Edmunds Smackdown #2 and #4

Many times a thread will drift as various folks bring their point of view for comment. But I'll give you my take:

Over the past four years, Edmunds publishes a "Smackdown" driving exercise where five cars follow the same path in a trip to Las Vegas and back. In this annual report, usually in September, Edmunds drives five cars for three days over:

1. Back Roads to Las Vegas
2. Las Vegas streets
3. Interstate back from Las Vegas

It turns out "Smackdown 2" has the ZVW30 Prius and "Smackdown 4" has the Chevy Volt and both have a Jetta TDI suggesting these tables:

	Column 1
0	[th]smackdown #2[/th][th]MPG #2[/th][th]MPG #4[/th][th]smackdown #4[/th][tr][td]2009 VW Jetta TDI[/td][td]41.2[/td][td]39.5[/td][td]2011 Jetta TDI[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010 Prius[/td][td]47.2[/td][td]37.8[/td][td]2011 Volt[/td][/tr]

Back roads, country highway.

	Column 1
0	[th]smackdown #2[/th][th]MPG #2[/th][th]MPG #4[/th][th]smackdown #4[/th][tr][td]2009 VW Jetta TDI[/td][td]31.6[/td][td]29.8[/td][td]2011 Jetta TDI[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010 Prius[/td][td]48.7[/td][td]44.8[/td][td]2011 Volt[/td][/tr]

Las Vegas city driving.

	Column 1
0	[th]smackdown #2[/th][th]MPG #2[/th][th]MPG #4[/th][th]smackdown #4[/th][tr][td]2009 VW Jetta TDI[/td][td]40.6[/td][td]40.4[/td][td]2011 Jetta TDI[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010 Prius[/td][td]47.4[/td][td]45.2[/td][td]2011 Volt[/td][/tr]

Interstate.

Observations

• The larger displacement 2011 Jetta has lost MPG
• Jetta is hurt in City driving, does OK in either Highway
• Volt is hurt in Country Highway driving, does OK in City and Interstate
• Prius is at the top, both Highway routes and City

Now some folks objected to the test as having unreasonable distances, 180 miles, on the first and third test, and a whole day of cruising around Las Vegas. But it turns out that many of us to live in less urban areas have friends and co-workers with daily commutes in the same order of magnitude. And then I realized we could actually characterize typical USA vehicle usage by looking at their annual mileage.

Ebay also sells cars with the model year and odometer readings. We can plot this data and using a linear trend line, get a good approximation for annual mileage. Divide the annual mileage by the number of driving days per week and voila, we have a reasonable number for the daily miles:




So looking at the slopes and treating the weekend as 'half-day', we can calculate a credible, daily miles:

• 20,000 mi/year -> 20000 / (52*6) -> 64 miles/day
• 15,000 mi/year -> 15000 / (52*6) -> 48 miles/day
• 10,000 mi/year -> 10000 / (52*6) -> 32 miles/day
• 5,000 mi/year -> 5000 / (52*6) -> 16 miles/day

The top two miles/day exceed the Volt EV range significantly. Living in North Alabama, I have co-workers whose daily commutes are twice the 64 miles/day, closer to the "Smackdown" mileage. These folks are not good candidates for a Volt replacement. Now my co-workers might get some Plug-In Prius advantage but they are better served with just an ordinary Prius. So I suggested our good Volt friends might shift from the Prius community to proselytizing other car owners:

• Camry - the top selling sedan in the USA, gas-only version
• Hummer - another vehicle often cited by Prius skeptics

Both of these vehicles are well within the Volt EV range. This is not the case with many Prius owners. We actually are driving many more miles, at least 50% more per year than Camry drivers. And then there is the Hummer.

In 2006, CNW Marketing issued a press release about an unpublished study claiming the life-time cost made the Hummer 'greener' than the Prius. A couple of months later, they released their study and it turned out he claimed 300,000 miles for the Hummer and only 109,000 for the Prius. In fact, every hybrid-and-gas model showed the hybrid with fewer miles than the gas model ... someone having both a gas and hybrid model in their driveway would choose to drive the more expensive gasser. This report release was just months before GM announced they would end the Hummer line. Here is data, six years later, showing the complete humbug of the claimed, lifetime mileage:

• Prius = 2*Hummer :: highest mileage vehicles
• Prius = 2.5*Hummer :: average mileage vehicles
• Prius = 7*Hummer :: lowest (style) mileage vehicles

The Edmunds "smackdown" comparison of the Prius vs Volt led to a discussion of the distances involved. This led to looking at Ebay odometer readings and actual co-worker commuting practices. Adding the Hummer metrics closed the book on the old CNW Marketing "Dust-to-Dust" report.

Bob Wilson

 

Personally, I see the Volt as the Precept brought to market 10 years late. Had it come out in 2002-03, it would have given the first Prius and Honda Insights significant competiton:

The first generation, 2-seat, Honda Insight always got better mileage than the early, 5-seat, NHW11 Prius. But the Prius, especially the NHW20, pretty well crushed Honda Insight sales that ended in 2006.

In one respect, the 4-seat Volt faces a similar problem, utility, but it is on the market. The current 5-seat Honda Insight was a good attempt to fix the 2-seat Insight problems but it came out five years late. Hopefully GM will continue their Volt efforts and come up with improved versions in the future but I suspect Prius technology will advance too. Eventually the market will decide.

Bob Wilson

 

Good point:

We have a lot of apartment complexes even in Huntsville without any form of vehicle charging stations. It is hard for a renter to justify a charging station they can't load in the U-haul or moving van:

• 34% Renter-Occupied Housing (NMHC - National Multi Housing Council - NMHC)
• 66% Owner-Occupied Housing

What incentive exists for apartment buildings to install charging stations? It is the same problem of a business that has a capital budget. What is their pay-back for having charging stations? Employee loyalty?

Perhaps if a utility company decided to make money by having charger stations embedded in the base of their utility poles, transformer pads, or lighting poles. They might sell some off-peak power but what is their pay-back? Even wholesale prices, the wear and damage repairs would easily wipe out these marginal sales. Worse, copper cables are at risk of theft ... unless part of the vehicle ... and even these would be at risk.

Bob Wilson