Just as Lovins wrongly predicted that efficiency would quell electricity demand, there is a widespread belief that federal mandates for higher-mileage cars will result in less fuel consumption.

History shows that as the U.S. economy has grown more energy efficient, energy consumption has continued climbing.

Toyota Priuses and other hybrid cars are cool. But they are, as one Houston-based oil industry analyst put it, a "Band-aid on an amputee."

In 2005, (the last year for which statistics are available) the U.S. had 247.4 million registered motor vehicles. That's more than double the number of vehicles that were on American roads in 1970.

Americans are keeping their vehicles longer, which means that older, less efficient cars will be staying on the road for substantially longer periods.

In 2005

hybrids were outsold by SUVs by a ratio of 23 to 1.

The more efficient they grew, the more of them we built, and the more we used them -- and the more energy they consumed overall.