I recently talked to a man who rides a Harley. He told me he gets about 43 miles per gallon. I was surprised; my daughter does that well with her VW Jetta diesel station wagon. Unfortunately, because of enviromental regs she also pays over $5/gal in California because they hate diesel.

A recent visit to California convinced me that despite all the whining, Americans are making little or no personal effort to reduce their gas bills. They are still driving 70-75 on the freeways; still accelerating and braking with abandon; and of course absolutely refuse to carpool, whether to work or to soccer matches. Kids apparently cannot walk 1/2 mile to and from school on neighborhood streets. It is the same in Virginia, but folks here seem to whine a little less.

When the traffic light turns green, the number of people who get through the light depend on how quickly each reacts to the opportunity to move, and how briskly each accelerates. If, at the end of the green period, some cars that were waiting for the light before it turned green are still there, you have a backlog of idling vehicles. It means that at no time during the green interval were any cars able to flow smoothly through without braking away the precious energy that they bought by burning fuel. In effect, every car is forced to stop and accelerate again, at great cost in fuel. Even a regen-braking hybrid will not completely solve the problem because the regen braking, battery storage, and re-use in the motor will lose at least 30% of the energy, and maybe 60%. You also have increased time operating air conditioning, windshield wipers, or headlights as well as ventilating fans, increased driver frustration, and a much increased risk of accident as the backlog stretches further into the oncoming traffic stream. How much energy does it take to tow a car, process a claim, and repair it? What volatiles are released by the repainting process? How about the manufacture of new parts and the recycling of old ones?