Priu-sizing world, Priu-sizing life

Prius.

No explanation is needed....icon of energy-efficient, eco-friendly product.
Made the green the new black.



But where does it come from? I mean, why did Prius have to come from Toyota, Japan?

Japan has no oil and very little coal or natural gas. Almost all the oil import comes from Middle-East. Clearly, energy security has always been a major issue.

In Japan, gas price has always been high. It was around $3.5o -$4.00 for the last several years, and now it's gone up to $5.5!!
In US, when the gas hit $3.5o - $4.00 level recently, I heard people saying "this can't be possible....this isn't right...... Hey I can't drive my truck anymore!"

But wait a minute.

Japanese car makers started to develop tremendous energy efficiency technology and skills in reaction to the "oil crisis" in 1973 (Middle East oil producers sharply raised the price of the oil due to political issues). The crisis triggered a panic and fear in Japanese society; people raided grocery stores to buy all the toilet papers they could find on the shelves! (why toilet paper, I don't know....)

Faced with the high energy price, Japanese businesses desperately sought the way to be super-efficient....to survive! It was a matter of whether they could overcome the high price, or go out of business. Over the course of variety of efforts, cars became one the most successful efficient products that made Japanese brands so strong. After decades, Prius now is sweeping the world in greening the industry.

Even when faced with hardship, people always have strength and power to come up with improvements/innovation to address issues. In a sense, oil crisis helped Prius come to the world.

I am sure many creative businesses/people will come out of today's high gas price to offer product/services that maximize output with minimized input. Efficiency and down-sizing is the key to survive low-carbon society toward sustainability.

Now is the time to Priu-size world, and Priu-size life.