EPA "city" test
Posted on 06/01/2005 8:34:45 AM PDT by gridlock
WASHINGTON -- Back in the good old days when the price of gas in Seattle was a mere $1.50 a gallon, miles-per-gallon weren't so important. The number was a curiosity, the basis for bragging rights and mental exercise during long trips.
That was two years ago. Today, with the price of gas pushing beyond $2.45 a gallon in the Puget Sound region and federal projections saying it will reach $3 this summer, the miles-per-gallon estimates calculated by the Environmental Protection Agency have taken on a new prominence in a nation suddenly intent on squeezing every mile out of its cars.
And that's where the problem starts. The EPA's numbers are almost always wrong, inflating mileage by 15 percent to 30 percent, critics say.
The problem has gotten large enough -- and loud enough -- that on Monday Sen. Maria Cantwell will introduce legislation to force the EPA to update the 30-year-old formula for predicting how many miles a car can travel on a gallon of gas.
"It's just wrong that inflated labels mislead consumers into thinking they are getting better mileage on the road, and a better deal at the gas pump, than they really are," a summary of the bill prepared by Cantwell's office said.
"Americans expect government data to be accurate, whether it be food nutrition labels or prescription use instructions. Or another way to think about it, American motorists spent $20 billion more on gas last year than they thought they would" based on the mileage estimates attached prominently to the windows of every new car.
The numbers worked in the 1970s when the formula was written. But Cantwell and others say it's time to change the test to reflect modern times.
"The mileage information the government provides new car buyers should be correct so consumers can make informed choices and will know how much of their family's budget they can expect to spend on gasoline," Cantwell said this week.
There's no doubt that the formula is past its prime.
Even the EPA agrees. The agency announced last year it would consider updating the formula and a spokesman said a final rule should be in place by early 2007. In announcing the initiative, EPA acknowledged that the current system doesn't reflect the real world. "We have begun an examination of many factors that are not currently accounted for in our fuel economy estimates. These factors include the impact of air conditioning, aggressive driving (e.g. high speeds and quick accelerations), cold weather, traffic congestion and others on fuel economy."
Cantwell wants the EPA to move faster, noting that while the agency considers how to respond, the old system, which was last revised in 1985, remains in place. Her bill parallels one that was introduced in the House by Rep. Nancy Johnson, R-Conn.
Under the current formula, for example, the EPA assumes that a car traveling on the highway averages 48 miles per hour. That assumption was formed when the national speed limit was 55 mph. Today, the posted speed limit on many interstates is 70 mph and the actual speed of most cars is higher still.
The EPA assumes that drivers spend 55 percent of their time in urban traffic, the kind of stop-and-go driving that eats deeply into efficiency. In reality, congestion is far worse, having increased 225 percent since 1982 with a parallel effect on fuel mileage.
The EPA also assumes that only 10 percent of cars have air conditioners. Air conditioners are among the biggest drains on engine efficiency, causing a 2.5 mile-per-gallon decline, on average. Unlike the 1970s when air conditioning was still an expensive option, virtually every new car sold today has it as standard equipment.
And people nowadays are driving with a much heavier foot as cars get more powerful and performance improves. Yet the EPA doesn't fully account for that change, critics say.
The maximum acceleration rate in the EPA test cycles has a car going from zero to 60 mph in about 18 seconds. The average new car or truck can accelerate nearly twice as fast on average, and much faster under certain driving conditions.
Despite the flaws, auto manufacturers say the current formula works fine. Driving habits and conditions vary so widely, said Eron Shosteck, a spokesman for The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, that any estimate will miss the mark.
"There is no typical driver ... It says right on the label that actual mileage may vary," Shosteck said. "The estimates are for comparison purposes only, to help shoppers when they are comparing one vehicle to another."
Shosteck and automakers worry that the effort to change the mileage formula could be a backdoor attempt to increase the corporate average fuel efficiency -- CAFE -- standards, the miles per gallon benchmark that by law automakers are required to meet. Automakers stridently oppose increasing the fleet-wide fuel average from the 27.5 mpg currently required. Environmental groups and others say the average could be substantially raised without adding significant cost.
Though Cantwell supports increasing corporate fuel efficiency, she denies that is the purpose of the EPA bill, pointing out that it is the Department of Transportation, not the EPA that sets CAFE standards. "I carefully crafted this (provision) so that it would in no way directly or indirectly affect CAFE standards," Cantwell told senators this week.
