While Texas is known for its energy production, it is sorely lacking when it comes to energy efficiency. In a new report released by WalletHub, a site designed to help people make smarter financial decisions, Texas was ranked 45th out of the continguous 48 states. Only Kentucky, Louisiana, and South Carolina ranked lower than Texas.
The report took a look at both home-related and car-related energy efficiency and gave each element a numerical score based on a computation of ratios (residential energy consumption per capita to degree days for home-related energy efficiency and annual vehicle miles drive to gallons of gasoline consumed for car-related energy efficiency).
While we can’t do anything about the price of fuel, we can offer you a few pointers on how to increase your car’s fuel economy. Keep your car well maintained and serviced regularly. Pump up your tyres to reduce resistance and get the car serviced regularly so you can tune up or replace your Stanadyne pump. Be gentle and change gear early. Accelerate and brake gently, and change to a higher gear as soon as possible. As a general guide, change up before 2000rpm in a diesel and 2500rpm in a petrol, without letting the engine struggle at low revs. Lots of modern cars are fitted with engine stop-start technology, which can be great if you let it work properly. Sit with your foot on the clutch and the engine will continue to burn fuel; take it off and you’ll save money and fuel.
In case you were wondering, Vermont, New York, and Wisconsin took the top three spots for energy efficiency. You can see the entire report here.
image courtesy of mcmees24
