EPA: MY2013 MPG highest ever @ 24.1

via GCC:

EPA annual trends report finds new vehicle fuel economy at record 24.1 mpg; new powertrain technologies rapidly gaining share

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http://www.greencarcongress.com/2014/10/20141010-epatrends.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

How pathetic we are. There were 50+mpg subcompacts in the Eighties, and 35MPG family sedans in the Nineties. Every increase in efficiency yields mainly a more powerful, more bloated vehicle fleet. I'll bet that the Ford F-150 is still one of the top-selling vehicles, driven mainly by D-bags who never use it for anything that requires a pickup...

LeftieBiker said:

How pathetic we are. There were 50+mpg subcompacts in the Eighties, and 35MPG family sedans in the Nineties. Every increase in efficiency yields mainly a more powerful, more bloated vehicle fleet. I'll bet that the Ford F-150 is still one of the top-selling vehicles, driven mainly by D-bags who never use it for anything that requires a pickup...

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full sized pickup trucks lead passenger cars by more than 2 to 1 so that will always be true as long as the F-150 and its like are the primary use vehicles for businesses

DaveinOlyWA said:

LeftieBiker said:

How pathetic we are. There were 50+mpg subcompacts in the Eighties, and 35MPG family sedans in the Nineties. Every increase in efficiency yields mainly a more powerful, more bloated vehicle fleet. I'll bet that the Ford F-150 is still one of the top-selling vehicles, driven mainly by D-bags who never use it for anything that requires a pickup...

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full sized pickup trucks lead passenger cars by more than 2 to 1 so that will always be true as long as the F-150 and its like are the primary use vehicles for businesses

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Right. For instance, here in my neighborhood in the Metro Bay Area, one night I got curious and counted the number of pickups on my evening walk to see how many of them were used for businesses. Out of 31 total, at least 9 were used for business purposes, based on company logos on the vehicle, utility racks over the bed/cab and/or locking toolboxes. Another 10 or so had evidence of heavy use in the bed or debris/trash there that indicated frequent utility use, for say a landscaping/gardening business. Standard cabs predominated among the work vehicles, while king cabs were next. I saw no crew cabs that appeared to be used for work. As a rule, pickups with bed liners or covers were clearly lifestyle vehicles and fell exclusively in the king/crew cab category, as of course were the few jacked-up trucks. And in farm/ranch areas, pickups are essential work vehicles.

IME it's largely pick-up based SUVs that are rarely used for work.

The suburbs are where you see the highest concentration of "lifestyle choice" pickups. Parking issues tend to discourage them in cities, and in the country it's easy to find a use for one, even if it's only 10% of the time. I agree that SUVs are the worse offender overall; I mentioned the F-150 because it's been at the top of the sales list so much.

LeftieBiker said:

The suburbs are where you see the highest concentration of "lifestyle choice" pickups. Parking issues tend to discourage them in cities, and in the country it's easy to find a use for one, even if it's only 10% of the time. I agree that SUVs are the worse offender overall; I mentioned the F-150 because it's been at the top of the sales list so much.

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I'm in a suburban city, albeit one that predates cars so higher density, but the majority of the cars in my neighborhood are parked at the sidewalk despite plenty of garages and carports. The F-150 has been at the top of the U.S. LDV sales list for the past 32 years, which is why the 2015 shedding 700 lb. is so important, as its improved fuel consumption spread over 600k+ sales, and GM and Chrysler's improved MPG in response for similar numbers of trucks will have a much larger effect on national MPG average than a few tens of thousands of PEV sales. And with gas prices already down almost $0.20/gallon in the past month and forecast to drop as much as $0.30/gal. more by the end of the year,

http://www.insidebayarea.com/News/ci_26704378/Gas-prices-in-California-could-fall-30-cents-by-Christmas" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

you can bet that sales of larger, less fuel efficient LDVs are going to spike, while HEVs/PHEVs and more fuel-efficient ICEs will sag. Not sure what will happen with BEVs, but the economic argument for them will be worse as well.

The above is all true, but if we keep taking the tiny-incrementalist route, the pickups of 2050 will have to be amphibious, with self-contained life support.

