Paris to ban old cars (Diesel owners take note)

[cheap]

http://www.drive.com.au/motor-news/p...12-13d0l4.html

It seems the city of love has called time on the humble car. Or at least those built in the 1990s.

Officials in Paris are set to enforce a blanket ban on heavy polluting vehicles in the coming months, in what's being described as a radical attempt to quell the city's pollution problem.

Autocar in the UK reports that a series of rolling restrictions are expected to begin this summer, when all coaches, buses and trucks registered before September 30, 2001, will be banned from central Paris. Those vehicles will still be able to access the Boulevard Perpherique, the giant ring road that encircles the city centre.

For car owners, passenger vehicles registered before December 31, 1996, will be banned while a September 30, 1997, mandate will be enforced for vans and light trucks.

According to French reports, the restrictions will gradually become tighter up until 2020, when the only private vehicles with unrestricted access into the city centre will reportedly be cars registered after 2011 and motorcycles registered after July 2015.

Daily smog has become so bad in the French capital that, last year, officials began imposing alternate driving days for motorists – depending on whether they had odd or even-numbered licence plates. Paris officials have also offered incentives for public transport and car pooling in the past.

The restrictions appear largely aimed at diesel vehicles, with the French government wanting to gradually phase out diesel-powered passenger vehicles. As it stands, roughly 80 per cent of French motorists drive diesel-powered cars.

"In France, we have long favoured the diesel engine. This was a mistake, and we will progressively undo that, intelligently and pragmatically," the country's Prime Minister Manuel Valls said in December.

According to one report this week, Parisian mayor Anne Hidalgo was quoted as saying that while the older diesel cars were the most polluting, "even the filters in the latest models can't get rid of the most dangerous fine particles".

The French government is said to be adding to the push against diesel by raising the tax on diesel fuel, as well as deliberating over whether to hand out incentives for citizens who swap out of diesel-powered vehicles into electric or petrol-powered vehicles - a scheme that could bolster the country's local car manufacturing industry.

Similar anti-diesel sentiments are being expressed in other European cities including London, because of the health warnings about high levels of nitrogen oxides and fine particles generated by diesel-powered vehicles.

The Parisian restrictions come as the Europe Union clamps down on Euro 6 emissions standards introduced in September last year. Australian authorities are said to be considerably behind the eight-ball in enforcing such measures.

According to The Carbon Dioxide Emissions from New Australian Vehicles 2013 paper released last year, the emission average for the Australian vehicle fleet has fallen nearly 10 years behind equivalent European measures.

Despite the fleet average in carbon emissions falling 3.4 per cent in 2013 – down from 198.5 to 192g/km – Australian standards still pale against the European Union's fleet average of 158.7g/km C02 in 2007.

[2011G6E]

Hmmm...I wonder how much greenhouse gas and pollution would have been made by myself (and of course the one previous owner) of my 1982 Celica if we hadn't kept the one well maintained vehicle on the road for the last 33 years and instead had been good consumers and bought a whole brand new car every couple of years...?

[LoudPipes]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

Hmmm...I wonder how much greenhouse gas and pollution would have been made by myself (and of course the one previous owner) of my 1982 Celica if we hadn't kept the one well maintained vehicle on the road for the last 33 years and instead had been good consumers and bought a whole brand new car every couple of years...?

I don’t know how actuate this is:

What's the carbon footprint of ... a new car?

Making a new car creates as much carbon pollution as driving it, so it's often better to keep your old banger on the road than to upgrade to a greener model.

Mike Berners-Lee and Duncan Clark
Thursday 23 September 2010

The carbon footprint of making a car is immensely complex. Ores have to be dug out of the ground and the metals extracted. These have to be turned into parts. Other components have to be brought together: rubber tyres, plastic dashboards, paint, and so on. All of this involves transporting things around the world. The whole lot then has to be assembled, and every stage in the process requires energy. The companies that make cars have offices and other infrastructure with their own carbon footprints, which we need to somehow allocate proportionately to the cars that are made.

