Customizing Your Car to Be Greener
In today’s economy, everyone seems to be finding new ways to conserve and make their daily routine as efficient as possible. At Sierra Mazda we understand this and fully support new technologies that make our lives greener and more efficient. We love the Southern California landscape, and would support any technology that would help cleanup the Los Angeles air.
Zoom Zoom with the Mazda MX-5 Miata
For example, how much gas could you save by making some strategic changes to your Mazda car or any car for that matter? Certain scientists at MIT say that you can save almost half your use, meaning with coming green car technologies, we’d all be buying 50% less gasoline.
The United States uses about 140 billion gallons of gasoline each year, meaning that the US has to do more than just drill to lower the costs of transportation (which also includes the environmental costs). Scientists and researchers led by John Heywood have just finished a five-year assessment of what can be done to cut down on fuel consumption for the nation and money for all of our pocketbooks.
The car efficiency researchers at MIT checked out how gas and diesel engines, as well as hybrid electric cars and plug-in cars, are likely to evolve between now and 2035. The researchers also studied what can reasonably be expected from new fuels such as hydrogen and biofuels.
“Improvements” in cars in recent years have largely focused on increasing performance, driven by the demand for ever-larger and more powerful cars (SUVs). As a result, no significant fuel consumption gains have been realised over the past 25 years, says the team.
They call for car manufacturers to focus efforts on improving fuel savings over performance.
Lose the Car Weight
The simplest way of reducing the amount of fuel used by cars without a big change in consumer preferences would be to produce lighter cars (Mazda’s been doing this for decades!). Heywood’s team estimate that the average US car 25 years from now could feasibly weigh between 20% and 35% less without compromising on auto security and convenience. This alone would cut fuel consumption by between 12% and 20%.
Looking to what types of cars could push petroleum cars off the roads in 15 to 30 years, the research team see the greatest potential in hybrid electric and plug-in hybrid electric cars – with batteries that can be recharged from the grid already in place in our homes, that itself would include mo
re renewal resources such as solar power and wind power.
Today, current spark-ignition autos use on average 8.9 litres of gas to go 100 kilometres. More efficient vehicle equivalents could use up just 5.5 litres by 2035. Hybrids and plug-in hybrids on the other hand would use up 3.1 and 2.2 litres respectively.
The team calculate what this would mean in terms of carbon dioxide emissions. On average, current “conventional” cars in the US emit 277 grams of CO2 per km travelled. In 2035, their equivalents could chuck out just 178g per km. Hybrids and plug-in hybrids, meanwhile, are projected to emit just 109g.
The Price for Greener Cars
With green technology, especially concerning cars, there’s always the cost factor: the hybrids will cost between $2500 and $5900 more than their contemporary petrol-only brethren. Heywood says the U.S. government may to support some initiative that will help with the green car transition.
Even with all the hurdles and politics, he and his team estimate that by improving fuel efficiency over the next 15 years and bringing in substantially different automobiles, trucks and SUV’s, including hybrids and possibly fuel cell cars in the next 30, it should be possible to slash the amount of fuel guzzled by the gas-guzzling nation by 30% to 50% by 2035 if everything goes according to plan.
The team points out that the biggest change can come from the drivers themselves. “We have got to get out of the habit of thinking that we only need to focus on improving the technology, that we can invent our way out of this situation,” says Heywood.
“Transitioning from our current situation onto a path with declining fuel consumption and emissions, even in the developed world, will take several decades – much longer than we had hoped or realised,” he says. “We’ve got to start now.”
Where to Start Greening Your Car
If you’re looking for a smaller but more fuel efficient Mazda, and/or need help customizing your Mazda car or any car for fuel efficiency in Southern California and the LA area, come down to Sierra Mazda and maybe we can help. Otherwise, there are quite a few zippy and light-weight Mazda cars we’d love to tell you about.
Zoom, Zoom with Sierra Mazda.
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