GRA said:

... LDV sales list for the past 32 years, which is why the 2015 shedding 700 lb. is so important, as its improved fuel consumption spread over 600k+ sales, and GM and Chrysler's improved MPG in response for similar numbers of trucks will have a much larger effect on national MPG average than a few tens of thousands of PEV sales...

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your statement is crazzzzzeeee.

you need a 12 step program and fast!!

I thought I could handle a drink here and there. "just 2 and I will stop"...

ya buddy! keep living the dream

Dave - it's a damn shame (I agree with you there!) but Guy's right - a tiny fuel economy increase on the most-driven vehicles completely dwarfs the fuel savings from the hybrid and BEV fleet today.

Home and office energy efficiency, and farm energy efficiency is also orders of magnitude better than BEVs and hybrids - even after all personal transportation is electrified.

BEVs are very important - but right now their benefit to society is little more meaningful than the boil on a flea on a dog's back is to the dog.

AndyH said:

Dave - it's a damn shame (I agree with you there!) but Guy's right - a tiny fuel economy increase on the most-driven vehicles completely dwarfs the fuel savings from the hybrid and BEV fleet today.

Home and office energy efficiency, and farm energy efficiency is also orders of magnitude better than BEVs and hybrids - even after all personal transportation is electrified.

BEVs are very important - but right now their benefit to society is little more meaningful than the boil on a flea on a dog's back is to the dog.

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that unfortunately, is the public's perception of the situation. they really couldn't be farther from the truth

The idea that incrementalism is more significant than paradigm shifts is an example of what I named the "Snapshot Fallacy" back in the Nineties. It looks only at numbers in the moment, rather than at future effects. Yes, adding a few MPG to pickup trucks saves more fuel *right now* than do BEVs, but if that paradigm remains the dominant one the future is much bleaker than one in which BEVs prompt a shift to PHEV trucks and BEV trucks. Not to mention rail transport instead of most of the trucks.

DaveinOlyWA said:

AndyH said:

Dave - it's a damn shame (I agree with you there!) but Guy's right - a tiny fuel economy increase on the most-driven vehicles completely dwarfs the fuel savings from the hybrid and BEV fleet today.

Home and office energy efficiency, and farm energy efficiency is also orders of magnitude better than BEVs and hybrids - even after all personal transportation is electrified.

BEVs are very important - but right now their benefit to society is little more meaningful than the boil on a flea on a dog's back is to the dog.

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that unfortunately, is the public's perception of the situation. they really couldn't be farther from the truth

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2013 F150 2WD 3.7L 6cyl 15,000 miles per year, 600,000 annual sales, 13 MPG city[1] 1153.8 gallons per year each; 692.3 million gallons per year
2014 F150 2WD 3.7L 6cyl 15,000 miles per year, 600,000 annual sales, 17 MPG city[2] 882.4 gallons per year each; 529.4 million gallons per year

A four mile per gallon change saves 271.4 gallons per year per truck, or 162.9 million gallons compared with another year of 2013 sales.

Prius, 15,000 miles per year, 145,200 annual sales[3], 51 MPG[4] 294.1 gallons per year each; 42.7 million gallons of gas per year fleetwide
Prius, 15,000 miles per year, 145,200 annual sales, 55 MPG 272.7 gallons per year each; 39.6 million gallons of gas per year fleetwide

A hypothetical shift of 4 MPG here from 51 MPG to 55 mpg only saves 21.4 gallons of gas per year per vehicle, or 3.1 million gallons across the fleet.

If all Prius owners sold their 2013 cars for the mythical 55 MPG hybrid, they would gain only about 2% of the fuel savings from the fuel economy increase in the F150 fleet.

As long as trucks are needed by our society, it's better for carbon emissions to cut their fuel use than to increase the size of the Prius fleet 12 times.

[1]http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=34528
[2]http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=33184
[3]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Prius
[4]http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=33324

LeftieBiker said:

The idea that incrementalism is more significant than paradigm shifts is an example of what I named the "Snapshot Fallacy" back in the Nineties. It looks only at numbers in the moment, rather than at future effects. Yes, adding a few MPG to pickup trucks saves more fuel *right now* than do BEVs, but if that paradigm remains the dominant one the future is much bleaker than one in which BEVs prompt a shift to PHEV trucks and BEV trucks. Not to mention rail transport instead of most of the trucks.

