Petrol Car vs Diesel Car and Hybrid Car vs Fuel Cell Car
Posted by admin on 17 Apr 2010
I would quite like to make an informed decision but currently cannot.
I’m an engineer and quite capable of working out the pros and cons given the basic data. The problem currently is that the data is either produced by vested interest or is incomplete.
I spent 20 years when younger and fit, cycling 5000 miles a year to and from work so hopefully that gives me some green credits.
So here are some of my problems with the entire what car debate:
- Most investment now has to have a green slant, this does tend to shoot the green argument in the foot as everyone wants the money. We’ve seen several cases recently where a tower of research has been undermined because the premis has been based on opinion or a cynical grab for chash. I’d like to think the green debate is a good one but I can’t see the truth through the bull****.
- The anti-green lobby produces just as much effluent, the reply tends to be flac rather than reasoned unbiased argument.
- One of my biggest concerns is the yard-stick. We currently have all this argument between various groups base on the levels of a few gases produced that directly effect the greenhouse layer of the atmosphere. To have the definitive bun-fight we need to see the whole picture.Take for instance diesel, in the uk over the last 20years there has been a move towards diesel vehicles but as far as I can see the particulates they produce are not even considered in the green debate. In the last 20 years the cases of asthma and chest complains have increased (no science here but I just find I wheeze when I follow a diesel 4×4). So is there a tie up or not and if there is what’s the extra overhead due to drug production and extra journeys to doctors/chemitsts etc. If a particular driving option has some secondary paths leading to “dirty processes” then looking at the basic data may result in the wrong conclusion.
- Government – may politicians all die a painful and hideous death. In the uk we have a government that claims it’s doing it’s green bit, we get taxed on buying a vehicle, we get taxed on the fuel – this is fine by me as the tax can relate to the pollution.
- Tax on engine size – why, your already paying for that in the fuel. If it is based on the CO2/mile then it should be related to the MOT production level. I keep my car serviced and replace faulty parts and my CO2/CO on a 10year old 2litre is 15% of the book level at my MOT. Where as a knackered 1litre may still pass the test pump out significantly more pollutants and pay less tax.
Finally some of us work in jobs where there are limited jobs available so a few years ago I found myself flying each week to and from work. I would have liked to move the family but we now have a large penalty tax on moving house so “financial sense” = screw the environment.
So please can we set loose a band of cynics with inquisitive minds and show the primary and secondary financial and environmental costs of:
- what is takes produce a car.
- full life cycle of vehicle (repairs and replacement parts).
- hit per mile (+ battery efficiency, power line and power plant efficiency).
- end of life costs.
- social change/impact.
Perhaps if we had the info the choice or solution may be more obvious.
Here’s some daft ones that might come out of the results:
If the media stopped equating the one unfortunate incident where a child is killed on the roads out of millions of journeys by children on our streets every day to: “your child will die if you let it walk to school”. Would this get the vast majority of kids walking to school, this would get the dosey parents in their 4×4s that wave to each other and probably do the vast majority of running over kids on their way to school, off the roads. Secondary effect, if the kids get exercise twice a day five days a week does that mean the 3 journeys to the gym a week disappear too?
Put the money in to fast cheap internet and get a large proportion of those who can “working from home”.
Would it be more cost effective pool all the money we pump in to hybrid technology, use it to lease all the farm land in equatorial countries and replant the rain forests.
Ps. I think fuel cell is the way to if we can get all the efficiencies up.
This is based on the fact that the vehicle itself runs clean and you fill it up like a petrol vehicle. Unfortunately the power to crack the hydrogen probably comes from a US power station burning brown coal – so what do I know (like most folks probably very little).
Submitted as a comment – Gordon
