Zandra and I bought a hybrid car to replace her car about 3 weeks ago. The decision was somewhat accelerated after her Volvo got hit in the parking lot at Costco, causing enough damage to need fixing, but not enough to call the insurance company about (i.e., about equal to our deductible).

We had long been considering getting a larger vehicle to replace her Volvo S40 - we had purchased the Volvo when we were a family of 3. As a family of 4, the car was tighter and taking along a stroller or any amount of kid stuff effectively eliminated our capacity to bring anything else home. Our Ford Freestyle is wonderful as a family car, but sometimes, it was just *too* big (I think our eyes were bigger than our stomachs when it came to deciding how much capacity we really needed...) The Mini Cooper, of course, is just for fun.

But, with gas prices doing what they are, we wanted something relatively fuel efficient. We'd always been interested in getting a hybrid, and that's what we ended up doing. I won't mention what kind of hybrid we got though.

The hybrid has been living up to our expectations (and then some) when it comes to mileage. For an SUV type vehicle, we are averaging about 28 miles per gallon. Not bad for 4400 lbs. of car. We are now driving it almost everywhere, averaging about 400 miles/week in various errands, etc. It's comfy, quiet, and pretty good on power too.

Of course, I was curious to figure out how long it was going to take for us to pay for the difference in the price of the car over a non-hybrid. I calculated we paid a hefty $4500 premium for the privilege of owning a hybrid over a gas model. Here's the math.

For the gas version of this car: 15000 miles/year / 22 miles/gallon == 681.81 gallons of gas per year.
For our hybrid version, assuming our mileage stays the same: 15000 miles/year / 28 miles/gallon == 535.71 gallons of gas per year.
I save 681.81 gallons - 535.71 gallons == 146.1 gallons each year.
At $3.50/gallon of gas (what it *currently* costs for premium unleaded where we are), this works out to roughly $511.35/year in savings.
$4500/$511.35 == 8.8 years to pay the difference.

A less optimistic calculation is if you compare it to the 22 mpg we average on the Freestyle (which uses regular gas).
681.81 gallons * $3.25/gal == $2215.88 per year versus 535.71 * $3.50/gal == $1874.99
This results in a savings of only $340.89 per year, or 13.20 years to make up the difference.

If the price of gas changes, however, the time decreases. Let's say I go up 20%. Using the Freestyle calculation:
681.81 gallons * $3.85/gal == $2624.97 per year versus 535.71 * $4.20/gal = $2249.98
This results in a savings of $375/year or roughly 12 years to make up the difference.

Worth it? From an environmental point of view, yes. Dollars, it's probably a sacrifice. I may revisit this calculation later in case of errors or other new interesting data....

(Followup on 3/31/2008 - I forgot to mention that even though the $$$ may not add up, having twice the space is definitely not to be forgotten! -- JH)

Tags: Technology