...been doing a lot of reading lately and very little writing (Damn little!! - admin) and even missed my 3rd blogaversary in June. (It doesn't seem like it's been 3 years, but it does seem like it's been 38 months. Go figure.)

Some interesting reading is an article on the Reason Magazine website (h/t Instapundit, I think) entitled "Have You Hugged Your Hummer Today?" The writer summarizes a work of research on the full lifetime energy costs of cars and trucks. The research paper is a downloadable file (warning!: 458 pages unzipped) found here and is titled "Dust to Dust."

Amazingly thorough, the study takes into account all costs associated with designing, building, driving, maintaining and scrapping the vehicle. And the results are probably not what you would expect:

What are the top 3 vehicles in terms of lifetime energy costs? #1 is the Scion xB at $0.48 per mile, #2 is the Ford Escort at $0.57 per mile and #3 is the Jeep Wrangler at $0.60 per mile. The bottom 3 are the Mercedes Benz Maybach at $11.58 per mile, the Volkswagen Phaeton at $11.21 per mile and the Rolls-Royce line at an average of $10.66 per mile.

And the headline stems from the Hummer line coming in using less energy than any hybrid currently on the market. Honda Civic Hybrid? $3.24 per mile. Toyota Prius? $3.25 per mile. Hummer? $1.949 per mile.

The main points are: the more complicated the car, the higher the lifetime energy use; the more unique the car, ditto; and the shorter the expected lifetime of the car, double ditto. Neat stuff for the analytical mind. Price of anything is a strong signal for how much it costs to make the thing (duh) but those costs include the energy required all along the way.

I don't recommend reading the whole research paper, but the Reason article is great. Just a different way to look at a subject (vehicle energy efficiency) that is much in the news.

One of the most perverse things about U.S. consumers buying hybrids is that while this might reduce air pollution in their own cities, they increase pollution – and energy consumption -- in Japan and other Asian countries where these cars are predominantly manufactured. "In effect, they are exporting pollution and energy consumption," Spinella says.

Hmmmmmm.