In other words, even more than with most items, the manufacture of a car causes ripples that extend throughout the economy. To give just one simple example among millions, the assembly plant uses phones and they in turn had to be manufactured, along with the phone lines that transmit the calls. The ripples go on and on for ever. Attempts to capture all these stages by adding them up individually are doomed from the outset to result in an underestimate, because the task is just too big.

The best we can do is use so-called input-output analysis to break up the known total emissions of the world or a country into different industries and sectors, in the process taking account of how each industry consumes the goods and services of all the others. If we do this, and then divide by the total emissions of the auto industry by the total amount of money spent on new cars, we reach a footprint of 720kg CO2e per £1000 spent.

This is only a guideline figure, of course, as some cars may be more efficiently produced than others of the same price. But it's a reasonable ballpark estimate, and it suggests that cars have much bigger footprints than is traditionally believed. Producing a medium-sized new car costing £24,000 may generate more than 17 tonnes of CO2e – almost as much as three years' worth of gas and electricity in the typical UK home.

Interestingly, the input-outpout analysis suggests that the gas and electricity used by the auto industry itself, including all the component manufacturers as well as the assembly plant, accounts for less than 12% of the total. The rest is spread across everything from metal extraction (33%), rubber manufacture (3%) and the manufacture of tools and machines (5%) through to business travel and stationary for car company employees.

The upshot is that – despite common claims to contrary – the embodied emissions of a car typically rival the exhaust pipe emissions over its entire lifetime. Indeed, for each mile driven, the emissions from the manufacture of a top-of-the-range Land Rover Discovery that ends up being scrapped after 100,000 miles may be as much as four times higher than the tailpipe emissions of a Citroen C1.

With this in mind, unless you do very high mileage or have a real gas-guzzler, it generally makes sense to keep your old car for as long as it is reliable – and to look after it carefully to extend its life as long as possible. If you make a car last to 200,000 miles rather than 100,000, then the emissions for each mile the car does in its lifetime may drop by as much as 50%, as a result of getting more distance out of the initial manufacturing emissions.

When you do eventually replace your car, it obviouslty makes sense to do so with a light, simple and fuel-efficient model: that way you'll be limiting both the manufacturing and the exhaust-pipe emissions. But before you buy, look into car clubs, especially in a city centre: you may save lots of money as well as reducing the number of cars that need to be produced.

Of course, the exact benefits of new versus old cars, diesel versus hybrids, car clubs versus owning, and so on, are different for each person. To find out the greenest choice for you, check out the new interactive greener car guide at Startuk.org.

http://www.theguardian.com/environme...tprint-new-car

[2011G6E]

Remember the whole-of-life figures that compared a Prius with a Hummer H2?
Taking into account everything from the sourcing of the materials in it, through manufacturing, the fuel useage, and life expectancy of the vehicle, it was more environmentally friendly overall to buy the Hummer...

The "clean green" Prius was way behind the eight ball from the start because of the staggeringly environmental filth and damage created from the mining of the basic materials, and transport all across the globe, of the stuff in the battery packs.

[new2ford]

The writing has been on the wall for diesel vehicles in Europe for some years, the trend just hasn't reached Australia yet, nor is it likely to, due to official apathy about such things. Diesel buses are prohibited from city centres in some European cities and there is a big move on towards converting all public transport to electric propulsion. Trucks are more difficult, but there is a lot of research going on. Cars will be an easy target to at least go to petrol, with development of electric propulsion continuing. A long way down the track it may be difficult to import diesel cars from Europe.

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

Remember the whole-of-life figures that compared a Prius with a Hummer H2?

The Hummer isn't listed in the current NRMA/RAC operating costs calculators but I do recall some time ago that the I-tech Prius had the same WOL cost as a TX Territory.

When I look it up today, I see that the I-tech Prius (the normal Prius is much cheaper) has an estimated WOL cost of $235 per week. The petrol TX Territory is $251 per week. However, diesel Territory fans should note that the diesel TX is estimated at $272 per week, $21 more pw than the petrol Territory. What isn't appreciated is that fuel cost/economy is only a small proportion of the total life cost of a car.

