ASH8

Gas-guzzling sports cars, 4WDs and people carriers could be priced off European roads within five years after a crackdown on carbon emissions.


The average new car in 2012 will have to emit no more than 120 grams of carbon per kilometre under proposals to be announced by the European Environment Commissioner, Stavros Dimas.

He said on Thursday that European carmakers had failed to comply with a voluntary agreement they signed in 1998 to reduce emissions by 25 per cent by 2008, cutting only 13 per cent.

At 104 grams of carbon per kilometre, only the petrol-electric Toyota Prius produces less than the 120 grams that the commission will set as a legal requirement for every car manufacturer's range in 2012.

Manufacturers said the proposals, to apply only to new cars, would devastate stand-alone sports car builders, such as Porsche, and specialist manufacturers, such as Land Rover.

Mr Dimas insisted that manufacturers could subsidise cheaper family cars and pass the extra cost of developing new, low-emission vehicles on to the buyers of cars that produce more pollution.

The Prius entered the British market at about £16,000 ($40,000) but costs far more to produce. The difference is added to the price of luxury cars.

Mr Dimas said the five-year introduction period would give manufacturers time to invest in technology to make low-emission cars from lighter materials.

Sigrid Devries, of the European Automobile Manufacturers Association, said: "The commission's own studies show it would add EUR5,000 [$8300] to the price of a car. Manufacturers would have to move outside Europe."

Jeremy Clarkson, who presents Top Gear on BBC TV, said: "I would anticipate that a lot of car manufacturers will start making bicycles. There will be a Lamborghini bicycle, a Peugeot bicycle, a Ferrari bicycle and a BMW bicycle. They will say, 'Look, these are all zero emissions', and get out of it that way."

This week DaimlerChrysler said that comments at the Detroit Motor Show by its chief economist that "quasi-hysterical Europeans" were exaggerating the risk of global warming had been taken out of context.

Van Jolissaint had told the BBC that since he started spending more time at the company's headquarters in Stuttgart he had been shocked by European "Chicken Little" attitudes.


Belching carbon

Supercharged Range Rover
Sport V8: 376 grams per kilometre.
Five-door Ford Focus 1.6 litre (petrol): 184 g/km.
Citroen C3 (diesel): 120 g/km.
Toyota Prius (petrol- electric): 104 g/km.

http://www.drive.com.au/Editorial/Ar...rticleID=22619

ASH8

Where will this leave our RX-8 in 2012?

dtorre

'12 will be a new generation of 8's even if their still around....no need to worry though...by then all 8's will run on Hydrogen

Ajax

I'm hoping that by 2012, the internal combustion engine is no longer turning the wheels, and if it's found in a car at all, it's only spinning an alternator to keep the real power plants running.

playdoh43

I'm hoping that by 2013 all cars will be running on flinstone power we can get off our lazy asses.

toxin440

hah so in 5 years we have to re-invent the engine? if that thing goes into effect - i wouldnt be surprised if Porshe, Lamborghini and all the other big names jump ship and go someplace else to make their cars.

You cant just change everyones desire in 5 years like that - i still think the only way anything will ever get done is when its economically desireable to do so (without meddling with economic factors, taxes, etc) The prius is a joke - it costs far too much does'nt really do anything special and is ugly as crap.

DaveCM203

What kind of mods can I put on my new 2012 RX8 Hydrogen? Will Pettit make an s/c for it?

brillo

That won't happen. Automakers employ to many people in Europe to shut down, the labor unions have to much political power.

You'll see a push to more diesel/hybrid vehicles and smart cars over there, but I can't believe they could make that happen politically.

MadRonin

All electric cars would help the situation provided there is a proper infrastructure for the increase in electricity demand.

PoorCollegeKid

With current technology (or even technology available in the near future) they would just shift the carbon emissions elsewhere.* You wouldn't be reducing pollution if you went all electric, you'd just be increasing pollution around power plants and decreasing it in the cities.

