Set sprinklers to water the lawn or garden only - not the street or sidewalk.
Use the microwave to cook small meals. (It uses less power than an oven.)
Purchase "Green Power" for your home's electricity. (Contact your power supplier to see where and if it is available.)
Scrape, rather than rinse, dishes before loading into the dishwasher; wash only full loads.
Cut back on air conditioning and heating use if you can.
Turn off appliances and lights when you leave the room.
HOUSTON -- Going green with a hybrid vehicle that gets 40 to 50 miles per gallon may sound great. But after you factor in the cost of the car, maintenance and insurance, are hybrids really saving their owners money?
Before $4 a gallon gasoline, Gary Stankowski bought a hybrid vehicle for the ecological reasons.
“I just thought it was the right thing to do,” he said.
Now, with so many people looking to buy hybrids, they are very difficult to find. However, for the 2008 model year there will be 24 different types of hybrid vehicles on the market.
They will come in all shapes and sizes, from the compact Toyota Prius to the 4-wheel drive GMC Yukon.
An 11 News search of the Web site Cars.com shows that very few hybrids can be found now. We did find one Ford Escape hybrid and just four Toyota Prius within 50 miles of downtown Houston.
“Basically everybody is ordering them. Waiting a couple of months (and) signing up before they even get here,” said David Womack of Sterling McCall Toyota.
But the different hybrids vary widely on overall savings.
All hybrids cost more up front. On average, a hybrid is $3,000 more than the non-hybrid version of the same car.
The automotive research firm Intellichoice decided to take everything else into account and priced out the hybrid vehicles to see how much money you really save makes up the difference for the up front costs. Its study took into account depreciation, financing, insurance, maintenance, repairs, fees and of course the cost of fuel.
For the purpose of the survey, the Prius – which does not have a non-hybrid counterpart – was compared to the Toyota Camry.
The sticker price was $2,855 higher fro the Prius, but over five years the total cost of ownership was $3,430 less. It’s even better when actual costs are analyzed with a savings of more than $5,500 over a five-year period.
The biggest savings though comes from the Ford Escape Hybrid, which was compared side-by-side with the standard version Escape. The hybrid cost $2,500 more up front, but yielded more than $5,500 in savings over five years.
Not all hybrids are created equal, however. The GMC Yukon 4-wheel drive is $3,375 more when purchased. It’s overall savings after five years is just $3,369, which is no real savings at all even with the upgrade in miles per gallon.
The Intellichoice survey suggests that maintenance costs for hybrids are actually virtually identical between the gas saving version and the standard version vehicle.
Most hybrid models also hold their value better than the standard models. The Prius holds onto 74 percent of its market value while the hybrid Chevy Malibu holds 43 percent of its value over five years.
For many, however, the gratification comes almost instantly when they pull up to the pump for the first time.