While I understand that diesel engines have their purposes, I wouldn't buy a diesel car for ordinary use.

[burnz]

Originally Posted by new2ford

The writing has been on the wall for diesel vehicles in Europe for some years, the trend just hasn't reached Australia yet, nor is it likely to, due to official apathy about such things. Diesel buses are prohibited from city centres in some European cities and there is a big move on towards converting all public transport to electric propulsion. Trucks are more difficult, but there is a lot of research going on. Cars will be an easy target to at least go to petrol, with development of electric propulsion continuing. A long way down the track it may be difficult to import diesel cars from Europe.


The Hummer isn't listed in the current NRMA/RAC operating costs calculators but I do recall some time ago that the I-tech Prius had the same WOL cost as a TX Territory.

When I look it up today, I see that the I-tech Prius (the normal Prius is much cheaper) has an estimated WOL cost of $235 per week. The petrol TX Territory is $251 per week. However, diesel Territory fans should note that the diesel TX is estimated at $272 per week, $21 more pw than the petrol Territory. What isn't appreciated is that fuel cost/economy is only a small proportion of the total life cost of a car.

While I understand that diesel engines have their purposes, I wouldn't buy a diesel car for ordinary use.

you know diesels are cleaner than petrol!

[FG50T]

For anyone whose been to Paris have you noticed that the concrete/stone buildings are usually a dirty stained black colour? That's from car pollution. The entire city actually gets washed every 5 years I think. Same story for Rome and Madrid.

[Ross 1]

The last thing you want in Paris is a new car! It is common practice, when you park on a level road , to leave your hand brake off so when someone squeezes their car in, your car rolls a bit to absorb the impact. Otherwise your bumpers are stuffed in no time.

[WoodyAU]

I think this highlights one of the big problems with working out emissions and such. Diesels were always considered better for the environment, until they started measuring things differently, the they were worse. As science will continue to evolve, this may change again. My two AUs may not be the most efficient or environmentally friendly cars on the road, but I own them and they will be driven until they are unable to be fixed. Barring accidents and rust, that should be for ever.
What we really need is an for someone to develop a new engine to go into older cars, so we don't get the emissions associated with building a whole car, and don't need to scrap what is otherwise a good vehicle.

[mik]

Originally Posted by WoodyAU

I think this highlights one of the big problems with working out emissions and such. Diesels were always considered better for the environment, until they started measuring things differently, the they were worse. As science will continue to evolve, this may change again. My two AUs may not be the most efficient or environmentally friendly cars on the road, but I own them and they will be driven until they are unable to be fixed. Barring accidents and rust, that should be for ever.
What we really need is an for someone to develop a new engine to go into older cars, so we don't get the emissions associated with building a whole car, and don't need to scrap what is otherwise a good vehicle.

i read recently(sorry i cant remember the link), but apparently there's 3 million odd commercial air craft flights per year putting up 6% of the pollution on the planet , and the flight frequency increasing by about 0.4 percent per year.

Heres another bit of pollution trivia be it old article (2009)but never the less interesting about big diesels on ships .

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...ars-world.html

[mik]

Originally Posted by WoodyAU

I think this highlights one of the big problems with working out emissions and such. Diesels were always considered better for the environment, until they started measuring things differently, the they were worse. As science will continue to evolve, this may change again. My two AUs may not be the most efficient or environmentally friendly cars on the road, but I own them and they will be driven until they are unable to be fixed. Barring accidents and rust, that should be for ever.
What we really need is an for someone to develop a new engine to go into older cars, so we don't get the emissions associated with building a whole car, and don't need to scrap what is otherwise a good vehicle.

i remember reading an article a year or two ago about bad pollution in china, and how modern clean burning cars could have cleaner air coming out of the exhaust than what was going into the motor, so therefore , the modern low emission petrol vehicle was actually cleaning the air,

here is an interesting photo with some numbers.
http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/china/a...12b1e57615.jpg
.