Every day I walk half a mile to my local railway station, often passing queued traffic going the same way as me, to stand at Platform 1 and wait for the train to London Liverpool Street. Every day for the past week I have had to face an advertising hoarding bursting with excitement to promote the new Lexus RX Hydrid SUV. Low Emissions. Zero Guilt.
Yes, it does say that. And here is a picture of the lovable vehicle you can now own with “Zero Guilt”
The specifications are less than mouth-watering for those interested in energy conservation.
The RX 400h luxury SUV harnesses the power of a 3.3-litre V6 petrol engine and two powerful electric motors, delivering 269 Bhp of seamless power, whilst returning the lowest premium petrol SUV fuel consumption today: 34.9 mpg in the combined cycle.
34.9 mpg may sound impressive if you are used to a hulking Ford Explorer or a Chrysler 300C, but in the world of medium sized cars 34.9 mpg is not great.
The similar-sized Land Rover Freelander gives 36.7 mpg
The Renault Grand Scenic ranges from 34.4 to 52.3 mpg
The Ford Galaxy, 34.4 to 44.8 mpg.
The VW Polo diesel 5-door does 60.1 miles per gallon.
Hybrid Drive doesn’t sound too good now, does it?
But what we are seeing here, in the world of the guilt-ridden consumer, is the equivalent of putting twice as much half-fat cream on your pie. Rather than compromise your lifestyle by buying a more modest vehicle (how much space do you need for a family, for goodness sake!?) you are being tempted to carry on as before, and let the designers lighten your guilt load.
If you aren’t prepared to change your lifestyle to put this planet right again then you deserve to feel guilty, whatever the marketing executives want you to feel.
Keith Farnish
www.theearthblog.org
www.reduce3.com
And Proud Member Of The Sietch
American car companies are doing the same thing, with ford hybrids that get an extra 2-10 miles per gallon…big whoop. The 08 prius is set to get almost 100 miles per gallon! Like you said these companies are simply marketing to guilty consumers.
At the same time however, I will take any improvement in mpg I can get. If that means we have to fight for every little bit then so be it. Once car companies accept the fact that they can market hybrids to consumers successfully they will start to compete for the most efficient hybrid they can. They are still afraid that they will lose there shirt in the hybrid market if they put out something too “radical.”
Consumers should do research and make sure that the hybrid they buy is really worth paying the extra money. As you point out several similar cars get even better mpg for and fill the same car use classification.