Whatever the politics, fuel efficiency results are being scrutinized as never before.
Industry analysts report that consumers are paying close attention to mileage ratings, with the numbers accounting for a bigger and bigger reason behind their decisions on which car to buy.
"They are very aware of it," Toyota spokesman John Hanson said, adding, "EPA's numbers have long been criticized."
Toyota makes the Prius, which the EPA says should get 60 mpg in city driving and 51 mpg on the highway. Another popular high-mileage car is the Honda Civic hybrid, which the EPA says should get 48 mpg in the city and 47 mpg on the highway.
When actual results don't come close to EPA predictions, people start asking why. Among the most vocal questioners are owners of super-high mileage hybrid cars, those that augment a conventional internal combustion engine with a battery-powered electric motor.
"I would like to get the mileage they said we would get but I just assumed everybody realized EPA's numbers are not based in reality," said Charlie Cunniff, a Seattle resident who drives a Prius he bought in September 2001.
Cunniff gets 42 mpg even though the EPA said he should get 52. "I thought it was going to be a little higher," Cunniff said, though he said even the lower result is vastly superior to most cars on the road today.
Cunniff, who heads the Environmental Coalition for South Seattle, says he would have bought the car even if the true mileage results were listed because the car is less polluting than almost anything on the road.
Others, however, go less quietly. Pete Blackshaw of Cincinnati, Ohio, started a Web log to vent when his Honda Civic hybrid brought in only 33 mpg rather than the 48 mpg promised on the sticker.
"I'm feeling a tad burned. But the issue is far bigger than Pete Blackshaw. This is all about how advertisers set expectations with consumers," he wrote, complaining about "unrealistic expectations" driven largely by "very faulty EPA estimates" and heavy advertising.
Toyota spokesman Hanson hears them too. "We do get complaints by owners who say, 'Wait a minute, I'm not getting 60 miles per gallon.' "
Toyota, he says, would accept a new mileage formula as long as it is applied evenly to all manufacturers.
Some Puget Sound residents said the challenge is balancing the need for a large, sturdy vehicle -- something well-suited for camping and outdoor activities, or families hauling around kids and their friends -- with a desire to get a lot of miles per gallon.
"If you want a car that's a decent size, it's hard to get a car with decent mileage," said Brem Scherer, a Vashon Island resident and mother of a 12- and 16-year-old. She settled on a 2003 Toyota Sienna minivan.
"I try as much as I can to conserve gas, but it does get hard," she said. The van seems to get close to the predicted 24 mpg on the highway, but the windy roads of Vashon and creeping congestion of Seattle sends it dipping below the expected 19 mpg for city driving.
Scherer said that when she was buying the car she realized that local driving conditions would probably shrink the van's efficiency. "I wasn't super surprised," she said.
When Marjorie Fiddler and her husband were looking for a car to replace an old Subaru wagon two years ago, they needed something that could lug a lot of gear for camping trips with friends.
Fuel efficiency was a concern, but there weren't any hybrids that met the Shoreline couple's needs. They settled on Subaru Forester, a smaller SUV-style vehicle. On long trips, the mpg is in the high 20s, she said.
"We have actually been pleasantly surprised," Fiddler said. "Our long-trip mileage has been better than they said."
Seattle's Emily Schultz and her husband are in the market for a Volvo wagon or maybe a Subaru Outback. The car's mpg will be a determining factor.
"Gas mileage, in particular, is an issue because it's so expensive," Schultz said. That, and gas guzzlers are "bad for the environment."
The problem now is that so many vehicles are being designed to the test. The new Dodge 300/Magnum takes advantage of the 18 second 0-60 times in the EPA test by accelerating without ever using four of the eight available cylinders. But in real life, the driver puts the foot down, uses all 8 cylinders, and goes 0-60 in 7.5 seconds. This leads to dramatically lower actual real-world milage for almost everyone.
But the worst offenders in this respect are the Hybrids. The rule says that each vehicle starts with a fully charged battery. Much of the work of running the test is done by the battery, but the engine is never run to recharge the battery before the test is over. In the extreme case, if somebody built an all-electric car capable of completing the test, it would show an infinite number of miles to the gallon. Automakers might not be able to claim that with a straight face, however.
The test has been around so long, the automakers are finally designing ways to get around it. Customers, however, will not stand for this for long.
The funny part is that I'm one of those people whose driving style allows them to usually slightly exceed the EPA mileage ratings on vehicles - and I'm usually not found below the speed limit. Quite the opposite, actually...
