Should We Celebrate the Hummer-Driving Vegan?

Dan Mitchell’s Daily Bread post today about Michael Pollan’s contretemps over Hummer-driving vegans versus Prius-driving meat-eaters reminded me of a controversial 2006 study of total costs associated with driving, say, a Hummer versus driving, say, a Prius. The study was undertaken by an outfit called CNW Marketing Research and later attacked for flawed methods. However, it did focus on one useful metric: overall mileage expectations as a measure of vehicle lifespan. Toyota and various Prius enthusiasts disputed the numbers, but the projected lifespan of a Prius fell well short of the expected lifespan of a Hummer.

Which is to be expected. The Hummer, based on a military platform—and now nearly owned in its consumer incarnation by the Chinese—is designed to last a long time and to be both mechanically simple and physically durable. A Prius is designed to operate in one environment only: paved roads. Its potential to get down in the dirt and negotiate rocky terrain, ford rivers, and so on is questionable. You can say a lot of things about people who buy Hummers, but they do buy them to last.

Pollan’s point, of course, was that eating meat is so environmentally damaging that even driving a maligned Hummer wouldn’t put a vegan at a disadvantage. However, it is probably true that if a vegan drives a Hummer, maintains it very well, and limits yearly miles driven while still stretching out ownership for several decades, then the Hummer-vegan matchup would be more sustainable than the Prius meat-eater marriage. It’s possible that one could buy a Hummer and never buy another vehicle. That’s unlikely with a Prius, which, while a Toyota and therefore built to last, simply can’t outlive a big, heavy truck. There’s also the not-insignificant matter of the Prius’ battery, which isn’t capable of lasting the life of the car and needs to be replaced.

The sustainable mobility crowd often tries to make this point with the whole question of whether you should buy a new hybrid or hang on to your old gas-powered car. This flies in the face of Cash-for-Clunkers-type programs, but it’s almost always better to keep the old car. Obviously, it would be a disaster for the auto industry if everyone drove their cars until the wheels fell off—and many people buy new or lightly used cars because their older vehicles have become a maintenance hassle or no longer fit their lifestyles—but given consumer patterns, that’s probably not a threat. But if you are buying for the long haul, bigger, heavier, and at first more polluting and gas-thirsty can be a better formula.