IRV'S SHEET: Fact Vs. Folklore

It looks like some folks just didn’t get the memo. As you may already know, a popular television program called "Boston Legal" last night broadcast an episode that contained a speech by one of the actors that repeated a curious and incorrect piece of – well, folklore.

This piece of folklore purports, quite incredibly, that a Hummer H2 is more "environmentally friendly" than a Prius. This curious hypothesis first made the rounds last year in a 458-page tome titled "Dust-to-Dust: The Energy Costs of New Vehicles from Concept to Disposal," published by CNW Marketing Research.

As thoughtful researchers have pointed out, it was wrong. It's still wrong now. Its inclusion in the script of a television show doesn’t change that – no matter how deep the conviction with which the actor delivered the lines containing this fairy tale.

Irv Miller posted a response to the CNW report on June 7. Click on the link to see it complete with reader comments - or you can just read on here to read the memo that the folks at "Boston Legal" apparently didn’t get. Mind you, we can't blame the show's writers for finding this a fascinating story angle. But it's fiction. Just to set the record straight, to provide facts instead of fiction, here it is again.

~Jon F. Thompson, Corporate Communications

We reported earlier this week that our Prius hybrid vehicle contributed significantly to our strong sales results for May with a record 24,009 Prius sold across the U.S.

Which had us wondering about all of the potential energy savings that might have resulted had our competitor to the east of us sold 24,009 Hummers instead. 

After all, it's been well publicized across the net, in respected newspapers and even by the authoritative columnist himself, George Will, that the Hummer uses less energy per mile than our own Prius. 

The source of this energy buzz is, of course,  the 458-page "Dust-to-Dust: The Energy Costs of New Vehicles from Concept to Disposal" published by CNW Marketing Research. There, you may recall, our Prius was expected to last only 15 years and poop out at only 100,000 miles. The Hummer, on the other hand, would be plowing its way through the nation's highways for 35 years and make it to 300,000 miles.

I'm a car guy, not a scientist, and certainly not a mathematician who might be able to explain the logic and turn what seems like a bit of tomfoolery into bona-fide research.  Enter Dr. Peter H. Gleick of the Pacific Institute.  Dr. Gleick digested all 458 pages of the CNW Report, but came short of calling it bona-fide research.  Way short.  Gleick's documented report, Hummer vs. Prius, just published by the Pacific Institute calls "Dust-to-Dust" Bad Science, flawed by faulty analysis and untenable assumptions.

Like I said, I'm an automotive veteran and a corporate PR guy interested in facts and truth.  So I would hardly know bad science from good science.  But I'll tell you this, after reading the Pacific Institute's Gleick Report, released as part of its Integrity of Science Initiative, I am oh-so-happy to know that our Prius cracked the Top 10 Vehicle Sales rank last month with those 24,000+ sales. 

Kind of a relief to know too, that American consumers and the car-buying public evidently share the same conclusions drawn by the Pacific Institute that the only real way to cut our consumption of fossil fuels in the transportation sector are to develop vehicles that use alternative energy sources and to build more efficient cars.  Buy a Prius, too!

~ Contributed by Irv Miller, Group Vice President, Corporate Communications

Comments

[RB]

I read George Will's column on this back in April 2007. I thought the numbers he cited seemed bogus. I was upset that a respected columnist would so uncritically repeat such information. So I did a little research of my own and found some good links that debunked the CNW assertions that the Hummer is more environmentally friendly than the Prius.
Needless to say, I lost respect for George Will.

(comment edited to remove links - Roadmaster)