2006 Prius 21 MPG in cold weather???

You can make a case for warming it up for about 1 minute (stage 1a of operation), but not after that. Even then, most simply see the idling as a waste of fuel for no purpose other than human comfort in the cold. My commute is 1.5 miles, and just driving it we get around 40 mpg in kansas winter (similar to yours), using zero idle time. Ours is a 2010, but I think similar to Gen 2. Anyway, I think you should be in low 30s on your commute if you wear coat and gloves and forego idling. Its only 2 minutes or so commute?

Make sure your tire pressure is at or above Toyota placard, and that your oil is not over-filled.

When driving several miles, you get what, 45+ mpg?

 

You have a near-worst-case scenario for Prius fuel economy: Very short trips in cold weather, presumably with cabin heat running.

Any car's fuel economy drops in the winter, but the effect of cold weather on the Prius is proportionately greater because of the car's warmup cycle. When the car is fully warm, the ICE (internal combustion engine) will cut off when not needed for propulsion. Your car never has that chance, so the ICE runs continuously unless it's at a full stop, and even then it runs for the first minute or so after startup.

Warming it up ahead of time is not helping. Just get in and drive.

I strongly suggest you consider an engine block heater. Do a good search on PriusChat for "block heater" or "EBH" for more.

 

And consider grill blocking in winter at least to partially mitigate the warm up problem...

 

I don't believe that you would get 21 mpg in your GrandPrix if you were only driving 1 mile at a time. No vehicle is going to do well under those conditions with the exception of an EV. Maybe you should consider a golf cart. :madgrin:

 

so your complaining about bad mileage when your basically warming up the car for longer then the trip will take?

Your getting 0 mpg when your warming up the car.

 

A better metric than MPG for standstill is likely going to be gal/hour. 0 MPG doesn't look overly threatening. If you're burring xxx gallons/hour it's more noticeable that you're affecting mileage.

 

This commute calls for an EV, a bicycle, or feet.

Tom

 

Yeah, Tom, in isolation. So long as he has someone with a 40+ mile one-way commute to take him to client meetings, lunch, errands, etc.

Luckily, I didn't give up my rights when I moved close to my work, so I'll keep driving short hops getting mediocre mpg. Time is money, and we each allocate our time and money to our own perception of optimal.