When I first started driving I drove slow bc I thought it would save gas, then I started driving faster when a friend told me you use the same amount of gas whether you drive slow or fast (as long as it’s the same distance), you just would be driving fast for a shorter amt of time and driving slow for a longer amt of time, but at the end you burner thru the same amount of gas. Is this true?
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It’s not that simple. There’s a speed that’s “ideal,” and the closer you are to it, the more gas you save.
Think about it like this. The car can generate energy from petrol, and it uses energy to move. The faster a car moves, the more energy it needs to overcome air resistance and friction with the road. So at slower speeds, you NEED less energy.
BUT. The amount of energy an engine produces is shaped kind of like a bell curve. At very low speeds, the car is not very good at making energy from 1 gallon of petrol, at very high speeds it’s also not very good. But there’s a sweet spot where it is really good.
You want to drive on average at a speed where the engine is very efficient and the car doesn’t waste energy pushing through the air and the road.
Electric cars kinda solve this problem, because they’re very efficient at all speeds. So for them, indeed going slower will save you the most power. For an ICE car, it’s a little more complicated and you will almost always use more energy at almost all speeds than an electric car.
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