£64 Over-rev the car engine

Driving the car more efficiently has the most potential to reduce our expenditure and cut our carbon emissions.  This primarily means not over revving the engine.  Reliable facts on fuel effiiciency and driving less aggressively are difficult to get hold off, but on the basis that a 5% improvement in fuel consumption is possible if you keep the revs below 2500 rpm when accelerating it is possible to make savings of £64 per year. Keeping to the speed limits also reduces revs and improves fuel efficiency.

Toyota have announced plans to install an Eco Drive Indicator (EDI) into Japanese market automatic transmission vehicles. Depending on the accelerator use, engine and transmission efficiency and speed and rate of acceleration the EDI lights up when it is being driven in a fuel efficient manner. Toyotal claim that the EDI can improve fuel efficiency by approximately 4%. We need more innovations like this to assist motorists get value for money.

£60 Use the car for short journeys

Nearly 80% of all trips made in the UK by car are for journeys of less than 2 miles. On the basis that we can walk or cycle instead of taking the car for a short journey of 2 miles or less we can save up to £60 per year. It is certainly worth combining as many activities as possible if you do have to use the car for short journeys.

 £27 Leave the engine running while the car is stationary

Idling when in traffic jams or to warm the engine is not fuel efficient. According to Toronto city council, it is more fuel efficient to turn the engine off than have the car idling for more than ten seconds. Toronto and New York have both passed laws that have made it illegal to idle the car englne for an extended period of time. Other cities such as Ontario have taken steps in this direction.

In many ways this is where cars such as Toyota's Prius come into their own as when the car is crawling in congested traffic it uses the electric motor, thereby avoiding the additional and unnecessary emissions when stationary.

We have estimated that if you can avoid 5 minutes of idling time each trip you could save £27 per year.

Other efficient driving advice

There is lots of common sense advice around about driving more efficiently including ensuring the types are at the correct pressure, only using air conditioning when strictly necessary, not carrying around heavy loads, removing roof racks, etc.