Over 200 mpg?

Volkswagen, the guys who brought you the Porsche, the Beetle, and were involved once upon a time in the Me fighters of WWii have revived a 50 year old design that couldn't work as a commuter car and created a carbon fiber, titanium magnesium composite set of machining that becomes a 2 seater commuter car getting 235 miles per gallon on diesel, and is road worthy for the Autobahn. It was unveiled recently in a ceremony that included it being actually driven on the highspeed road system as part of the proof of concept.

The car was developed 6 years ago, but considered not practical becuase of the high cost of the carbon fiber body. Becuase carbon fiber technology has gotten much better faster than anyone thought possible, and oil prices cannot retreat much at all, the car will begin to be built 2 years from now, in amounts of at least 1000 per year. The carbon fiber is only a skin, with a monocoque safety cage beneath it. The price will be high enough that even $10 a gallon gas wil make it not "practical"--but the road away from $20 a gallon gas has to go through the valley where people with money for expensive toys become the real world testers, and th real world guinea pigs who will establish whether this type on answer, the micro-car, is part of the solution to the world's energy problems.

An American version of the car would get significantly lower mileage, but for the urban commuter, such a vehicle mofdified with something to make it easier to see on the road (it's only a little more than 3 feet high) combined with existing hybrid technology would yield a vehiclecould be a real driving force to get other research and innovation out of the labs and onto the road.