NBC Today Show Uses Electric Ford Mustang Mach-E To Demonstrate Fuel-Saving Tips

Fuel prices are skyrocketing as the world says no to Russian oil, leading to high fuel prices at the pumps. It’s a worrying time, especially in the US where gas prices are a national obsession. Step forward the Today Show, with a useful set of tips for drivers looking to save money on fuel. All demonstrated using a Ford Mustang Mach-E electric car. Wait, what?

Vicky Nguyen is a Senior Consumer Investigative Correspondent, so her exclamation that “Idling can cost you up to half a gallon of gas per hour” is delivered with force, which is all the more startling when you consider the car she’s in has no engine, and no ability to idle whatsoever.

We’ll give NBC a pass on the advice to remove heavy items from your car, that’s a good tip for any driver, and extra weight certainly isn’t a friend of the EV driver desperately trying to get to the next charging point. But was it a fluke?

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To give the team credit, quite a few of the points mentioned would also help improve electric driving range. Driving more slowly on the motorway…check. Accelerating gradually and easing off the throttle when approaching a red light…that’s not bad advice either. Checking your car’s tyres are correctly inflated is another well-known economy and safety tip, so perhaps NBC did their homework after all.

Well, driving a Mach-E around looking for the “cheapest gas prices”, avoiding waiting until “your tank is almost empty” and avoiding gas stations just off the highway or in the middle of a major city still all seems rather awkward in a fully-electric car. As is the suggestion to join a fuel rewards program in a car which will never require a single drop of petrol, from the day it rolls out of its factory in Mexico to the day it’s shredded in a recycling plant.

But the biggest fuel-saving tip Nguyen never mentions during the three-minute segment: driving an electric car.