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I don't disagree with you in general, Leftie, but to have an apples to apples transition, we need a BEV or FCEV pickup with the same range and load capability as a current ICE F150. Until that happens, the future that we must get to cannot happen.

The need for trucks is not likely to 'ever' go away, but the need for an ICE truck can go away once there's a viable replacement.

AndyH said:

LeftieBiker said:

The idea that incrementalism is more significant than paradigm shifts is an example of what I named the "Snapshot Fallacy" back in the Nineties. It looks only at numbers in the moment, rather than at future effects. Yes, adding a few MPG to pickup trucks saves more fuel *right now* than do BEVs, but if that paradigm remains the dominant one the future is much bleaker than one in which BEVs prompt a shift to PHEV trucks and BEV trucks. Not to mention rail transport instead of most of the trucks.

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I don't disagree with you in general, Leftie, but to have an apples to apples transition, we need a BEV or FCEV pickup with the same range and load capability as a current ICE F150. Until that happens, the future that we must get to cannot happen.

The need for trucks is not likely to 'ever' go away, but the need for an ICE truck can go away once there's a viable replacement.

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Right, the point is to find the cheapest, quickest way to buy the time we need for the technologies to develop so we can make the transition. As Andy's numbers show, we get the biggest bang for the buck currently by boosting the numbers of the least efficient vehicles. Barring a prohibition on such trucks (and what would we replace them with, at the moment?), increasing their efficiency is a vital if purely transitional step to something better.

I wonder how many trucks out there drive less than 60 miles a day nearly every day? a "small" number? betting not. no matter. I feel that EVs will gain critical mass within the next 4-6 years. Betting trucks will be a LOT different then

The order of magnitude difference analogy between EV's and trucks can be made between POV's and airplanes. We are a looong way from being free of fossil fuel.

As long as trucks are needed by our society, it's better for carbon emissions to cut their fuel use than to increase the size of the Prius fleet 12 times.

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As long as we keep confusing what we "need" with what we want, the problem will never be solved. Sure we need some trucks, but only a small fraction of the number we have. To put it yet another way: as long as we continue to believe that small, painless changes are all we need, and that we can have it all, we are Screwed. The time for incremental change was the last century.

I don't disagree with you in general, Leftie, but to have an apples to apples transition, we need a BEV or FCEV pickup with the same range and load capability as a current ICE F150. Until that happens, the future that we must get to cannot happen.

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And why exactly can't we start with a plug-in hybrid truck, instead? That's an incremental change that can actually change the paradigm. The technology is already here. While we're at it, require that most trucks be weak hybrids that shut their engines off when stopped, and can creep in traffic for a mile or so. That technology is also already here, and most trucks already have the room for a modest battery pack. But no, we want our trucks to look and act exactly the same, but with aluminum bodies under the same paint, and a whopping two more MPG instead of ten more...

LeftieBiker said:

I don't disagree with you in general, Leftie, but to have an apples to apples transition, we need a BEV or FCEV pickup with the same range and load capability as a current ICE F150. Until that happens, the future that we must get to cannot happen.

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And why exactly can't we start with a plug-in hybrid truck, instead? That's an incremental change that can actually change the paradigm. The technology is already here. While we're at it, require that most trucks be weak hybrids that shut their engines off when stopped, and can creep in traffic for a mile or so. That technology is also already here, and most trucks already have the room for a modest battery pack. But no, we want our trucks to look and act exactly the same, but with aluminum bodies under the same paint, and a whopping two more MPG instead of ten more...

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The reason why is because auto manufacturers can provide a Bulls**t logic that says using 400 million gallons of gas is "much" better than using 450 million and in a supposedly more aware forum such as this one, can get people to believe it to be the "best" way to go

"this truck will use 80 million less gallons of gas" (but gotta consume a Billion gallons to get there)

Yes, pretty much. Just to be clear, I do understand human nature. My original post was philosophical more than pragmatic: I'm not arguing that we realistically *can* force a change to 30MPG trucks, but I'm saying that claiming that a slight raise in the fuel economy of a lot of trucks is better than trying to advance new technologies, that just won't help us nearly enough to survive. At least those aluminum trucks will provide precious "ore" for the scavenging society that will follow this one in a generation or two.