I am trying to educate myself on what a "green" car actually is. Is it based solely on performance of the vehicle, or does the production and manufacturing of the car get taken into account? any ideas? thank you!

The production and shipping of the car can swamp the mileage improvement, unless you keep the car for a long time/distance.

Yes, both factor in.

But the term "green car" is poorly chosen. To me it means any car of that colour. "Environmentally less destructive" would be a better, though harder to use, term.

Pearl is a
2007 Driftwood Pearl Prius
Package "B" (everything but leather, nav, and rear camera)

Kind of like asking about the meaning of life. The reason behind why you are asking the question is probably a better starting point than then the original question.

Ultimately, a "green" car is made primarily out of wood from managed forests crafted from hand tools used by vegetarian craftsmen who generally dislike baked beans for lunch. The driver pedals are manually operated to power the wheels. In other words, almost 0 impact on the environment.

But any practical car is going to impact the environment in some way. At what point does a real life car become "green", what mathematical boundary is there that takes into account amount of toxic chemicals used, air, water, and ground contamination from use and manufacture, and greenhouse gas emissions that can pronouce one car green (or greener) compared with another. And how do you weight the impact of each criteria... If that's what your asking, tough one...

If its a personal voyage of discovery in order to make a better "green" choice in a car for personal needs, then I guess it falls to you to decide which factors you think are most likely to make the world a better place. Will carbon emissions from gasoline burning cause global warming to doom the planet, will the eventual world shortage of oil bring us to nuclear confrontation, will ground pollutants at chemical plants turn us into mutated sickly walking corpses, or is it just the desire to take a walk without consulting the latest smog report. Whatever car offers an improvement from one before in an area that concerns you, that is a green car. Collectively, if everyone improved in some area of their own concern which each new car (process of never ending improvement), then collectively the world would indeed become a better place.

Two climate control systems, one inside and the other at the tailpipe.

2007 Camry Hybrid (in service June 2006)
2004 Sienna (in service May 2003)

A green vehicle is a vehicle that is considered to be more "environmentally friendly" than traditional all-petroleum internal combustion engine vehicles (APICEVs).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_vehicle

Green Vehicles

its not completly out of pollutrion .. all you can say is little more environmentally friendly"
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Lewismark

Capture One Auto Transport

There are many different opinions re what constitutes "green". Most have something to do with reduced environmental impact. Areas of concern include: less petroleum and other non-renewable resources, pollution output, and recycling of materials. Turns out that almost all of the material in an automobile is recycled already. So the focus is on petroleum and pollution. The manufacturing/distribution is part of the cycle, so energy use and pollution during manufacturing/distribution counts, too.

The possibilities continue to evolve as technology develops. And, opinions continue to change. What is now considered horribly polluting was once a new, environmentally friendly, less-polluting vehicle. What is now considered to be "green" will someday be considered a horrible polluter.

The "greenest" form of transportation is "feet". Second is "bicycle". Third is "public transportation". Private cars are somewhere down the list.

There are many different opinions in this site sharing by different kind of persons. What constitutes "green" most have something to do with reduced environmental impact. Areas of concern include: less petroleum and using other meterial resources, pollution output, and recycling of materials. Turns out that almost all of the material in an automobile is recycled already. So the focus is on petroleum and pollution.

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Jobs.steve

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