Gas Mileage
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Not too long ago, acceleration and top speed may have been the most crucial criteria when picking a new police car but with gas prices continuing to creep higher requirements have changed, even in this field. In the past, the standard issue for a police car was a big and brawny rear-wheel drive sedan powered by a muscular V-8. Today, things are very different, with sedans, SUVs, all-wheel drive and economical V-6 engines getting the tick of approval. Such criteria is what got Ford’s new Interceptor range of police cars, based on the latest Taurus sedan and Explorer SUV, enlisted as the...
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VIDEO: 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco, High Gas-Mileage FeaturesWith gas prices top of mind for many drivers, the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco model seems perfectly timed. The model with a six-speed manual gearbox is EPA-rated at 28 mpg city, 42 mpg highway, for a combined 33 mpg. On our recent road test over a long weekend, we beat that slightly, getting 34.2 mpg...
John Voelcker -
VIDEO: 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco, Our Real-World Gas MileageGas mileage is on absolutely everyone's mind these days. Strife in oil-producing nations, and the associated rising gasoline prices, have already led to a surge of interest in any vehicle's MPG ratings. Now production in Japan (source of most of the world's hybrids) is shut down, at least...
John Voelcker -
BMW Looking To Boost MPGs With TwinPower Turbo Three-Cylinder EnginesExpect to see smaller engines for BMW’s future models, as high fuel prices and greater environmental concerns push automakers towards engines with lower displacements. We’ve already seen this trend with the recent announcement of BMW’s new TwinPower Turbo 2.0-liter four-cylinder...
Viknesh Vijayenthiran -
VIDEO: 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco, Two-Minute Drive ReviewThe EPA rates the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco at 28 mpg city, 42 mpg highway, when it's fitted with the six-speed manual transmission. But can the Cruze Eco really reach beyond that magic 40-mpg number, which is highway mileage only? VIDEO: 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco, Our Real-World Gas Mileage On our...
John Voelcker -
High Gas Prices May Soon Turn Your Lovely Suburb Into A SlumAmericans rarely think much about zoning, but it governs almost every facet of how we live our lives. And unintended consequences of 50-year-old zoning codes may be about to turn some of our loveliest and quietest suburbs into the next slums. Why? Simply because they've been built too far away from...
John Voelcker -
While many Americans may still scoff at the idea of driving a reasonably sized car with an engine not much bigger than that found on a motorbike, sales numbers are showing that the tide is starting to turn and this archaic negative perception towards smaller engines may soon alleviate altogether. As fuel prices increase, American car buyers may have no choice but to accept downsizing to smaller engines. Vehicle sales numbers are already starting to show increased demand for four-cylinder engines over V-6 and V-8 powerplants, and this trend is only set to continue. GM is one automaker with a...
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Selling A Used Car? Put A Gas-Mileage Sticker In The Window!For every new vehicle that gets sold in the United States, four used cars change hands. Those new cars have nice, big window stickers showing their EPA-rated gas mileage figures. Used cars? All you get is the seller mumbling something like, "Oh, yeah, it always gets, ummmmm, at least 25 miles a...
John Voelcker -
2011 Chevy Cruze Eco Gas Mileage: We Get 34 MPG--Which Is FineWith political uncertainty in oil-producing states, and the rising gas prices that brings, you can expect to see a lot more headlines saying "40 MPG!" We just did a quick overnight road test of a 2011 Chevrolet Cruze Eco with the six-speed manual transmission, which the EPA rates at 28 mpg city and...
John Voelcker -
Who's Your Gas Buddy? 16 Cars With 40-MPG Gas Mileage On Sale NowGas prices got you all nervous? Figuring the days of cheap gas are over? Thinking about a new car with much better gas mileage? Well, just because the EPA rates a specific car at the magic 40-mpg mark doesn't mean you'll actually get 40 mpg. But the ratings are a good indicator of where cars stand...
John Voelcker -
2012 Honda Civic HF Joins The 40-MPG-Plus Parade, Hybrid TooYou may have seen it on a t-shirt: "40 is the new 30." But you may not have realized it applies to miles-per-gallon just as much as age. While cars with EPA ratings of 30 mpg or more used to be considered in the highest ranks of fuel efficiency, now 40 mpg seems to be the new benchmark for...
John Voelcker -
2012 Mazda3 SkyActiv-G Engine: How Much More Fuel Efficient?Next year's Mazda3 models will deliver fuel efficiency gains over their 2011 counterparts, the company said today, as it unveiled refreshed versions of its popular compact hatchback and sedan, to go on sale later this fall. The 2012 Mazda3 will offer as an option what Mazda now calls the SkyActiv-G...
