- Approximately 700,000 vehicles were purchased and destroyed in the $3 billion “Cash for Clunkers” program
- A “clunker” that gets 15mpg and travels 12,000 miles per year, consumes 800 gallons of gasoline per year
- A new “fuel-efficient” replacement vehicle that gets 25mpg and travels 12,000 miles per year, consumes 480 gallons of gasoline per year
- Replacing a clunker thereby reduces US gasoline consumption by 320 gallons/year for a total of 224 million gallons/year
- 224 million gallons of gasoline can be refined from approximately 12 million barrels of oil
- At $75/barrel, the cost for 12 million barrels of oil would be $900 million
- The US consumes approximately 1 million barrels of oil per hour
The Cash for Clunkers bottom line:
Taxpayers spent $3.33 for every $1 saved and extended annual US consumption of oil by an additional half day
