braindump

Here’s a brief update on my recent post on the Prius, looking at fuel consumption, CO2 emissions and pollution as listed on the Australian government Green Vehicle Guide.

Using the guide’s advanced search feature, I selected the current model (3rd generation) Toyota Prius, the previous model (1.5 litre, 2nd generation) Prius, the MINI Cooper D Hardtop manual (which has the best consumption of all the variants) and a slightly more recent model of the Honda Jazz that I currently have.

Here are the results:

Green Vehicle Guide comparison

Take the air pollution ratings with a grain of salt; most manufacturers don’t test their cars against the higher standards that enable them to get a rating above 5, so the cars that are shown with a rating of 5 may actually be better than that.

One interesting point in the figures above is that the MINI Cooper D has exactly the same combined fuel consumption as the new model Toyota Prius. As far as I’m concerned, that means that MINI’s advertising of the Cooper D as “Australia’s most fuel efficient car” (“As per Green Vehicle Guide as published by the Australian Government, based on combined fuel consumption as per ADR81/01 for MINI Cooper D Manual”) is false advertising. And if you take into account the higher price of diesel compared with petrol, and the greater CO2 emissions per litre, the MINI Cooper D is clearly worse than the new Prius. I think I’ll complain to the Advertising Standards Bureau.

UPDATE: I didn’t complain, but the MINI Cooper D is now advertised as “Australia’s most fuel efficient diesel car”.