Fuel-economy distributions of purchased new vehicles in the U.S.: model years 2008 and 2014

Abstract

We have recently shown that the average EPA-rated fuel economy of purchased, new, light-duty vehicles in the U.S. improved from 20.8 mpg for model year 2008 vehicles to 25.3 mpg for model year 2014 vehicles. This report provides information about the changes in the sales-weighted distributions of fuel economy for the same model years. The findings indicate that the improvements are also present throughout the distributions of vehicle fuel economy. For example, (1) 22.2% of model year 2008 vehicles had fuel economy lower than 16.0 mpg, as compared with only 3.2% of model year 2014 vehicles, and (2) only 1.3% of model year 2008 vehicles had fuel economy of 32.0 mpg or higher, as compared with 16.7% of model year 2014 vehicles.