Home / You won't find the 300 MPG Volkswagen XL1 in an American showroom; in fact it has even been denied a tour of America because it is too efficient  
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Image of You won't find the 300 MPG Volkswagen XL1 in an American showroom; in fact it has even been denied a tour of America because it is too efficient

I hesitated to post the link to REALITY: 300 mpg from a normal production car - the Volkswagen XL1 because it was difficult to verify the claim about being denied entrance into the US (especially given the car was driven in NYC back in Dec, 2013). But the many articles around the web indicate the car itself is the real deal (e.g., Popular Science, cnet, ExtremeTech). AutoBlog wrote one year ago that VW hints hyper-efficient, 260-mpg XL1 could come to US, but only to show off, which adds some credence to the claim:

We asked VW of America's manager of product and technology communications, Mark Gillies, who poured water on the idea of the XL1 being available in the US: "Not happening. Ever." Gillies did say some XL1 might come here as part of a publicity effort or test drive, but that's about it. Thus, the car won't be sold in America...

But the key hypothesis of the article seems very reasonable:

Simply for the sake of raking in huge profits from $4 a gallon gas, getting guzzled at 10X the rate it should be, the corporations have via campaign contributions and other types of pay outs succeeded in getting the FED to legislate the best cars off the road for irrelevant trumped up reasons. The XL1 will not meet American emission standards NOT because it is not clean enough, it will not meet them simply because inefficient parts that are mandated by the EPA are not part of the XL1's power train. We will never see truly clean running and efficient cars in America, because the FED has mandated that American cars be intentionally stifled by horribly fuel wasting parts that add to the cost of the vehicle and do absolutely NO GOOD, how much more efficient and clean can you get than 300 mpg? The exhaust from the Xl1 has to, by simple math and the laws of physics, run at the theoretical threshold of emissions perfection.

Anyway, get ready to drool.


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Reminds me of something I read a few days ago: The solar powered plane set to fly around the world with no fuel - and it is so efficient it could remain in the air indefinitely. More importantly, it also remind me of a movie I haven't seen for ages (and which appears now to be in the public domain, which is great). It's called Who Killed the Electric Car. Amazing and very educational movie.

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Every time I see articles like this about engineering marvels, I always hum to myself "what a wonderful world." And then I read "mandated by the EPA..." and sigh heavily in disgust.

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