Honda size matters: does the engine or engineering count more in mpg?

My comments about the mpg rating of Honda's FIT in the US and its European equivalent in a recent op-ed piece for the San Francisco Chronicle provoked some interesting responses.

The comparison I used was taken from an earlier posting on this blog:

In the US, the EPA's mileage rating is between 28 to 35mpg for a Honda FIT. But the UK equivalent does around 52mpg.

This is far from the most extreme example. Compared with most US passenger vehicles, the Toyota Prius is a shining example at 48-51mpg, but its EU counterpart runs at around 70mpg. But this site lists the MiniCooper as the UK's most fuel efficient car at 72mpg whereas the US equivalent is around 35mpg.

Perhaps there was too much shorthand in the SF Chronicle piece.

@mrwhirly

The whole climate change issue is filled with information that is spun up to support one side or the other, this article is a good example, it states that the Honda Fit gets 55mpg in Europe compared to the same model sold in the U.S. with 33mpg., it may look the same but these vehicles are are very different, first off the Euro model would never pass the Smog Test requirements in the U.S. which is the reason you fail to note both vehicles emission output.

Second, the vehicle would not pass our collision tests for safety, if I removed most of the smog equipment from my car and reduced its weight by 500-1000 pounds it would get better mileage to.

The truth is the cars sold in the U.S. have the lowest emissions of any other vehicle market and are the safest.

If your going to write an article, WRITE IT RIGHT!

I didn't omit a comparison of tailpipe emissions for any other reason than space and pace … the point I was trying to make was that the person selling this car didn't know what the tailpipe emissions were. He should have known - you think it might be of casual interest given his line of work even if the federal or state governments don't mandate him to do so? He didn't even offer to find out the information where its supply is mandatory.

 Automakers are so reluctant to provide their customers with this information. I have never seen a single TV auto ad with grammes of CO2 per mile.  Consumer access to information is much harder than it is in Europe.

Last year's Honda Jazz 1.4 VTEC EST has emissions of 125g/km. It is easy to find this information on the DVLC website even for used cars as it determines your road tax rate.

Its US equivalent the Honda FIT 1.5 has emissions of around 300g/mile which is a good 100g/m more than the UK version. Emissions of ozone, etc, maybe less thanks to catalytic requirements in the US where smog is a real issue in urban areas.

But I'd be very interested to hear how the contention that tailpipe emissions in the US are less can be substantiated.

I do concede however that weight does play an important role - American motorists prefer larger "tophats" because, well everyone else has one, so it's safer, right? At least I think that the logic behind the upward trend since 1980s. But American consumers have paid for this with mpg improvement rates that have remained pretty much static for 30 years.

It's almost fair to say that they are not the same car. Not even Ford makes the same Focus for the US as the UK markets, though I'm told the European-style Focus is becoming more popular here. I hired a Ford Focus in the UK recently it had a 1.2 VETEC engine - you can't even buy a Ford Focus in the US at that size the smallest is 1.6.

And yet American motorists have been sold the lie that size matters. Tell that to Mercedes, BMW and Volkswagen who have tooled their engines to perform better with fewer litres.

The new Mercedes SLK 200 on sale in the UK does a smart 43.5mpg and spews out a modest 151g/km.

But it costs to get more out of less… and who in the US would pay $25k for a Honda FIT?

Obama steps up a gear with new standards on fuel efficiency for cars

Barack Obama pleasantly surprised many today with his announcement on fuel efficiency standards today – or at least he would have done if 54.5 mpg by 2025 target hadn’t been conveniently ‘leaked’ earlier in the week.

“This agreement on fuel standards represents the single most important step we’ve ever taken as a nation to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. Most of the companies here today were part of an agreement we reached two years ago to raise the fuel efficiency of their cars over the next five years. We’ve set an aggressive target and the companies are stepping up to the plate. By 2025, the average fuel economy of their vehicles will nearly double to almost 55 miles per gallon.”

At an increase of 5% a year, this is almost the highest rate of increase in fuel efficiency Obama could have opted for. Campaigners leveled their bargaining position at the highest rate, 6% from 2017, resulting in a 62mpg fleetwide. Some would have pushed for higher targets. The Ceres group for example published a report, More Jobs per Gallon, which sketched an economic scenario at the 6% rate:

“U.S. federal, state, and local government tax revenues increase by $9.5 billion under six percent scenario, from more than $9 billion (2009 dollars) under the three percent scenario to nearly $19 billion (2009 dollars) under the six percent scenario.”

Most economists would agree that increasing fuel efficiency would divert money from the 55% of oil imports for vehicles and pump that into the economy instead of fuel tanks.

And the Obama administration has done its own maths, estimating that American families will save $1.7 trillion in fuel costs and cut oil consumption by 12 billion barrels of oil “and by 2025 reduce oil consumption by 2.2 million barrels a day – as much as half of the oil we import from OPEC every day.”

