Toyota Primes Its New 120MPGe Plug-in Hybrid Prius

That seems more sensible, and 600 miles is also quite good. See Bisco, you can drive to Chicago now.

 

I've said it elsewhere, possibly in this thread, but MPGe is idiotic. All it does is confuse the consumer, who is familiar with MPG, but doesn't know how it relates to MPGe (if it even does). Heck, I'm a science minded enthusiast of cars and technology, and I don't really know how Miles Per Gallon equivalent is derived. Electrons aren't measured in gallons, so attempting to equate it to a heat (burning fuel) engine is absurd.

The measure of electric efficiency needs to be expressed in a useful unit such as Miles (Kilometers) per kWh, or kWh per 100 miles. With this info I can actually approximate the expected range of any given vehicle with a given battery capacity.

I don't know who the genius is that invented the MPGe, and I doubt the stupid system will change, but at least I have this forum to vent my frustration.

 

MPG is idiotic too. All it does is mislead the consumer... The measure of gasoline efficiency needs to be expressed in a useful unit such as...

Notice the problem? We're stuck with a flawed measurement system. Your suggestion of fuel-quantity per 100 miles is what some of us have been wanting for many, many years. It hasn't happened. It most likely won't be accepted for many years to come... here.

Elsewhere in the world, they do have sensible way of what they measure. We don't here. MPG has problems. MPGe mimics them.

Being consistent can be helpful. That's the approach EPA has chosen to at least make the understanding a little easier.

 

I never met or heard of anyone is the USA that doesn't understand MPG (Miles per Gallon). How is it idiotic? They sell fuel in gallons and our cars measure distance in miles.

 

It's extremely misleading... which is why most of the rest of the world doesn't use it. Compare a vehicle getting 30 MPG to one getting 50 MPG. Those numbers don't tell you how much fuel is actually consumed over any particular distance... for example, 100 miles.

Notice how much more informative these are:

3.33 gallons / 100 miles
2 gallons / 100 miles

 

You're correct that there is useful information about MPG and that you can estimate fuel consumption using those numbers, but as mentioned above by John, the way the number is expressed is distorting for most people.

For example, if I trade in an old car that got 20 MPG for one that gets 30 MPG, we know the new car gets 10 more miles per gallon. If later on I trade in the 30 MPG car for one that gets 40 MPG, the new car again gets 10 more miles per gallon. However, the fuel savings isn't linear each time we increase by 10 MPG, but the average person probably doesn't realize this.

20 MPG = 5 gallons per 100 miles
30 MPG = 3.33 gallons per 100 miles (1.67 gallon savings compared to 20 MPG)
40 MPG = 2.5 gallons per 100 miles (0.83 gallon savings compared to 30 MPG)

As you can see, there is a diminishing return to increasing the MPG. The first time we improve MPG by 10, we save 1.67 gallons on a 100 mile trip. The next time we improve MPG by 10, we only save 0.83 gallons on the same 100 mile trip.

It's much more intuitive to use gallons per 100 miles (or liters per 100 kilometers) as a measure of efficiency.

The following are various Prius models expressed in both MPG and gallons per 100 miles:

Gen 1 - 41 MPG = 2.44 gal / 100 miles
Gen 2 - 46 MPG = 2.17 gal / 100 miles
Gen 3 - 50 MPG = 2.00 gal / 100 miles
Gen 4 - 52 MPG = 1.92 gal / 100 miles
Gen 4 eco - 56 MPG = 1.79 gal / 100 miles

Notice how easy this figure is to adjust to other distances. To figure out how many gallons per 10 miles traveled, move the decimal point to the left one time. For gallons per 1000 miles, move the decimal to the right one space.

 

I feel MPGe is a term EPA likes because it makes Plug_ins sound superior. also EPA Cargo Space allows claiming big cargo space, helps green cars with smaller cargo space sound good.

 

mpg works fine when you're comparing one model to another. mpge makes no sense at all.



Merged, use multi-quote

only if it's slightly downhill.

 

KWh/100 miles is also more useful!

Calculation based on 1 gallon of gasoline = 33.7 kWh, and the US fleet mpg average is currently: 25 mpg.

So, a 2016 Hyundai Sonata Plug-in Hybrid rated at 34 kWh/100 miles or 2.9 miles/KWh is 4x more efficient than the average or 33.7 KWh/34 KWh = 99 MPGe. 2016 Hyundai Sonata Plug-in Hybrid

 

Unfortunately, that's a little bit misleading too... since most of us use a gas/ethanol mix rather than 100% gas, which carries more energy.

1 gallon of E10 fuel = 32.6 kWh

 

Yes, but sadly, it almost never gets referred to.

 

Although there likely isn't a definition of "fully loaded", my understanding, and likely the understanding most have, is that fully loaded means it includes every option. It wouldn't make sense to refer to a base model as "fully loaded" since that doesn't expand the understanding of what options it has, since it's assumed that a car has at least the minimum of options.

What does full option car mean? - Quora

... and I didn't realize the EPA includes kWh / 00 miles on the sticker. That's very encouraging!

Since consumers generally haven't learned any measure of efficiency for EVs yet, now is the time to standardize on one that makes sense, otherwise we'll end up using a dumb unit of measure, like feet and inches, and be unwilling to change later on.

 

Sure it does, it is just a mathematical conversion of miles/kWh into miles/gallon of gas.
It allows a relative comparison between electric and gas cars.

kWh/100 miles is a much better method for tracking the car's own efficiency over time.
However asking people to compare mpg to miles/kWh when comparing different cars is far more confusing.

 

I'm beginning to believe Prime will be a sub-class for any Toyota Vehicle, much like Limited is now. Camry Hybrid Prime is now a plug-in version of the Camry Hybrid or RAV4 Hybrid Prime. Of course the opposite doesn't exactly ring true for the Prius. There is no Prius S or Prius XLE so I'm almost sure there will be no Prius Prime LE, XLE, and Limited.

 

there's a plug in version of the camry hybrid?

 

people are easily confused. we need a whole new rating system that cuts across fuel types. a simple efficiency rating would be best.

 

Making examples of Toyota's naming conventions, possible naming conventions.