There a a lot of minivans and fullsized cars in my hood for sale. I've recently seen 2 car service cars for sale. I loved my old car service in B'klyn where people just used their own normal cars, you might be picked up in a civic or camry, not all town cars.

Yeah, and the rumor mills is that Toyota is going to introduce the next gen hybrid system late this year, early next, while Honda is planning to launch a new low-cost hybrid next year.

With these next-gen systems, the plan is to get the hybrid premium over standard IC engines down to around $2K.

My friend who owns a Prius said when gas was cheaper it would have taken about 5 years for the extra cost of the Prius to pay for itself in fuel savings. Now the time is down to a year and a half or two years....

I've been trying to find (unsuccessfully so far) a company that will rent me a hybrid car for the drive up to Canada this summer.

So far I know that Avis and Budget both have hybrids in their fleet, but none in NYC that I can find.

Meanwhile, the price of used fuel-efficient cars has been going up a fair amount.

DAMN, do I love my 8-year-old Toyota Echo. I still get 33-34 mpg. And the tank is only ~10 gallons, so I don't have to take out a bank loan to fill it up.

I've been trying to find (unsuccessfully so far) a company that will rent me a hybrid car for the drive up to Canada this summer.

Well, the extra savings from hybrid technology mostly comes in city driving.

Meanwhile....

The world's premier energy monitor is preparing a sharp downward revision of its oil-supply forecast, a shift that reflects deepening pessimism over whether oil companies can keep abreast of booming demand.

The Paris-based International Energy Agency is in the middle of its first attempt to comprehensively assess the condition of the world's top 400 oil fields. Its findings won't be released until November, but the bottom line is already clear: Future crude supplies could be far tighter than previously thought.

...

For several years, the IEA has predicted that supplies of crude and other liquid fuels will arc gently upward to keep pace with rising demand, topping 116 million barrels a day by 2030, up from around 87 million barrels a day currently. Now, the agency is worried that aging oil fields and diminished investment mean that companies could struggle to surpass 100 million barrels a day over the next two decades.

Oopsie....

[link]

Well, the extra savings from hybrid technology mostly comes in city driving.

So you don't think over a 2000 mile drive it would be cheaper to be in a Prius than a Camry? (I'm seriously asking - I don't actually know enough about it to be certain.)

Well, I think the highway mileage of a Prius is still better than the Camry. But the car rental people usually charge more for a Prius, so you might wanna look closer at the numbers....

Ugh -- someone I interviewed a couple of weeks ago just called to check on the process, and I had to tell her she didn't make the cut. I wish she had emailed!

I guess I'd better email the rest of them now.