Driving Efficiency: Cutting Costs for Families at the Pump and Slashing Dependence on Oil, also estimates that the standards will cut more than 6 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas over the life of the program – more than the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by the United States last year.

But what was billed even by campaigners as a “historic compromise” could equally be described as a “historic achievement.”

Obama had invited Ford, GM, Chrysler, BMW, Honda, Nissan, Toyota and Volvo among others as well as the United Auto Workers.

But perhaps the key player in this was Mary Nichols, the chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board who had also been invited to the announcement in Washington.

Carb has been working behind the scenes with the EPA, the DOT and NHTSA to thrash out a deal that the auto-industry would agree to and submitted its suggestions in June. The fact that this compromise was agreed to way before the September 1 deadline is testament to the way Nichols is such an effective negotiator among stakeholders and has now achieved in DC what she has already achieved in Sacramento by winning the support of business in California’s cap and trade scheme.

Obama didn’t directly name Nichols. But he might as well have done. When he thanked the “state of California” he was addressing one person and her agency, not its population of 38m.

Obama’s remarks today were also genuinely strong on the power of policy to create innovation that fuel the next generation of technology – and repeatedly connected decreased use of fossil fuels with increased developed of clean energy.

"$4 billion in subsidies we provide to oil and gas companies every year at a time when they’re earning near-record profits, and put that money toward clean energy research, which would really make a big difference.

"In the long run, we’re going to have to do more. We’re going to have to harness the potential of startups and clean energy companies across America. We’re going to need to build on the progress that I’ve seen in your factories, where workers are producing hybrid cars and more fuel-efficient engines and advanced electric vehicles. We need to tap into this reservoir of innovation and enterprise.

"Lastly, these standards aren’t just about the bad things we’ll prevent; it’s about the good things that we’ll build. As these companies look for ways to boost efficiency, they’ll be conducting research and development on test tracks. They’re going to look to startups working on biofuels and new engine technologies. They’re going to continue to invest in advanced battery manufacturing. They’re going to spur growth in clean energy. And that means new jobs in cutting-edge industries all across America

Clearly exasperated by the battles in Congress over raising the debt ceiling, Obama made no secret that this is the kind of dealmaking he would welcome:

“So when it comes to tackling the deficit, or it comes to growing the economy, when it comes to giving every American an opportunity to achieve their American Dream, the American people are demanding the same kind of resolve, the same kind of spirit of compromise, the same kind of problem solving that all these folks on stage have shown. They’re demanding that people come together and find common ground; that we have a sensible, balanced approach that’s based on facts and evidence and us reasoning things out and figuring out how to solve problems, and asks everybody to do their part.”

Of course the rule is still only a proposal and there is still time potentially for the automakers to expand the loopholes on small trucks and the 2021 ‘review’ but for now, the US really has changed gear.

Without no energy or climate policy on the horizon, the announcement today could be the single most effective decision to date in the development of clean energy in the US. 

Cornflakes, ethanol, an ex-CIA boss & terrorists = innovation through a tube

Who knew that a box of cornflakes, an icon of the perfect American home, could become such an controversial symbol of misguided policymaking?

The Senate's vote earlier this month on stopping ethanol subsidies marked a rare moment of bispartisan consensus in Washington. The amendment will end three decades of subsidies to the corn ethanol industry, save taxpayers $6bn this year and end ethanol import tariffs.

Former investment banker turned policy adviser, Steven Rattner wrote a brilliant piece in the New York Times last weekend that brought home just how iniquitous ethanol subsidies had become. As a former journalist it's no surprise his piece is suffused with nuggets about the fool's gold farmers and some in government have been passing off as something useful to society and the environment:

Thanks to Washington, 4 of every 10 ears of corn grown in America — the source of 40 percent of the world’s production — are shunted into ethanol, a gasoline substitute that imperceptibly nicks our energy problem. Larded onto that are $11 billion a year of government subsidies to the corn complex.

Forty per cent of corn in the US is diverted to ethanol with "disagreeable consequences for food" such as a 24% increase in the price of bacon, he writes.

But that's not the worst of it. Ethanol packs less punch than gasoline and uses considerable energy in its production process. "All told, each gallon of gasoline that is displaced costs the Treasury $1.78 in subsidies and lost tax revenue."

To ease the pain, Congress threw in a 45-cents-a-gallon subsidy ($6 billion a year); to add another layer of protection, it imposed a tariff on imported ethanol of 54 cents a gallon. That successfully shut off cheap imports, produced more efficiently from sugar cane, principally from Brazil. 

That tariff has now been dropped - welcome news for the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association which can now introduce its less energy intensive and less environmentally controversial ethanol on to the American market.

Brazil's ethanol industry and the impact it has had on its motor fuel infrastructure was the subject of the keynote speech at last month's Ceres conference in Oakland. 


