“You have got to be kidding me, four dollars and twelve cents a gallon for regular gas,” I exclaimed as I passed the local gas station on my way to work last week. For a brief second, I regretted having purchased a car that only gets about 22 mpg in town, instead wishing I had bought a used 2000-2006 model Honda Insight, which gets a Prius pulverizing average of 66 mpg. I then remembered that while I have infinite respect for anyone who drives the original Insight, I would have to give up what I love about my car—It’s fun. This is a situation that many people have found themselves in over the last few years: Driving big thirsty cars, with fill-up costs that are slowly burning a hole in their owners’ wallets. So what do you do?

Let’s rewind a bit back to when I bought my car. The year is 2008, it’s summertime in California, gas prices are nearing the $5.00-per-gallon mark, and I am a first-time car buyer. Like any young Californian male, I’m looking for something that’s fast and fun, but can still carry a couple of surf/snowboards. While I still enjoy being a not-insignificant drain on my parents’ income, I do make a conscious effort to look at vehicles that don’t go through fuel faster than a burning Iraqi oil field. After all, I will soon have to start paying for gas out of my own income. In the end, I settled on a brand new ’09 Mitsubishi Lancer GTS (manual) with 168-hp engine and a mpg rating of 21/29—all for a great price.

Okay, we can now fast forward to today or, rather, last week. Now what do you do if you have a car that the government says should get 21 mpg city but you want better gas mileage? Most people assume there really isn’t much they can do, so they waste their money by selling their old car and buying a new, more efficient one. Trouble is, we are still in a recession and most people don’t have that kind of liquidity at the moment. The solution is very easy: Hypermile. More...

The ancient Greek philosopher Diogenes spent his life looking for an honest man. Had he been born in our time, he’d probably be spending much of his life looking for a parking spot in the city. Now MINI makes that easier to do with a special folding bicycle that fits in the rear so you can park farther from your destination and bike the rest of the way there.

The aluminum-framed MINI bike has 20-inch wheels and eight speeds, and weighs about 24 pounds. It comes with a gel saddle and a stuff bag that hangs off the back. Fenders and a Teflon-coated chain help keep your work clothes clean. The bike folds along the crossbar and the handlebars, the saddle retracts, and the pedals fold up close to the frame.

The MINI bike comes in flat black with silver highlights in the MINI lettering on the crossbar. It even comes with a bell on the handlebar for channeling your inner Pee Wee Herman. The price of not having to hunt for a parking space is about $730, a sum that might send Diogenes looking for an honest deal on a less expensive folding bicycle and a felt-tip pen to write MINI on the frame. www.miniusa.com

The stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant could or, maybe, should mean the death of electric cars and plug-in hybrids. That’s because the anti-nuclear lobby can now easily panic the public and politicians, ending hopes for an aggressive effort to build nuclear plants in the U.S. Without nuclear-generated power, all-electric cars and plug-ins aren’t dead on arrival, but they are almost useless on arrival.

If the U.S. doesn’t start a highest-priority effort to build nuclear plants, electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids will be ineffective at their core purpose: Reducing the use of carbon-based fuel.

Prior to Fukushima, rational environmentalists (including President Obama) supported nuke plants as an alternative to the natural gas and coal that account for roughly 70 percent of U.S. electricity production. Nuclear makes up another 20 or so percent. (You’re contributing to global warming when you plug in your Leaf or Volt. Granted, it’s easier to capture pollution at the coal- or gas-fired plant than at car tailpipes, but we’re still burning carbon-based fuel to make the electricity.)

The no-nukes crowd is portraying Fukushima as a catastrophic disaster. As this is written, it isn’t. Except, that is, for owner Tokyo Electric, the two plant workers who are missing and almost certainly dead, and those who live in a 20-mile arc who are being encouraged to leave their homes. Even if things worsen, Americans should feel safe with expanding nuclear power. Current U.S. nuclear plants are more-strongly built than the aging Japanese plant and lessons learned from Fukushima will be incorporated into new U.S. plants.

Regardless of facts, the no-nukes crowd will attempt to frighten the uninformed, just as they did with another nuclear plant non-disaster, the 1979 Three-Mile Island incident. For youngsters, more died in the back of Teddy Kennedy’s car than at Three-Mile Island.

How about other renewable energy sources touted by the anti-nuke crowd? There are winds farms that loudly blight the land, slaughter birds and insects and kill people during construction and maintenance. Solar is still deep in the research and development stage and would create its own environmental problems. How about tidal turbines in the ocean? Place them away from whales, dolphins, bluefin tuna, sailfish, Chilean sea bass, swordfish and other threatened species.

While I assert we should continue to dig for coal (and drill for oil and natural gas in the U.S. on- and off-shore), know that about 30 miners are killed each year in the U.S. Many older, former miners suffer from black lung disease. In other parts of the world catastrophes are far worse.

Without a huge increase in nuclear power, electric cars and plug-in hybrids will be best at moving pollution from big cities to the country. That’s where I live.

“It’s a sign,” old folks used to say when something they witnessed seemed to predict the future. “It’s a sign” that electric cars are on their way to being fully embraced when all-electric cars start showing up at the dragstrip. Those who hot-rod electric cars are what marketing folks call “early adopters” and average people call “nuts,” “super nerds,” or “whackos.” Versions of those names where applied to people who stuffed V8s into Model T chassis back in the 1940s. (Somehow, those who put V8s into 3 Series BMWs or overly shortened the suspension springs of Hondas earned the more respectable-sounding moniker of “tuner.”)

Someone who would build a street-legal electric drag racer capable of running a quarter mile in 10.3 seconds at just over 120 mph is far more of an early adopter (and a car guy) than the Ed Begley Jr. types who acquire, but don’t often drive, a Prius, Leaf or Volt.

John Wayland has converted a 1972 Datsun 1200 Coupe into what he calls the “world’s quickest street-legal car.” (Wayland calls himself “Plasma Boy.” Ladies, that’s a pretty good indication he’s single.)

A video of Plasma Boy’s racing exploits shows him racing—and beating—Corvettes and BMWs among others. One of Wayland’s advantages is that, like every electric car, his makes maximum torque at zero rpm. Combined with the made-for-drag-racing tires, that means the White Zombie launches like a real drag racer every time. It helps that his opponents in the video have the reaction times and shifting skills of cannabis-browsing koalas. (Since the video, a switch to lighter and more potent lithium-ion batteries has allowed Wayland’s car to run much faster.) More...

I was at an auto-company-sponsored “holiday dinner,” the kind with bottomless wine bottles and menu items up to $200. I wound up in an unwelcome, uh, discussion with a representative of an American automobile club. Just like high school debate club, I found myself defending a point with which I don’t fully agree: Electric cars are the solution to our transportation problems. Those who know me, and have followed my writing are chuckling at the irony.

Despite the fact I had placed my wineglass upside down and my “opponent” didn’t, I got whupped.

He started with his position: The car club is against electric cars and for hybrids. My position: Electric cars will be a small part of the cure, and that hybrids are a cynical marketing exercise. (I don’t have room to support the latter, but that’s the belief of ex-Formula 1 designer and creator of the T-25 city car Gordon Murray, so it’s good enough for me.)

I agreed with most of my opponent’s positions and even added one: Do NOT call electric cars “zero emissions vehicles” until their electricity is made by bird-slaughtering wind turbines, desert tortoise-choking solar cells, fish-shredding ocean-tide turbines, or nuclear plants using weapons-grade uranium. More...