Tom Whipple writes a weekly column related to peak oil at the Falls Church (Virginia) News-Press, which I often read on EnergyBulletin.net. This week, he takes on the folly of continuing to build low-mileage cars when there are more cars registered in the US than drivers and we have every reason to believe that gas prices will skyrocket again in a few years.

If we are going to replace enough of those gas-guzzling internal combustion vehicles before they have to be scrapped for lack of affordable fuel, then the sooner we stop the better... Since Washington seems to be telling Detroit what to do these days, let's get them going in the right direction. The first step would be to rapidly phase out the production of large, heavy, internal combustion power vehicles. Halting the manufacture and sale of 2-axle vehicles that do not get over 30 miles per gallon is a good start. If somebody really needs something bigger and less efficient, then there are and will be millions for sale on the used market.

Current fuel standards are a political compromise and absurdly too low for the era. We should be building vehicles that get not less than 100 mpg as soon as possible. Absurd no - such cars have already been built and with crash programs and licensing of existing technologies could be in large scale production in a few years.

The whole thing is worth reading.