Scrap Diesel cars

[Keithie]

I remember when, if you drove a fair distance, car bonnets and grilles and even windscreens used to be covered in flies and other insects.

What happened?

is that due to diesel and unleaded fuels or something else like gm crops?

 

[Jacob]

I..... has a whiff of environmentalist virtue signalling about it. ......

:lol:
Neat little bit of Telegraph cliche simplistic nonsense soundbite there!
How about "politically correct" or has that gone out of fashion on the right?
You can tell what paper a person reads by the cliches he echoes!

If you are a "science sceptic" about climate change, lead pollution, deisel pollution, you name it, you can believe what you like but it means you are almost certainly quite wrong about everything and you will have difficulty in understanding the world.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I remember when, if you drove a fair distance, car bonnets and grilles and even windscreens used to be covered in flies and other insects.

What happened?

is that due to diesel and unleaded fuels or something else like gm crops?

Aerodynamic vehicles.

 

[Jacob]

Ah Greenpeace who campaigned so that we all adopted unleaded petrol, one of the most toxic fluids in general use.
Based on a scientific report allegedly sponsored by the oil companies that showed lead levels in the blood streams of inner city kids was about the same as that endured by the Anglo Saxon's therefore it must be because of traffic pollution and not elderly paint and plumbing.
It is also entirely coincidental that since the adoption of unleaded petrol insect life and bird numbers have taken a downward trend.
Perfectly good arable land taken out of food production for solar farms, but the replacement food is now shipped or flown in from Asia.
If the greens ever have an idea that is good for the environment and public health it will be a first.

I agree - lead is good for you. Ask a Trumptard!

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/ ... level-lead

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning

nb it wasn't Greenpeace it was the scientific community. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clair_Cameron_Patterson

 

[Beau]

Why only target cars, though? Are delivery vans, HGVs, buses, taxis, portable and emergency generators, construction equipment and so on not contributing to the problem? Why victimise one group of internal combustion engine users, but not the others?

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... data-shows

Car drivers have a choice of petrol or Diesel. HGV and bus drivers don't. :wink:

Yep

Just been through buying a pickup truck for work. Settled on an Isuzu Dmax as it was supposed to be cleanest most efficient of the options. Had to get rid of it as the filters used don't like my driving style as I do a lot of short journeys. When looking for an alternative looked for a petrol one but they simply don't exist in the current UK market and ended up getting a much older truck without the filter but I know this is a bad thing for the environment

Sure in the not too distant future electric commercials will be viable but sadly not yet.

 

[themackay]

I get a whiff of an excuse for more revenue raising here

 

[Jacob]

I get a whiff of an excuse for more revenue raising here

You mean a good reason for raising tax levels? I agree.
Keep it simple; increased revenue could be fed into alternative energy resources, so it'd be win, win.

 

[Beau]

I get a whiff of an excuse for more revenue raising here

Our city's air quality is dreadful and something needs to be done. Yes what we have been recommended to do has been changed a few times over the years but I think it just follows the the scientific recommendations of the time. Recon our air pollution would be one hell of a lot worse it we did not have unleaded fuel, catalytic converters DPFs etc.

 

[themackay]

I get a whiff of an excuse for more revenue raising here

You mean a good reason for raising tax levels? I agree.
Keep it simple; increased revenue could be fed into alternative energy resources, so it'd be win, win.

I would like to think that would be the case but this government has a poor track record on alternative energy.

 

[DiscoStu]

The reason Petrol vans and lorries don't exist is because it was more economical to buy diesel. I bought a Land Rover Discovery in 2004 there was a petrol option but they sold almost zero because it was much cheaper to have diesel. If the government didn't want us to have diesel then they should have made it more expensive and then manufacturers would make petrol vans etc. I recently bought a new Discovery and there wasn't even a petrol option (in the UK) but in other countries there is.


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[graduate_owner]

The Telegraph article which stated that London's Mayor would be introducing hydrogen powered buses was interesting though. If it is now realistic to burn hydrogen in an internal combustion engine safely ( I suspect fuel storage is the issue) then surely that is the way to proceed. Possibly an electric vehicle with hydrogen back up? So where do we get the hydrogen from? Oh yes, electrolysis using off peak surplus energy, especially surplus energy from those unreliable sources such as wind and solar farms. Pollution free production of hydrogen, burning in a vehicle to produce pollution free water as an exhaust gas. What what? Now we can't possibly have that, can we? Pie in the sky stuff. New fangled nonsense. This government couldn't possibly back research into that. Let's go back to good old diesel. You know where you are with tried and trusted technology. Ah well, we can always dream. I feel very lucky to live about 40 miles from the nearest city.

Just one point though, if the government, any government, were serious about reducing pollution, they would be pushing the electric car option more than they currently (currently - sorry, couldn't resist) do. Electric vehicles are just too expensive and battery replacement likewise. We need drastic government financial incentives but that costs money - but taxing the diesel motorist is easier and raises money instead.


K

 

[t8hants]

Ah Greenpeace who campaigned so that we all adopted unleaded petrol, one of the most toxic fluids in general use.
Based on a scientific report allegedly sponsored by the oil companies that showed lead levels in the blood streams of inner city kids was about the same as that endured by the Anglo Saxon's therefore it must be because of traffic pollution and not elderly paint and plumbing.
It is also entirely coincidental that since the adoption of unleaded petrol insect life and bird numbers have taken a downward trend.
Perfectly good arable land taken out of food production for solar farms, but the replacement food is now shipped or flown in from Asia.
If the greens ever have an idea that is good for the environment and public health it will be a first.

