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EPA Lowers Prius Mileage Estimate

Feds' Findings Confirm Consumer Complaints

By Joe Benton
ConsumerAffairs.com

December 19, 2006

• Feds Investigate Toyota Prius Brakes • EPA Lowers Prius Mileage Estimate • Prius Ranks #1 in Owner Satisfaction • Toyota Aims for Even Better Prius Performance • Toyota Prius Named in Patent Infringement Suit • A Wild Ride in a Prius • First Chinese Prius Ready to Go • Prius Supplies Will Remain Tight Through 2006 • Prius Runs Amok After Stalling, Hits Tow Truck • Toyota Boosts Prius Price, Cancels Fleet Sales • Toyota Continues to Sell Faulty Prius Hybrids • Greens Call Toyota a Wolf in Sheep's Clothing • Toyota Warns Prius Owners of Stalling • GM Sells Subaru Stake to Toyota, Which Increases Stake in Hybrid Battery Supplier • Prius Profiteering as Salesmen Squeeze Consumers • Prius Turns Profits in Used-Car Market • Feds Open Probe into Prius Stalling • Prius Problems Traced to Software Glitch • Toyota Probes Prius Stalling Problem

Prius owners concerned about poor mileage in their hybrids have been belittled, ridiculed and misled as they searched for some reason why their little cars continually came up short in fuel mileage.

Prius consumers have listened while dealers and technicians offered sometimes outlandish explanations of why their own fuel mileage calculations were wrong and why Toyota claims for the Prius were correct.

Other Prius owners even accused the complainers of disloyalty to the hybrid movement.

Toyota claimed the little hybrid would get 60 miles per gallon in city traffic, not just the 45 many consumers were experiencing.

One Prius owner told ConsumerAffairs.com that her Toyota technician went so far as to explain how the onboard computer in the Prius took into account of head winds along with other sophisticated calculations.

Now it turns out that most of the hybrid owners questioning Toyota's mileage claims for the Prius were right on target while Toyota was wrong, at least according to the Environmental Protection Agency's new mileage estimates.

The facts seem to be that the Prius gets 45 miles to a gallon on average in the city. That is the new word according to the EPA.

The government fuel economy estimate also confirms ConsumerAffairs.com's road test of the Prius in July. That test drive concluded that the Prius got 45.2 miles per gallon in vigorous city driving.

Just this last October, the very same EPA that now says the Prius gets roughly 45 miles to a gallon praised the little car for topping the government mileage list with 60 miles per gallon in the city and 51 miles per gallon on the highway despite protests from many Prius owners saying that just wasn't so.

The Prius did not come close to 60 miles per gallon in the ConsumerAffairs.com test either.

So now the troubling question for Toyota is this: Will the Prius with its new and more reliable mileage rating still be a hit with consumers? Will the little car that is now rated at 45 miles per gallon in the city be as popular as the same car that was believed to get 60 miles per gallon around town?

A Toyota spokeswoman said her company expects customers to understand that the technology in the Prius hasn't changed, and company marketing for the popular hybrid will not be revised.

The desire for fuel economy is the reason most consumers plunk down big bucks for a Prius or one of the other gas-electric hybrids that are consuming a fast-growing slice of the American auto market.

Now that the EPA has washed most of the fiction from its fuel mileage numbers, will the hybrid market suffer?

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