Think Slow, Think Small

Remember the tiger the oil industry put in your tank not too many years ago? Well, the U.S. Senate has that tiger by the tail, and is trying to pull it in an effort to ease the nation's fuel short age. The legislators last week tacked a "sense of Congress" resolution onto an oil allotment bill, urging states to lower speed limits on federal aid roads by 10 m.p.h. or to 55 m.p.h., whichever works out higher. The resolution, which each state can heed or disregard as it chooses, is based on the desperate but indubitable logic that cars burn up less fuel at middle-range speeds. The Administration's energy experts, who are flat-out in favor of the resolution, claim that a car driven at 60 m.p.h. instead of 70 will consume 11% less gasoline; a car driven at 50 will burn 23% less.

The legislators, however, chose to ignore the fact that Americans like to go fast, and that, however sensible, speed limits of 55 and 60 m.p.h. would be extremely difficult to enforce. Americans this year have bought more automobiles than ever -- the majority of them still overpowered, low-mileage behemoths. A better solution could lie in the countertrend among the ecology and economy buffs toward lower-powered cars. In recognition of that trend, Ford Motor Co. last week opened a new $100 million plant in Lima, Ohio, to build four-cylinder engines, which have not been manufactured in the U.S. since the model A's and B's of the 1930s.

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