Flare, I've used one of those before.
Wayne, the Prius is much more dependent on the battery, which can be a good or bad thing. In heavy traffic, use of the AC will drain the battery and therefore cause the engine to be on excessively for 5 or 10 minutes afterwards to charge the battery back up. That tends to kill mileage -- perhaps a drop of 1 MPG per tank each time it happens. Then again, if cruise control is on the battery tends to charge up rather quickly and even attempt to burn off some excess energy, so the use of AC isn't as dramatic. Under heavy traffic, AC may reduce mileage by 15%. Under little to no traffic, perhaps 5-10%? I haven't ever driven without AC completely, so I'm taking a guess.
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