The “Break it Down” Blog

This was a shock to me, but a report from Cardiff University and automotive consultants Thames Clifford rated the top 12 greenest cars in the world, and the Prius surprisingly came in #12.

The entire list is as follows (in order of greeness):

1. Smart Roadster
2. Smart Fortwo cabriolet
3. Citroen C1 1.0i
4. Peugeot 107 1.0
5. Citroen C1 1.4 HDi
6. Fiat Panda 1.2
7. Ford Ka 1.3
8. Toyota Yaris 1.0
9. Fiat Panda 100hp
10. Peugeot 206 1.4
11. Mini Cooper D
12. Toyota Prius 1.5

Ok I’ll admit I haven’t heard of 8 of the cars on there, but I was surprised by the Mini Cooper and that the Yaris was so much greener than the Prius, considering it’s not a hybrid.

Now before you go declaring shenanigans on the world, consider how these numbers were reached:

…researchers gave a car’s carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide emissions 50% weighting in assessing its overall environmental score.

For the other 50%, the researchers ranked cars on their construction, energy used and end of life disposal costs.

In which case I’m not too surprised about some of the conclusions. I’ve read that the disposal costs of the Prius and other hybrids, because of the batteries, are environmentally pretty high.

Toyota commented that their revised Prius with improved emissions and mileage won’t go on sale until 2009, but will offer carbon dioxide emissions of between 90 and 99g/km.