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  Ford?s Europe-designed and built Fiesta ECOnetic is driven through a five-speed manual that can realise as little as 3.7 litres per 100km. That?s opposed to the CVT-driven, petrol-electric hybrid Prius?s 3.9.

In this country you might as well try to market a car without wheels as one with a manual transmission.

Australian drivers have become shiftless slobs for whom changing gears is as inconceivable as flicking channels without a remote. But would you (re-)learn the art of stick shifting to save the planet?  I ask because the leanest running car in the country is not that ostentatiously shaped advertisement for your greener-than-thou self, Toyota’s Prius.

It is, as this blog’s reader is aware, Ford’s Europe-designed and built Fiesta ECOnetic, with a small but relentless four cylinder turbo diesel driven through a five-speed manual that can realise as little as 3.7 litres per 100km. That’s opposed to the CVT-driven, petrol-electric hybrid Prius’s 3.9.

OK, those figures have questionable real-world application, being achieved in the contrived circumstances of official testing. What is of real-world significance is the disparity in price – the Pious … sorry, the Prius begins from just under 40 big ones.  The ECOnetic is to be had from $24,990. And there’s no issue with the brakes.

The Ford, is of course, smaller than the Toyota, but there’s no shortage of slightly larger diesel sippers whose consumption and emissions figures barely exceed the Prius in the real world.

And increasingly, manual oilers will get stop-start, the tech currently being rolled out by BMW and Audi, such as the seamless A5 2.0 TFSI we had last week. Coupled with energy recovery systems, these can save around a litre of juice per 100km and 5g of Co2 per klick.

If you don’t find the Fiesta and Prius readily comparable, the Mazda6 and Toyota’s Camry couldn’t be more so -- not least the Diesel 6 (5.9l/100km) at $36,250 and the Camry Hybrid (6l/100km) at $39,990. Lineball stuff consumption wise, but if you’re serious about preserving the ice caps, surely every litre and gram counts.

If it’s not easy being green, changing gears really isn’t that hard.   Harden up, soft cogs.