The 100 MPG Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid

that certainly hits on a major point of our penny wise, pound foolish society. purchasing an expensive environmentally intensive manufactured (and eventual disposal) vehicle. As these cars age they will lose power and MPG as the batteries deteriorate, and it's very unlikely that those in the market for second and third hand cars will be financially willing or able to spend several thousands of dollars on top of the cost of the car to replace batteries and other components.

Yes, they will be a great boon to the upwardly mobile, who can spend lavishly, throw away the undesirable and feel good that they are somehow saving the planet, but for those of us that no longer march in the consumer parade and look farther down the road to see what happens where the parade disperses, costs and what's left to clean up, these might well wind up being albatrosses that are no better than that old mini-van, but with much less room and carrying around hundreds of pounds of dead batteries.

Wouldn't it be great if we all had wind or solar powered homes to plug these rechargeable hybrids into? The time has certainly come. Legislators could make this technology affordable if they chose to.

All we need to do is front the trillions of dollars that will be saved by averting environmentally mediated diseases in the near future and use it for this technology!

The quality of our environment is directly linked to the quality of our health. It is time to Stop Treating! Start Preventing!
Teresa Holler www.holler4health.com

I've found elsewhere that the vehicle will use about 0.25kWh per mile. So I calculated the cost per mile like so (which makes more sense the me than mpg).

Lumina (L) miles per unit = 23 (gasoline)
Prius (P) miles per unit = 4 (electric, 1 mile / 0.25kWh)

L: 1 unit / 23 miles = 0.0435 units/mile
P: 1 unit / 4 miles = 0.25 units/mile

L: 0.0435 u/m * $3.00 / unit = $0.1305 / mile
P: 0.25 u/m * $0.1635 / unit = $0.0409 / mile

7 mile trip
L: $0.9135
P: $0.2863

100 miles driven (aggregate, short daily commutes)
L: $13.05
P: $04.09

These figures look a lot different when you play with the numbers. With a 35mpg car, it only costs half as much per mile (instead of 3 times). But with $4/gallon gas, the cost for the same vehicle gets close to 3 times as much again. With cheaper utilities, say $0.10 kWh, the Prius only costs $2.50 for a 100 mile trip, making it over 5 times less costly as the $3/gallon / 23mpg Lumina, and about 7 times less costly with $4/gallon gas.

I don't think very many new electric or hybrid make any sense from a narrow focused pure cost perspective anyways. They don't make up for the cost difference in gas savings in the long run (though that doesn't factor reliability and maintenance cost). But when compared to what it would cost to make great environmental and social changes without them, they're a steal.

correction, .4921 x 23 is $11.32 in the second paragraph, I mistakenly multiplied by 21

Most people do think in terms of MPG only with no regard to where the rest of this "free fuel" is coming from. If I am to assume from this story it takes about a kilowatt of electricity to travel a mile (15 amps X 120 volts for 4 hours = 7.2 kilowatt hours of electricity giving the ability to travel 7 miles ), this would be no bargain for me. Our current electric rate where I live is 16.38 cents for the first 500 kWh. If I compared this to my '91 Lumina APV minivan (which gets 23 MPG in the winter with studded snow tires), the cost of driving the plug in hybrid only 7 miles (before the gasoline would kick in) would equal $3.77 a gallon (.1638 X 23), and that of course is also assuming no use of lights, heater or any other energy consuming element.

If it wasn't for a cost equalisation programme (funded by oil royalties in our state for rural communities), or if I consumed more than 500 kWh, the rate here would be over 49 cents a kWh (this rate also applies to non-residential customers), that would make that gallon of "hybrid gas" costing $10.33 (.4921 X 23)

Yes, not everyone is paying 17 cents per Kwh (although that is this May's average for the north-eastern states according to the DOE, so it's certainly not a far-fetched fantasy). What happens in the future as more power plants need to be constructed or road taxes are shifted to offset the loss of gasoline sales?

One thing corporate america should have taught us, levels of income or profits and growth will be maintained at all costs

when you say 100mpg but it plugs in. how is the cost of the electricity from the grid factor into this?