I take the EPA ratings with a 25lb bag of salt.
Of course, the watermelons don't like my bug cause it is a diesel and not a hybrid.
"Automakers might not be able to claim that with a straight face, however.
You might be surprised how bold advertisers can be.
But...when trade him in the trade-in will make me whine due to all those incentives....
The problem is not with the EPA, or with the method. The numbers are not "wrong". The problem is people, ignorant of science and the scientific method, and functional morons when it comes to analyzing any related information on their own.
The EPA tests all cars in the laboratory, under simulated conditions that ignore such details as wind, humidity, rolling resistance, friction coefficient and probably more that I can't think of.
In real life, each different car, shape efficiency and tires affect the EPA results in different ways, but they are all tested exactly under the same conditions , which allows comparing apples and apples.
How the cars react to real life conditions and driving styles is almost impossible to quantify, so the range of 10 to 20% reduction is reasonable.
In my Prius, the most "efficient" speed, mileage wise, is around 45 mph, an absurd speed for commuting on I5.
So "mileage may vary" takes on a whole new meaning.
My personal experience at first was a whopping reduction from the advertised 60mpg to around 42, a reduction of a whopping 30%. But that was at 70mph with occasional burst of 80.
Having adjusted driving style a bit, more recently, my average is now 46-50, a reduction of roughly 20%, still significant, at speeds of 62-65, and never exceeding 70mph.
All it takes is a grasp of the real world, and somewhat of an understanding as to why the EPA numbers were never intended to reflect the real world, but are simply one attempt at objective comparison.
The professional idiots can't seem to buy a clue.
If the standard is changed to reflect reality, the effect can't help but be the exact opposite.
Suddenly the average corporate mileage figures will plummet!
Hell, I would love to get 80% of the range in the slick color brochure that helped to sell me the 2003 model.
The least discussed design disaster in the prius is that, rather than the 600 mile range advertised, it is closer to 400, since the fuel management computer never allows you to really fill the tank (by 1 to 3 gallons), then to add insult to injury, it does not allow you to use the last 1 to 2 gallons before sutting down!
EPA "city" test
The complaint here is that changing the testing procedure to give much lower results while leaving the requisite scores as before will have the same effect as increasing the required scores under the old system.
Using real numbers, pretend GM's 2005 car fleet scores 27.5mpg under the current test, meeting the 27.5mpg CAFE standard and thus can be sold without penalty. A new test regimen will give the exact same cars a new score of 22.0mpg. This will no longer meet the CAFE standard, and would have to be made 25% more efficient to be sold without fines. This would be just like RAISING the CAFE standard to 34.4mpg using the old test procedure.
Small Euro type turbo diesels...
But the US doesnt seem too interested..
My Cummins TD gets better mileage than most of the so called
economy cars..
My vehicle was rated 15-20MPG.
It gets 17.9 on my work commute and if I drive down into town (600 foot drop over a mile or so) and back it gets about 100MPG going down and about 1MPG going up.
My vehicle should have been rated 5-20MPG. Stop and Go traffic is akin to opening a spitcock and draining the gas onto the pavement.
For some reason I see this as behind Cantwell's bill. The hybrids are having a very difficult time in meeting thier EPA numbers. Hybrids are the darlings of the left and the MSM and this just cannot be so.
I can't think of a single vehicle I've owned over the past decade thad did not meet it's EPA numbers. And I have a lead foot and drive 80mph on the hwy.
As a matter of fact, some have done even better (2000 VW Diesel Beetle).
My suggestion would be to save money by moving. You can get gas well below $2/gallon in Texas, Mississippi or Georgia. (The cheapest I've seen is about $1.93 in Mississippi - prices may be lower away from the interstate).
The offenders aren't the hybrids or their manufacturers. The federal govt makes the rules. My Prius averages around 48 mpg overall. No one really thinks it gets 65 mpg in town. The automakers don't make the claims, the govt requires that the numbers get reported.
I've read that diesels are useually understated. I don't understand why.
Funny thing about the watermelons and their hybrids, the old diesel Focus (available in Europe) gets 60mpg, better than the prius or insight.
Oh, and I am NOT a lefty. I like the car because it is cool, and does get pretty good mileage. My favorite thing about it is the smart key. I never have to take the key out of my pocket to unlock it or start it. I tell people it "knows" me... I am just a gadget guy.
"Americans expect government data to be accurate,..."
BWAAAAAHAAAHAAAAAA!
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