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Bay Shore couple's move to hybrids pays off

BY JOHN VALENTI | john.valenti@newsday.com

10:04 AM EDT, May 8, 2008

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He owned a Chevy Blazer. She had a Lexus RS330.

His sport utility vehicle had more than 100,000 on the odometer -- and, admittedly, didn't get very good gas mileage. So, Rick Brindell traded it in, got himself a 2006 Toyota Prius. A gas-electric hybrid.

Less than a year later, his wife, Lucille Seitz, did the same. She bought a 2007 Prius.

Now Brindell, 50, and Seitz, 58, who live in Bay Shore, say they are saving more than $300 a month in gasoline bills.

"I hate to see gasoline at $3.85 a gallon," Brindell said. "But, honestly, it doesn't feel like a gas crisis to me."

Brindell and Seitz are among a growing number of Americans trading in their gas-guzzlers -- or, even their non-gas-guzzlers -- in pursuit of fuel efficiency, eco-friendliness and cost savings.

CNN/Money estimates that hybrid sales increased 38 percent in April over the previous month, and a whopping 67 percent in May. Consider that just last year, the marketing firm J.D. Power and Associates predicted hybrid sales would be stagnant -- because few model variations were available and Americans had grown accustomed to gas selling for $3 a gallon.

But that was then.

On Thursday, the price of a gallon of regular gasoline once again hit a record all-time high on Long Island, averaging $3.883, according to the AAA Daily Fuel Gauge Report.

That was up from $3.864 the day before, up from $3.434 the month before. And, astonishingly, that was up from $3.192 just one year before -- an increase of 67.2 cents per gallon.

Brindell's Prius gets 46 miles per gallon on the highway, he said -- compared to 13.8 mpg for his old Blazer.

And a special government exemption -- called the Clean Pass and available only to Prius and Honda Civic hybrid owners in New York State -- allows Brindell to use the Long Island Expressway's high occupancy vehicle lane, even when he is alone in his car. This, he notes, saves him time commuting.

"When I first got it, some of my office mates were laughing, calling it a 'Flintstones' car," said Brindell, the vice president of marketing for the BWD Group Llc, a Jericho-based insurance broker. "The president [of the company] called it a 'brave purchase.' Now, all my co-workers are saying: 'I wish I had one of those.'"

For good reason. Not only did the price for a gallon of regular gasoline rise again Thursday, so did the price for a gallon of other grades of gas.

The average price for a gallon of mid-grade gasoline was $4.154, according to the AAA. The day before, it was $4.133. The year before, $3.415.

Premium was up, too. In the past year it has gone from $3.488 a gallon to $4.242.

The biggest spike in fuel prices, though, has been for diesel. One year ago, when J.D. Power predicted a stagnant hybrid market, its analysts said diesel sales would play a role.

After all, diesel fuel was selling for less than regular back then, the average price on Long Island being $3.112 a gallon.

On Thursday, the price was $4.651 a gallon here -- an increase of $1.539 a gallon. That's more than a 50 percent increase in the price.

And New York has the fifth-highest overall average price of the 50 states, with regular averaging $3.831 a gallon Thursday.