Well, it turns our that I am supposed to be dissapointed in the Raser Hummer that I blogged about last week.  In a press release, a spokesman for Raser claimed 100mpg on the behemoth SUV, which is simply incredible.  What we didn't know, is that apparently there are different ways of calculating fuel mileage, and the industry doesn't have a standard that it sets for offshoots like the Raser.  For clarity, the EPA can measure mass-produced cars mileage in a lab, and these are the EPA fuel consumption numbers you'll see reported most of the time, either performed by the EPA or by the manufacturer in a similar lab. 

The problem is starting to come with the amount of energy that is in the batteries, and the realistic expectation of a driving trip.  While some people are arguing that one ought to consider the amount of coal or natural gas that had to be burned to create the electricity that is stored in the battery, Raser did not.  Also, some believe a vehicle should be driven from a full tank of gas to an empty tank of gas, and again, Raser did not.  In fact, it appears that Raser felt it appropriate to drive the Hummer 40 miles on the battery, then 25 miles on gasoline, and THEN report the mileage. 

So if he counts 100 mpg, either it's 2/3 gal for those 25 miles, (37mpg or so), or it's 33mpg all the way (battery charging included), according to Doug Schiller of alternativeenergy.com. I know, I know, nowhere near as inpressive as 100mpg, right? Or is it?

If you look back to the first sentance, I said that I'm "supposed" to be dissappointed in the revelation.  While I can say that I'm certainly not AS excited, I'm still incredibly impressed for two reasons.  Most obviously, 33mpg is a HUGE number for a vehicle that typically gets HALF that, can still off-road, and tops out at 100mph.  I've driven an H2 around a sharp corner at 30, and I promise you I would never get anywhere NEAR 100mph in one of those things.  Second, while it seems a tad misleading to calculate fuel the way Raser does, I think it's only because nobody else does it that way.  I'm with him this time, thinking that maybe we need to look at the way we calculate fuel mileage.

I know for sure that I drive about an hour to work (or did until I quit Monday, anyway), and back, which is about 48 miles round trip.  That still gives me almost 15 miles or so of driving before I hit Raser's magical number of 100mpg.  If I drive less, it's probably more.  At any rate, I'm pretty sure that I drive more than most of America, although some drive more, and few drive MUCH more.  Calculate the mpg including the fuel burned to charge the batteries in your garage, fine, but I think we're missing the EFFICIENCY of that energy.  After all, that's one of the reasons to push to battery cars instead of self powered cars.  I listened to a physics professor explain the cost of a lightbulb and it's ridiculously cheap.  So cheap, in fact, that he makes the case that we wouldn't even notice if we left a 60 watt lightbulb on all day.  In fact, if it weren't for large appliances like washers, dryers, refrigerators, dishwashers and such, we probably wouldn't even notice our electric bill.  So the question is, shouldn't we be able to calculate, instead of miles per gallon, miles per dollar?  
 
I think that there ought to be several ways to measure gas mileage based on the ways that we are likely to drive our cars.  We already know that we are likely to get different figures for city driving vs highway driving.  What about those of us that would drive only 15 miles a day? We'd never need to fill up that Hummer with gas.  AAA gives us national average fuel prices, and I'm sure we could have a national average electricity cost as well.  I propose a 40 mile trip mpg and mpd(miles per dollar), a 100 mile mpg/mpd, and a 400 mile or 800 mile mpg/mpd, whichever we are more like to make on an all day cross-country trip style driving. 

This way, as consumers, we could evaluate a car based on the needs WE expect to use the car, and make the better choice for our pockets.  Granted, mpd wouldn't necessarily reflect what we'd pay because prices fluctuate across the country, but it would at least be standardized and give us a great comparison of apples to apples.  So maybe that Hummer wouldn't be the best thing for a guy who has to drive all day every day, but it could be a godsend for the grocery getting soccer mom.

All in all, I think it's still a fantastic vehicle representing a HUGE bound in the right direction.  A little more work on portable electricty generators, maybe some focus on vehicles intended to stay on road instead of off and maybe at more sane and, er, legal speeds, and we'll see that 100mpg in our pocketbooks at the end of the week.