"The key" to America's lagging fuel economy standards?

Recently, I played host to a film crew from the U.K., three youngish ( sorry, gents ) guys that live mostly in or around London. Since there’s necessarily a lot of time standing about, while somebody fiddles with a camera angle or the lighting, we got talking about cars.

The subject came up, since they’d flown into San Francisco from London, and rented what they’d hoped would be a SUV capable of carrying three strapping men, their luggage, and a large quantity of professional film and sound gear to last for the three weeks they plan on driving around the Sierras.

The Chevy Tahoe was wholly inadequate to the job and they were talking about trading it in for a Suburban. Now, really … from the outside you’d have thought this vehicle to be large enough, but from the inside it was a disaster. My Subaru Outback could have held as much.

Ronan got talking about the cars they’re driving over in the U.K. these days, and how they easily surpassed ours by a wide margin on fuel economy. In fact, folks over in the U.K. are so completely unamused by great behemoth automobiles that it’s very common - perhaps, de rigeur - to ‘key’ them as you walk by. For the honor students out there, that means inconspicuously dragging the tip of your car key along the side of the offending car, leaving a nice long, deep scratch in the paint.

It’s also a popular pastime to knife the tires. Probably after a few pints at the pub.

The Land Rovers get it. The Jeep Cherokees get it. The British seem to be pretty democratic when it comes to wasteful outrage.

They all told us about the cars they had. I was envious. I’d love to have a turbo diesel that gets over 40 mpg in the city and nearly 60 mpg on the highway.

Citroen’s C1 1.4HDi diesel-powered car gets an impressive 57.4 miles per gallon, but you can’t buy one of themhere in the United States.

In general, cars are far more fuel-efficient in Europe, where gas is much more expensive. In Europe, cars on average get 40 mpg, compared with 20.4 mpg for U.S. cars. Why should that be?

Why a double standard on fuel economy?

You would hope, in this age of jet airline travel, that our citizens would have gotten out more, and driven some of the cars available in Europe. I have. Once I rented a turbo diesel Fiatway back in the 80’s it got about 40 mpg and was an absolute blast to drive. I’ve also rented any number of other cars that sell a ‘weak sister’ version in this country and I could never quite understand why the disparity.

I guess that Americans are just an pleasant, uncomplaining lot, willing to take whatever is offered, even if it is substandard… unless it comes down to their right own an automatic weapon. ( Cheap shot, that.)

Wikipedia has an interested comparison of highest mpg vs lowest mpg cars that are for sale in the U.K. that you can see here.

Among all the performers in the top fuel economy category, it’s 40 to 60 mpg all the way.

Ford is among the leading manufacturers offering high mileage cars in England. Why can’t we buy them here? And, don’t tell me that they don’t match up to our safety standards. That might have been true 30 years ago, but they often exceed our stafety standards today due to stringent, non-lobbyist driven European Union regulations.

There’s a concept: doing the right thing without regard to campaign contributions or ‘K’ Street firms.

It’s no secret that the Ford Focus sold in the rest of the world is a significantly better car than the Focus sold in North America. The world’s Focus is, after all, based on the same advanced “C1” platform that underpins the Mazda3 and Volvo S40. Meanwhile we soldier forward with a Focus still built atop the same CW170 chassis that was introduced back in 2000. And in America, we have nothing like the upcoming Focus RS. A further look at the specs make a real driver drool.

At the bottom of the pack, as you might expect, were Lamborghini, Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Hummer and, oh yes … Chrysler Jeep products and Dodge screaming in with 14 and 15 mpg.

Whoa! Be still my heart.

Economical models actually fewer in America since 2005

The research from the Civil Society Institute, a not-for-profit think tank that focuses on energy and ecological issues, shows a growing “fuel-efficient car gap.”

CSI found that the number of vehicle models sold in the United States that achieve combined gas mileage of at least 40 miles per gallon actually has dropped from five in 2005 to just two in 2007 — the Honda Civic hybrid and the Toyota Prius hybrid.

Conversely, in Europe,therewere 113 vehicles for sale that get a combined 40 mpg, up from 86 in 2005.

American manufacturers withold economical models from American consumers

And here’s the worst pain point: nearly two-thirds of the 113 highly fuel-efficient models that are unavailable to American consumers are either made by U.S.-based automobile manufacturers or by foreign manufacturers with substantial U.S. sales operations, such as Nissan and Toyota.

You can point to any number of polls of American consumers, and it’s clear that they want high fuel economy cars. Meanwhile, we’re bailing out the very companies that are selling them to the Europeans - because the EUsets standards and insistthey be met - while we sit whining that government can’t do anything right, and bitch whenever it tries.

Fiat Grande Punto may not be the first to hit American shores, and will need to be re-bodied as a Chrysler.

There’s hope. At the Detroit Auto Show this year, the Volkswagen Bluesport concept premiered. It can get 57 mph in ecomode. Another up and comer, should the marriage between Fiat and Chrysler work out, would be the Fiat Grande Punto with fuel economy in the 40 to 50 mpg range. If it’s anything like other Fiats I’ve driven, it could also be high on the drool-o-meter.

Maybe if we give the car companies enough bailout money, they’ll let us have the really cool cars someday.

Please! Oh, pretty please?

Perhaps we should start ‘keying’ the big muthers in parking lots, and then the insurance companies might give Detroit the word that we’re not happy the same Detroit POS’s anymore.

maven