The fill it up to the brim meme seems to come from emergency preparedness folks like the police and the army where no vehicle goes to the parking space overnight without being 100% as ready as it can be for tomorrow.
Much fewer proportion of people are driving those peugots or other tiny cars where the weight of fuel would be material relative to the time it would take to fill up fuel more often.
Another British thing that amazed me was their auto insurance prices were based on engine size, and they were fretting about the insurance cost between 2L and 3L cars, and all the vehicles we had in America were 4L+.
In 2019, the average new petrol ("gas") car in the UK requires 5.7 l of fuel per 100 km (49.2 mpg) [1].
The corresponding figure for the US is ~9.44 l/100km (24.9 mpg [2,3]).
We really, really need to decarbonise our economy worldwide and in many ways this fuel scare may be the catalyst required, with UK autotrader saying it was driving people to e-car retailers [4].
[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/energy-a...
[2] https://www.iea.org/reports/fuel-consumption-of-cars-and-van...
[3] https://www.epa.gov/automotive-trends/highlights-automotive-...
[4] https://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2021/sep/27/uk-pet...
The spoils of a government that does not have a high fossil fuel tax.
My most recent car was 1.1L and was fine for anything I used it for...
I do agree that basing insurance on engine capacity is odd though. Why not power to weight ratio or something?
Do European cars have gigantic fuel tanks?
40kgs is 40 / 0.71kg/L = 56.3L ~= 14.9 gallons.
14.9 gallons is as much, or more than any car I own carries. And I've never put more than 13 gallons into any vehicle ever during a single fill up.
To have that kind of "spare" capacity beyond what would be necessary for my daily commute, I'd need to be driving a large SUV or pickup truck.
I looked up a 3 Series BMW, and they have 40L or 57L tanks in the new models. Down from 60 or so 10 years ago.
I feel like 20kgs is a more accurate number. And that's really the difference between a small woman and a medium sized man driving the same vehicle.
I guess the question is how much does moving 20kg extra cost you over 20k km?