My point is that those mandates have been relaxed and weakened for the last few decades and attempts to increase fuel efficiency across the board have been thwarted by the oil and auto industries. To show the extent of this the federal gov’t is threatening to overturn any new CAFE standards proposed by the California legislature (so much for states rights).

Hybrids are a joke, Honda made a civic in 1992 that got 56MPG (model VX), and guess what no one bought it. The sporty SI model was much more popular at 35MPG.

Electric cars on the other hand, even in 1991 could go 150 miles on a charge. How many people commute more than 50 miles a day? Almost no one, my commute is really short at 2.5, so it would be perfect for me, because like many americans, I have in a 2 car household (one electric and one gas maybe) and love to drive fast cars. I’d buy a 35k sportscar that was electric in a heart beat, but I can’ afford a Tesla. Who knows maybe I’ll actually stop talking and convert my S2k to electric. Don’t laugh, there are plenty of people who do it.

Another issue is weight. Today’s cars are heavier, across the board. And I don’t just mean the SUVs and such, even today’s compact cars are far heavier than compacts in the 70s. Today’s Beetle is a lot heavier than the 60s Beetle, etc. And a lot of that has to do with safety. The light, efficient cars of the past would never pass certification today. Requirements for bumpers, impact absorbing crumple zones, side impact protection, air bags, etc, have all added weight, which reduces economy. Many of the hyper efficient cars in Europe and Asia are not street legal in the US be cause they cannot meet US crash requirements.

And I don’t think you can blame the automakers either – and definitely not just the US automakers. Look at a recent Honda Civic compared to the early Civics – it is a lot bigger. The new VW Beetle is larger than the old Beetle. Cars have trended larger across the board – because consumers demand it. There are still small cars available – but people tend not to buy them. Maybe now that fuel costs are going up it will make people think more about small cars again, and the trend will reverse itself. But it isn’t the car makers in some vast conspiracy to make people buy bigger cars – consumers have preferred larger models when given the choice. So naturally car makers made bigger models – supply meeting demand.

For the record I drive a large car, I think it is official ‘mid-size’, a 2006 Dodge Charger RT Daytona. It has a 350HP 5.7L Hemi V8, and I don’t really track my mileage – I have a lead foot and I’m lucky to see 20MPG, though the car can do better than that if you drive it less aggressively – but where’s the fun in that? It does have variably displacement, where it cuts out 4 cylinders on the highway, and on long trips cruising at a steady speed mileage does go up. I just filled up last night – it takes 89 octane or better, and it was $4.099 a gallon at my local station. I put $66 in the tank. And I’d still buy the same car again today (I’ve had it since 9/2005) since I love it. And I’m 6’6″ and big (read: fat), so most small cars are profoundly uncomfortable for me to drive. This car is comfortable, with enough head and leg room for me. And it has the power to get out of its own way.

My last car was a PT Cruiser, which I got back in 2000 (I ordered one the week they hit showrooms, but it took while to come in), which was a decent car, but not the quickest on the road. Sometimes it had trouble getting out of its own way when trying to merge onto the highway, etc. Fortunately I had a stick, so I could wring more acceleration out of the 2.4L engine. The automatic was much worse.

While most of the world’s automakers are approaching 40 MPG for non-hybrid engines in the next few years (even China), the US automakers have to be dragged kicking and screaming to that goal. They had been mostly able to get legistation defeated until very recently. But even that was compromised: They aren’t mandated to reach 35 MPG until 2025. By then I’m sure the foreign automakers will be doing much better than 35.

I have to wonder if these gov’t mandates had been imposed years ago whether the US carmakers would have been more able to compete against. The US industry seems so dead set against innovation, to spite its best interests. They’re business models seem stuck in 1960s.

I think the best hybrid would be a pure electric drive, probably wheel motors, with a small internal combustion motor for recharging. And it could give truly high end driving performance. There is no reason hybrids need to be wheezers like the Prius.

But even better would be turbo-electric propulsion. As you say, the turbine is more fuel efficient and less polluting, and it runs on just about anything flammable and liquid. The Army has tested the M1 with things including coal slurry. And with modern computer controls a car turbine would have a FADEC (Full Authority Digital Engine Control) just like modern jets. No more monitoring all the temps and RPMs and flipping the right switches. You press ‘Start’ and the computer starts the turbine. And modern turbines are far more efficient than the models from the 60s. They’d also come a long way in difusing the hot exhausts – you see IR diffusers on many helicopters. They mix cool air with the exhaust to lower the IR signature to protect from missile attack – but the same concept would work in cooling the exhaust so it wouldn’t melt the tarmac.

A gas turbine running at its optimal speed would be extremely efficient, and it could turn a generator to charge batteries for energy storage. The turbine would only need to fire up when power demands required it, making it even more efficient. And removing the gearing necessary to step down a turbine for wheel speeds, and the clutches needed, etc, would reduce mechanical complexity and increase reliability.

Turbo-electric propulsion could provide high performance and better economy than piston-based hybrids, or piston or turbine engines providing purely mechanical propulsion.

If you want a glimpse of the industry check out the movie “Who Killed the Electric Car” and then tell me why we don’t have electric cars (or turbine for that matter) — and no it’s not the batteries.

My favorite quote from the movie was, They say that since current batteries can only power cars 150 miles they aren’t ready for all americans, they are right, they would only work for 90% of Americans.