As a fuel provider, Sun Coast likes to make sure its customers are informed on how they can save. Today we will discuss gas mileage, and a small trick you can use to save some cash.

Trent Hamm, a guest blogger on The Simple Dollar blog, recently shared a tip with the blogosphere on how to save money. It’s a very simple change in driving habit that will do more than save money, it will keep you out of trouble.

He first introduces the concept of how gas mileage exponentially decays after 55mph for most vehicles. With most interstate speed limits being 65mph+, we are getting rather terrible gas mileage. Hamm takes us through a little exercise of math to see how much we will save by simply driving 1 mph under the speed limit.

Let’s say you have a typical car that gets 25 miles per gallon at 55 miles per hour. At 65 miles per hour, it’s going to get roughly 15% worse gas mileage, or 21.25 miles per gallon. If you trim that back to 64 miles per hour, your gas mileage is a bit better – you’ll be getting 21.625 miles per gallon, more or less.

Now, let’s say you’re going on a 400 mile trip on the interstate and that gas is available for $3.25 a gallon.

If you go 65 miles per hour, it will take you 6 hours and 9 minutes to make the trip. You’ll burn through 18.82 gallons of gas, which will cost you $61.17.

If you go 64 miles per hour, it will take you 6 hours and 15 minutes to make the trip, six minutes longer. You’ll burn through 18.5 gallons of gas, which will cost you $60.13.

In short, driving one mile per hour slower will add six minutes to the trip and save you $1.04 in gas.

It’s not much, but for those who drive thousands of miles every week this could lead to saving up money for some good coffee.

Check out the original post here.

Be safe out there on the road!