The past decade has been a pretty incredible time for advances in sustainable transportation. All over the globe, scientists and engineers have worked harder than ever to create greener ways to get around. In looking back, three developments stand out in particular.
Gas prices in California are finally starting to drop after a series of record highs, following a fire at a Chevron refinery and a power outage at an Exxon Mobil facility, hurting Californians at the pump, and leading to calls for investigations into price manipulation. Of course, you’ve read this story many times before. Now, imagine the same series of events, but with a crucial difference ― your car has the ability to run on multiple fuels. What if, instead of just driving around for the gas station that has the least painful price, you could choose between fuels, and switch to an alternative when the price of gasoline goes through the roof?
At utility giant PG&E, 190 electric trucks are now used to keep things running. If a neighborhood has a power outage, a troubled truck rolls in. A technician is lifted high in the air to look at a transformer on a pole. Auxiliaries can be run for hours including test equipment into a communications. These plug-in trucks can be used twice as many hours per day as diesel trucks with legal noise restrictions. By switching from diesel to electric, PG&E pays for the electric trucks in 2.5 years according to Dave Meisel, Director Transportation for Services for PG&E.
By 2015, Toyota will be selling 21 hybrids globally. The Prius family will expand beyond the current four models: Liftback, Compact C, Crossover V, and Plugin. I was once asked, “Why would anyone buy a hybrid when you can’t cost-justify the premium?” I paid about a $4,000 premium to buy my 2002 Prius, and then sold it seven years later for a $3,000 premium. The Prius had saved me over $5,000 in gasoline when gas was cheaper than today.
Research conducted by UC Berkeley economists and the California Electric Transportation Coalition shows that fueling California’s cars and trucks with electricity instead of oil would help grow the state’s economy, creating tens of thousands of new jobs.
This city traffic is heavy and the parking space is tight. Like Luke Skywalker, I listen to “The Force” and I let go of the steering wheel. This 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid then parks itself. The Fusion Hybrid starts at $27,200 delivering 47 MPG, a $6,000 premium over the least expensive Fusion that delivers 26 MPG.
An estimated 691 million passenger cars were on the world’s roads in 2011. When both light- and heavy-duty trucks are included, the number rises to 979 million vehicles, which was 30 million more than just a year earlier. By the end of 2012, the global fleet could top 1 billion vehicles—-one for every seven people on the planet.
A new survey of some 1,400 California Nissan LEAF owners reveals that 89% of owners use their LEAF as their primary car and own a second gasoline fueled car, that they drive an average of 800 electric-fueled miles per month, and many pay the equivalent of $0.90 to $1.90 per gallon of gasoline to power their electric vehicles.
Delivery trucks are increasingly hybrids that sip diesel and gasoline instead of gulping. Thousands of trucks are now all-electric. 4.5 million vehicles in the U.S. are short-haul delivery vehicles. Although it would be impractical to get a big long-haul truck across the nation on electricity, it can be practical to charge 100 short-haul delivery trucks at the warehouse where they load.
With this PlugWiz tool, you can compare the fueling costs and CO2 emissions of different electric car models with your present car. We know that purchasing a new car is a big decision and hopefully this PlugWiz tool will help.