I agree - lead is good for you. Ask a Trumptard!

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/ ... level-lead

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning

nb it wasn't Greenpeace it was the scientific community. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clair_Cameron_Patterson

Never said lead was good for you, but unleaded is no better. When I was doing my nurse training we were told quite categorically ingesting unleaded fuel will cause stomach tumors eventually, so no more siphoning.
It was the fuel industry that wanted unleaded because there is more profit in it.

Asbestos, engine oil, old tyres are things that we do not want littering about the countryside but thanks to the greens sacred mantra of 'The polluter must pay' thats what we get. Instead of the more sensible, this stuff is nasty, so lets reward people for their safe disposal. Increased fly tipping and inappropriate disposal is a direct result of green policies-.
Bio fuel - thousands of acres of forest cut down.
Just as we get to the point where a car can last a reasonable time they want to scrap thousands prematurely because they don't like the engine, no mention of offering a petrol conversion. The industry will make tens of thousands of new ones, shipped halfway around the world, full of compounds of lead and mercury and other nastiness for their eco batteries and at least the inner cities will breath easier, but no one will look at the overall environmental costs

 

[Jacob]

......
It was the fuel industry that wanted unleaded because there is more profit in it.....

No it was the health industry who wanted unleaded because lead is highly toxic.
Unleaded is no doubt toxic too especially if ingested, but much less so without lead and less environmental lead pollution.
It is very well known and documented. It's been known about from early days.
it's science, like it or not, you can't just choose what to believe.
I agree about bio fuel - a disaster in the making.
NB Fly tipping is hugely decreased . It's a serious offence nowadays

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Fly tipping decreased? In our area it's probably running at five times what it used to.


Fly tipping statistics (2013/14), Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA)

A 20% increase in fly tipping over 2012/13 figures, with Local Authorities dealing with 852,000 incidents, two thirds of which were household waste.
The most common place for fly tipping is highways (47%), however the last year has seen a 15% increase in tipping on footpaths, bridleways and alleyways.
Approximately a third of all incidents consisted of small van loads of waste material.
Local authorities estimated cost of clearance of fly tipping at £45.2 million, a 24% increase on 2012/13.

Or a more up to date figure from Surrey

District councillor Alun Jones said fly-tipping was already a big problem in Surrey, having risen 40% in the past year ...

 

[Lons]

Yes it is true. HGV and Bus drivers don't have a choice, they drive what they're told to!

They are slowly building electric buses but don't expect to see petrol trucks anytime soon.

Diesel car drivers can choose to stop driving Diesel cars when they buy their next new car. :wink:

There are a large percentage of drivers who very definitely don't have a choice although I don't know the figures without research these are the company car drivers who have a choice of diesel or diesel. My son being one of them with a new diesel Insignia just a few weeks ago.

 

[graduate_owner]

I seem to remember a radio article saying the guy (American, Thomas Midgley) who invented the idea of using lead tetraethyl as an anti- knock additive also invented the use of Chloro Fluoro Carbon compounds as a refrigerant in domestic and industrial freezers to replace the use of inflammable gases. So according to this radio article, just one guy was responsible for two of the greatest pollutants of the 20th century.

K

 

[Lons]

I recently bought a new Discovery and there wasn't even a petrol option (in the UK) but in other countries there is.

Not just the Discovery Stu.

We were actively encouraged top buy diesel because it was "better for the environment" which it now apparently isn't and those who chose to do so paid a hefty premium for the diesel version in the hope it might be recovered through fuel savings. The government at the time soon realised they were losing revenue so put an extra tax on diesel fuel to make up the shortfall at a time when all other European countries were doing the opposite, still were in Spain when I was there a few months ago and diesel was, as it should be cheaper than unleaded petrol.

Manufacturers catered to the demand and as said petrol versions are sometimes not available. In may case, I bought an Audi A6 Avant in November and there are only 2 versions on sale, a 2 ltr and a 3 ltr diesel unless you buy a high powered RS version.

Like everything else from food to medical, what's recommended today is condemed tomorrow, I take everything at face value and believe nothing unless I've personally researched it to the death.

Maybe they should start taxing some of the verbal diarrhea to balance the books and spend that on environmental remedies! :wink:

Bob

 

[Phil Pascoe]

An interesting letter from The Times today -
Before the UK government starts spending taxpayers’ money on a diesel scrappage scheme, it should tackle the heaviest polluters, transport refrigeration units (TRUs), and the fuel subsidies they receive. TRUs are secondary diesel engines used to provide cooling on the refrigerated trucks and trailers delivering food to supermarkets, restaurants and our homes. TRUs are almost entirely unregulated, and emit 93 times more nitrogen oxides and 165 times more particulate matter than the emissions limits of a new diesel car. TRUs not only cause much more pollution than cars but are entitled to run on half-price “red” diesel. So we not only tolerate their grossly disproportionate emissions but subsidise them.

Toby Peters

Visiting professor, transformational innovation for sustainability, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh

 

[misterfish]

I wonder how much of the original decision to push diesel engined cars was down to the test figures showing lower pollution - the figures now found to be 'modified' by manufacturers' software when tests are carried out. As this is being perceived as a fraud (with huge penalties levied on some manufacturers) then maybe the perpetrators of this fraud should be liable for the costs of a buyback scheme.

Hopefully wkth the development of better batteries and a countrywide decent rapid charging infrastructure there will be a move towards electric vehicles.

Misterfish

 

[themackay]

Is the problem not caused by older vehicles if new cars are as clean as they claim having said that the problem is not going to go away due to the sheer volume of traffic