Competitive Conservation

A nifty idea from an editorial in TNR on conservation:

...we're pleased by the recent trend in the automobile industry, in which it's become increasingly common for carmakers to include fuel-efficiency gauges that display prominently the number of miles per gallon a car is getting at each instant. Toyota's Prius, among other models, comes with such a gauge, and Nissan announced last year that all new vehicles will be equipped with one. In trials, the gauge has prompted smoother and more efficient driving, which can increase fuel efficiency by 10 percent or more. Conservation, which was once, in the words of Vice President Cheney, merely a "sign of personal virtue, " becomes something far more appealing: a sign of personal superiority. It would be even better if the gauges displayed one's fuel-efficiency percentile, putting Americans in direct competition with each other for gas-sipping bragging rights.