*Unless you live in a country (like France, for example) where a significant amount of your power comes from non-carbon burning sources.

Mazmart

iTrader: (12)

Very well expressed PCK. Would you care to tell all the fine folks here how France does it.

Japan8

And Japan.

Tamas

iTrader: (1)

Nuclear power plants.

Japan8

And then the only question is how and where do you store the waste safely afterwards?





well that and nuclear plant safety, fuel processing plant safety (see accident in Ibaragi Japan)...

Tamas

iTrader: (1)

Well, the question was how France does it. That's how.

There are a lot of questions of this nature regarding nuclear energy, but seeing how the world depends on a relatively few countries supplying all the fossil energy sources, it seems to be likely that there will be more and more thoughts about going this route. With it's problems notwithstanding...

Japan8

I don't disagree... something needs to be done and this is probably the most viable solution. Just as we progress forward these questions need to be addressed before it's too late.

Clavius

I dont think this will ever happen, as already stated the unions have alot of power and the car companies employ to many people.

I've always been a fan of this kinda theory on getting what you want. Reward them!!! "Hey first car company to produce a car or line of cars that meet XX requirement and sells XXX units will get Xboat load of tax breaksX". Car companies like any company is in the business to make money. Make it worth their while to produce this kind of car. Hell it even works for normal folks, I think the state and national taxes give you a 2k credit if you buy a hybrid vehicle. I'm sure half of the people filing for that credit normaly wouldnt think of a hybrid but that 2k worth of money made them rethink it.

BigOLundh

iTrader: (1)

the prius costs $40k in europe? WTF??

dillsrotary

I have a Japan question, do they tax annually based on the liters your car or truck has? I've where a couple times that there is a base tax (for say a 1.5 liter engine) then an additional tax for every .5 liters an engine comes with.

As for the OP's article hitting reality, brillo's statement about unions is my exact thought. I think mainly a scale tax will be created, 120 emissions receive 0 tax while climbing the scale the range rover will get taxed heavily. I'd guess they'd tax the company for producing the vehicle then it'll trickle down to the base price of the car/truck. That'll lead europeans towards a cheaper purchase while allowing the high ends to still produce gas guzzling supercars (for an even more 'super' price.)

shaunv74

"Mr. Fusion anyone?"

Does anyone know if full electrical cars are net positive for emissions? I know co-generation gas/steam turbine power plants are much more efficient in terms of power produced per unit of carbon emitted than gasoline engines but I don't know how much of that would get to the end car. What's the math on the number of cars a power plant would have to power to pay for it's emissions?

PoorCollegeKid

I'm guessing that that's in Australian dollars, since the article is from an Aussie source. £16000 = $22800 USD.

The overall thermal efficiency ends up being about the same as a normal gasoline engine, or between 25% and 35%. I forget what the actual numbers are, but a modern power plant is around 50% efficient, and then you have transmission losses, losses associated with your batteries, and losses associated with the motors and driveline of your vehicle. I remember that we went over this briefly in a class I took a few years back, and the numbers for the electric car ended up close to the gasoline engined car and behind the diesel engined car.

mysql101

When people were talking about China making cars, little did they know that cars from China would be Porsche and Ferrari.

shaunv74

I know about 10 years ago I was working on the latest Gas turbine technology for GE and our new turbines in a co-gen gas/steam plant would be 60% efficient. All in all though it sounds like it's a wash unless we go nuclear, hydro, wind, or geothermal etc.

playdoh43

???

PoorCollegeKid

Large combined plants can hit efficiencies that high, but that's not exactly typical of the current range of power plants operating in the US. I should have said "most existing plants," not "modern plants," because large modern plants can achieve efficiencies approaching 60%, as you mentioned. Oops.

Are you talking about the H-turbine, by any chance? Cool stuff, that's the kind of thing that will make electric cars viable once they are widely implemented. Of course, ICE technology will continue to improve as well, so it may remain a wash for quite some time.