With gas prices on the rise today the average consumer has to save on the budget as much as they can. Even the automobile industry is trying to help as much as they can. Now that the Obama administration has stepped in they have to help the consumer more than ever with a deadline of 2025 to raise their average fuel economy. But that is still eleven years away and no one wants to wait that long. For the impatient person car manufactures are doing something to help right now.
Back in 2011 President Obama announced that an agreement with thirteen major automakers increase the fuel economy to 54.5 miles per gallon. The automakers involved in that agreement were Ford, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Mazda, Toyota and more. With the agreement the automakers must have reached 54.5 mpg by the model year 2025. But the automakers are improving a little bit at a time with each new model year.
Current CAFE and Future CAFE
The Hybrid car, Yes I said the word hybrid even though they might not be the most appealing *cough* Toyota Prius *cough* they are the cars that get the most vehicle and they are on a rise since 2005 and with the Prius being number 1 in sales. But what is a hybrid you ask. A hybrid car when two energy sources are running the car. Today it would gasoline and electricity. With the average mileage of a hybrid sedan is around thirty miles a gallon combined of both city and highway which is quite impressive since non hybrids only get around twenty miles a gallon combined.
Now if you still don’t want to spend money on gasoline but still want a car check out any pure electric car. The electric car just works likes a regular car but instead of a gas tank they have a battery pack which in most cars is in the back of the car. The great side of electric cars is they can go around 80 miles a charge. When it comes to charging it may take about 72 hours to go from empty to full in the case of Tesla model S and that’s just from a regular household plug. The down side of electric cars is that they need to be charged by a regular household plug or a special charging station that can be found in most major cities or you can have one installed in your house.
What car manufactures could do right now is have auto stop and start already equipped in all there new models. Auto stop and start is a feature that was just in hybrids but is now moving to regular cars. But what is auto start and stop is when you’re at a standstill in your car the engine will turn off and when you accelerate the engine will start back up. This would save you some fuel economy but not much. Every little bit does help.
Cost of driving a Electric Car
In conclusion the auto industry is doing a lot to improve the mileage of their cars. They could do better if they have auto start and stop already installed in all their cars but that is an add-on in most of their cars. With the help of President Obama the automakers are getting to the 54.5 mpg standard.
Work Cited
Csere, Csaba. “How Automakers Will Meet 2016 CAFE Standards – Feature.” Car and Driver. N.p., May 2010. Web. 18 Sept. 2014. http://www.caranddriver.com/features/how-automakers-will-meet-2016-cafe-standards “
Herrera, Tilde. “How Automakers Can Meet the New 54.5 MPG Standards.” GreenBiz.com. N.p., 01 Aug. 2011. Web. 18 Sept. 2014 http://www.greenbiz.com/news/2011/08/01/how-automakers-can-meet-new-545-mpg-standards”
Berman, Brad. “Cars.” Detailed List of Electric and Plug-in Hybrids. N.p., 16 July 2014. Web. 18 Sept. 2014. ” http://www.plugincars.com/electric-cars”