John Voelcker -
Writing about green cars can be a challenge. On the one hand, this site attracts many new-car buyers who want to learn more about more fuel-efficient alternatives to what they're driving now. Consider the Ford Explorer driver who bought a Honda Fit because it was really all he needed. But on the other hand, it has a significant readership of green advocates who often seem to believe that driving anything other than the most fuel-efficient vehicle you can buy is a moral crime. It's for them that we provide this gentle dose of reality, albeit with a needlessly provocative title. (1) Size and...
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Helpful GM Propaganda: How 2011 Chevy Cruze Eco Raises MPGsThe word "propaganda" can mean many things to many people. Today, we're using it in the sense of "a form of communication aimed at influencing the attitude of a community," as Wikipedia neatly puts it. The busy public-relations team at General Motors is now putting out roughly a video every week on...
John Voelcker -
2012 Infiniti M35h Hybrid With 350 HP Rated At 32 MPG HighwayThink "hybrid" and what comes to mind? Small or midsize, sometimes odd-driving Toyotas? There's now actually a raft of low-volume hybrid luxury and sports sedans from such makers as Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Lexus, and now Infiniti. The 2012 Infiniti M35h Hybrid was officially unveiled at last fall's...
John Voelcker -
Volkswagen's 79-MPG Up Hatchback, But Only For EuropeansWith fuel-efficiency and emissions regulations tightening all over the world, carmakers continue to push the limits on how economical a production car can get. The latest entrant in the high-mileage stakes: a future edition of Volkswagen's Up minicar that will return 79 miles per gallon using a...
John Voelcker -
Hyundai Steps Up Its MPG Reporting Dare To Other CarmakersAlthough EPA gas-mileage ratings may or may not be achievable in real-world driving conditions, they're a good relative benchmark. They're also a very public encouragement to carmakers to make more fuel-efficient cars. Hyundai, whose new 2011 Elantra compact model is rated at 40 mpg highway for all...
John Voelcker -
EPA Rates 2012 Fiat 500 Fuel Economy: Not 40 MPG, But CloseWith the first few Fiat 500 minicars now landing in Chrysler dealerships this month and next, the small car's fuel efficiency is clearly one of the main questions buyers will ask about. Now the EPA has released its final ratings for the car, though they're not yet on its FuelEconomy.org website...
John Voelcker -
What's good gas mileage? 30 mpg? 40 mpg? The 50-mpg combined rating of the 2011 Toyota Prius, the most fuel-efficient car sold in the U.S. this year? Nah. How about 261 miles per gallon? Or, for the Europeans in the house, a mere 24 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer. You heard right. The Volkswagen XL1 plug-in hybrid concept shown here, being launched at the Quatar Motor Show this week, achieves a fuel efficiency of 0.9 liters per 100 km, which for North Americans translates to a bit more than 260 mpg. Designed to build It's the third iteration of VW's "1-Litre Car" project, which has now...
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California, EPA, DoT Make Nice On Timing Of Higher MPG RulesThree government agencies agree to "coordinate" their actions and announce "a single timeframe" for proposing new rules. This signals "continued collaboration" among the trio. Yawn. But actually, this is a bigger deal than you might think. In the 10 months since President Barack Obama announced a...
John Voelcker -
2012 Mercedes-Benz C-Class: Half of Sales To Be High-MPG FoursMercedes-Benz likes to launch technologies and lead trends, but sometimes they follow along with the crowd. In this case, Hyundai's doing it. Chevy's doing it. Chrysler's going to do it. Even Porsche will be doing it. And now Mercedes-Benz has joined the gang: The luxury carmaker too will fit a...
John Voelcker -
GM Enters Compact Luxury Segment With 2012 Buick VeranoWhile the styling of Buick’s new compact sedan has been known for some time now (a version of the car was unveiled last year in China as the Excelle GT), we finally get a look at the North American model, which will be making its official debut next week at the 2011 Detroit Auto Show. Set to...
Viknesh Vijayenthiran -
Video: 2011 Chevrolet Volt EPA Gas Mileage ExplainedIf the idea of measuring the efficiency of an electric car, which burns no gasoline, in miles per gallon still irks you, spare a thought for our green car expert John Voelcker who goes to some length in this previous article to try and explain why the EPA deems it fit to do so. While that previous...
Viknesh Vijayenthiran -
Things We Read, And Like: 'Why We Need Energy Literacy'Many readers on this site are concerned with miles per gallon, or how much fuel their car uses. And while any site called Green Car Reports is bound to have an environmental tilt, most car buyers are far more concerned with saving money than saving the planet. Nonetheless, we're all about making...
John Voelcker