Jim Woolsey, former CIA chief turned venture capital investor, made the simple point that the reason why Brazilians had greater choice for fuels at the filling station was because of the type of plastic used in the fuel lines by Detroit manufacturers. Changing the fuel line in engines could be done simply and inexpensively he insisted, after all if Brazil can do it why can't the richest world in the country do it? 

It’s not we who are addicted to oil it’s our cars. Because of the type of plastic fuel line they cannot use anything other than gasoline – or with flex fuels they could use 85% ethanol.

But what if cars could pull into a gas station and pump either gasoline or methanol or ethanol. Methanol can be made out of biomass if you hate ethanol use methanol. Brazilians have a choice of fuels at filling stations. Why Brazilians so much smarter, shrewder and decisive than we? All that you need is the right kind of plastic in the fuel line so the cars can use alcohol fuels as well as gasoline. The alcohol fuels are readily made from green alcohol or wood alcohol for hundreds of years we have had a large methanol production capacity in the US, larger probably than natural gas.

We don’t have to have mandates, we don’t have to have mandates, we don’t have to have duties, we can get rid of all of the subsidies for oil, ethanol and the tariff barriers for ethanol and let them compete. It’s the worst thing that could possibly happen to oil because it depends on that lock in mandate which insisted upon buying cars with the wrong kind of plastic in the fuel line. 

He likened the shift in attitude towards transport fuels to that of salt as a strategic commodity, his implication being that oil could go the same way…

For 1,000s of years, salt strategic commodity – people had to have it to preserve meat and other food. When Ghandi went on his salt march in 1930 he was protesting about British taxes on salt. The reason why they were so burdensome was because everybody had to have salt. It wasn’t Ghandi that did it, it was electricity but electricity made salt boring because of refridgeration.

In relatively few years, salt was destroyed as a strategic commodity.

Energy, particularly transport fuels, is a matter of national security. And the only people at fault for funding terrorist in the Middle East were ourselves. This is how he reasoned this:

Between 1-2% of the world’s Muslims the Saudis control something of the order of 90% of the world’s Islamic institutions.

If you’re driving around and running out of gas, you need to stop at a gas station and you just happen to ask yourself as you’re listening to the radio why are these 8 year old boys in Pakistan or on the West Bank have their objective of becoming a suicide bomber? What’s going on? Who’s paying to teach them that?

Before you get out of your car to pump your gas, stop just for a minute and turn the rearview mirror just a couple of inches. So you’re looking into your own damned eyes - now you know who is paying well over $1bn for imported oil to teach those little boys to want to be suicide bombers. Moving off oil is a very high priority.

Innovation doesn't have to be bold, gamechanging or highly technical … although all those things are good too. Sometimes it comes down to innovating the way we look at things, finding new ways to apply old tools.

Innovation through a plastic tube that could also bring peace to the Middle East… now that's something I would like to see.

US auto industry's fuel efficiency has stalled: it's time to restart the engine

Conflicted approaches to energy use - I want it, but I want it cheap - are rife and sit alongside a lack of joined up thinking.

Here's just one, small example, of a lack of integrated and strategic thinking at municipal level.
San Francisco prides itself on being a "green city". It adopted a plan in 2007 to commit the city to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 20% below 1990 levels by 2012.  Its recycling rate at 77%  diversion from landfill and zero emission trolley buses powered by clean electricity from the  Hetchy Hetchy dam are laudable. But claims of being a green city by world standards are far-fetched.

SF Park, which manages parking spaces in the city, has developed a fantastic new real-time data service for iPhones which will tell you where the free spaces are in the city. I spoke to the project manager at the recent Transportation Camp in San Francisco. He told me that the app scheme cost $20m of federal dollars from the Federal Highways Department. But parking will now cost from as little as 50c an hour off peak and will, as he admitted, encourage people to drive into the city centre if they can be sure of finding a parking space more easily.

Honda FIT for US roads but leaves European twin to make up mileage

Most aspects of American life - eating, heating and driving - take more energy than the same activity anywhere else in the world. That explains the carbon footprint of the average American (19 tonnes of CO2) and that of the average Briton (9 tonnes of CO2).

But I know that it doesn't have to be this way. Easily. Improved fuel efficiency standards for America's 250m passenger cars could cut US dependence on foreign oil, while cutting transport emissions and cleaning the air of pollutants that cause cancer and asthma. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that transport contributes approximately 27% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and is the fastest-growing source of emissions. In the EU, transport (excluding air and maritime) accounts for 19% of emissions.

After five months of enduring transport paralysis - even though we only a couple of miles from San Francisco - my partner caved in and got her own car. A Toyota Prius was out of her price range, and the Japanese earthquake interrupted supply, making deals less attractive. So she opted for a less expensive, but less economical Honda Fit. The same model is called the Jazz outside the US. But although they are the same models, they are far from identical.