Anybody who’s been following the US election news recently will have heard about McCain’s mocking of an answer Obama gave to a question in one of his campaign stops about saving fuel. Then he half-retracted it.

The truth of the discussion is that ensuring your tires (or tyres, for those English speakers outside the US) are correctly inflated does indeed help to maintain the efficiency. Having a handy little pressure gauge in your glove box and using it regularly will help keep your car running efficiently.

How Much Does This Save?
The estimated improvement in your fuel economy is 3%, but what does that mean? At today’s prices in the US (around $4.50/gallon here in California), it is around 10 cents a gallon saving. If you have to drive to work, then that’s a worthwhile saving for such a simple thing to check.

The US government estimates that 27% of the cars on the road in the US have a significantly under-inflated tire. So get out there and check your tire pressures (hint: if you don’t have a gauge already, and don’t want to buy one, most gas stations have one attached to the air compressor).

Anything Else We Can Do?
ABC News has the following hints in addition to tire pressure, derived from FuelEconomy.gov: keeping your car properly tuned can save you up to 4%, replacing your air filter when necessary will save you as much as 10% and using the correct motor oil in your engine will get you between 1% and 2% savings.

Even better though, how about using public transit, a bike or even just walking instead of driving at all? That saves you as much as 100% and gives you some time to read a book or newspaper, or perhaps catch up on email or your favourite blog(s).

If you can’t avoid the car, think about getting a hybrid (or even a pure electric) when you replace your current ride. And do you need the SUV, or would a smaller car suffice? If you only need the larger car occasionally, then money you save on fuel by switching to a smaller car would allow you rent something larger when you need it.

• A cardboard bicycle from a student at Sheffield Hallam University in the UK. Created initially in an attempt to reduce theft, the low cost cardboard bicycle which is made almost entirely from recyclable and recycled materials and uses interchangeable mechanical parts.
• Inhabitat reports that Mercedes Benz intends to convert their entire line up of luxury cars to alternative fuels by 2015. That might sound like a long time in the future, but it is only 7 years away!
• SolarLab will be launching a solar powered rickshaw in London next year as a pilot program. If it performs well there, it will be released into other cities around the world too. The solar hybrids are human/electric hybrids combining pedal power and solar electric power from an array of photo-voltaic panels on the roof of the rickshaw. [Via InHabitat.]
• In Austin, Texas, Doug Pelmear claims he has modified a 1987 Ford Mustang engine, perfecting ideas his grandfather had 60 years ago, and his car now achieves 110 mpg. The car produces 400 bhp, and is claimed to go from zero to 60mph in just 3 seconds.

As oil prices continue to rise, consumers will become more and more interested in lower cost alternatives. Luckily for the planet, many of the solutions for reducing our dependency on oil are also good for the environment – a win, win situation.