Everyone want to save a few dollars and save the world but they forget the law of unexpected consequences. If everybody drove cars that get 60 MPG or more, the oil companies would not know what to do with all of the excess gasoline.
As they did before gasoline started to be used as a motor fuel, they would once again need to burn it off at the refineries. Getting rid of it is the only way they can refine down to the carbon based products of crude, where the big profits lay.
To make up for all the lost revenue the commodities buyers will bid the per barrel price up to well over $100 and gasoline will be over $5 at the pump. LOL
mike
> Last night on our local news there was an elderly couple interviewed
>> about their _brand_ new_ Prius. "When I saw the EPA rating of 60 miles
>> per gallon I said to my wife, we got to get this car." He goes on to say
>> he only gets 41 miles to a gallon. Then the couple is seen driving off
>> with him in the front passenger seat. I nearly fell off the couch
>> laughing. I guess his wife is determined to *make it work*.
>> ----------
>>
> All the while not knowing it *is* working. Few people actually keep track
> of the fuel consumption they are experiencing, and to see it presented is
> a shock. My daughter was shocked to find her '93 Accord 4-cyl automatic
> getting barely 20 mpg in town. Prius owners too seldom realize the in-town
> economy they are seeing is twice what they had before and that few people
> get EPA estimates in any car, especially on congested streets and with
> short trips. (Hybrids are not affected much by stop and go but are hit
> just as badly by warm-up.) That will probably get worse as efficiency gets
> better, because efficiency rarely affects fixed losses. In the Prius,
> there is too little waste heat from the engine in town to operate the
> heater at full output, so the engine runs just to heat the occupants. >
> BTW - I agree about the multi-function display. I keep mine dimmed. >
> Mike (averaging 46 mpg commuting three miles in his 2002 Prius). >
>