I don't think so.

Harvey D is correct - we need to develope a realistic method of calculating MPG for PHEVs.

DOH !!!

Sorry Rafel. I misread who posted your original thought.

Anyway dude - You are right on the money.

This industry needs some well defined standards.

why not standardize the fuel consumption to kWh/km (EMEA,ASEAN) or km/kWh (US,JP); and limit this to tank-to-wheel (although this would hide a lot of the energy costs for hydrogen powered cars)...

You can easily calculate the kWh / gallon (liter) of current test fuel (and even real-world fuel)...

After a one or two year grace period with simultaneous labelling of new cars with both numbers, continue with only the new scheme...

Why not label the PHEV with all electric range in miles as well as mpg once the ICE kicks in? If the ICE kicks in at a certain speed, list that too.

Kilowatt hours are probably a good measure to put on there as well, though many are going to want a formula for a more direct mpg comparison, and that's where it gets tricky.

Hmm and I got a day order to sell jan covered call at 17.50...Glad I up the strike, have to see what the institutions do.eh Just tring to collect a little rent to buy more:-)

Peace

Hi Roger,

Welp, Priuschat is down for new posts, but I was reading through one of the threads. Various new Prii owners were looking for comebacks to ignorami comments from various aquantances. So, I updated my spread sheet that I used, taking out the 3150 tax break, and upgrading the vehicle to something with similar legroom, comfort, stowage cpability, acceleration performance and similar popularity here in Chicagoland - a Pontiac G6 base (4 cylinder). The Prius has better stowage, but the G6 is a little quicker, so the two cars are an overall similarity. The 12 K mi/year break even came out at 3.10 years (37200 miles). The spread sheet uses lifetime costs for mantenance, normalized to a per/year costs for both vehicles, besides gas mileage ($3.00/gal yearly average) and new car costs(including sales tax and license) and cost of lost savings interest (assumes a cash purchase).

So, the HSD HEV costs are quite inline with present vehicle expenditures, just slanted towards the up-front costs. As long as the break even time is less than the life of car, the costs are in line. By evaluating the overall cost of ownership for the life of vehicle, resale differences will be accounted for. The HSD HEV has the smaller maintenance costs (fewer brake refurbishments, no starter or alternator repairs, more reliable - mechanically simpler transmission). A break even life of 3.1 years is fantastic, meaning a reduction of costs if the ownership lasts beyond 3.1 years. Which is a good bet with the lower repairs of the HSD. People primarily trade cars in at 3 years to 5 years, to avoid the hassle of unexpected repairs. With the HSD HEV, repairs from the 3 to 5 years are greatly reduced, so longer ownerships would be the result.

This might be why GM was against HEV's, as two of their major profit centers - repair facilities and finance, take a major hit with a HSD style HEV vehicle.

Your recommendation was the implied conclusion of "Who Killed the Electric Car". That there was a under-the-table agreement between car makers and CARB that the car makers would implement the HEV solution , in return for being let out of the zero-emissions requirement. And it deffinately made allot of sense back in the late 90's due to the lack of battery mass-production experience.

The issue then is if its time to ratchet up on the energy performance (to the PHEV) or not? Has the Prius investment been amortized? Have battery technologies been upgraded with the Prius investments ? Hard to say from a industry outsider point of view. GM is betting 2010 is the year for it to all come together apparently.

Thanks, donee, for the info.

Of course, "planned obsolescence" is the modus operandi of car and electronic mfg's. They would make it so that you would feel the urge to splurge for new models every few years, whether one really needs to do it or not!
Profit motive weighs heavily on any big businesses. However, due to severe competition, large discounts at the expense of profits have to be given in order to maintain sales in order to ensure the company's solvency. Likewise, mfg's often time have to make high-quality, low-maintenance products in order to compete for market share. GM will have no choice but to make high-quality, low-maintenance products (full HEV's) in order to survive in business.

Sulleny,
Are you the little green alien who is spying on Earth? Call Home, ET!