Gas Guzzlers and Fossil Fools

[Karlin]

The government wants to put out ads to disuade Canadians from buying large vehicles with large emissions of greenhouse gases, but the automakers are crying that such an advertising campaign would "hurt auto sales of large trucks and SUVs".

Well DUH, Thats the point!! Consumers won't stop buying them, so we go to the makers to stop making them, but they won't because people want to buy them.

So govt plans to start taxing gas guzzlers more. Consumers who insist on driving "planet killers" should pay for the extra atmosphere they are using up, for the severe weather events they contribute more to than efficient vehicle owners do, for their stubborn idea that freedom has something to do with having the right to damage the environment. If thats what you use to measure the quality of your freedom, you just don't have high enough standards, and no sense of fairness and sharing.

Please, the industry and govt are piddling around until there is no more oil, they have no intention of reducing the amount of fossil fuels we burn.

The way out is for people - you and me - to stop buying new cars and trucks until the makers produce a responsible one - it would happen very fast if nobody bought a gas guzzler in the next 6 months. Find a way to make your present vehicle carry on instead of buying a new one, wait until there are more low emissions ones available.


Karlin

Or - make your own solar car! plans at the link below!!
2nd link - climate change info
3rd link - Esso: #1 climate criminal
4th link - Jeep is a planet killer
5th link - alternative fuels!! [good one!!]

http://www.solarvehicles.org/pages/5/index.htm

http://www.campaignagainstclimatechange.net/

http://www.campaignagainstclimatechange.net/

http://www.campaignagainstclimatechange.net/

http://www3.sympatico.ca/dhaughey/alter.htm

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: Gas Guzzlers and Foss

There are a few points I'd like to make on this.

1. People making a living with their vehicles should be exempt from a gas guzzler tax. Construction workers, farmers, couriers, tradespeople, etc. do need large vehicles. I'd like to see the tax implemented at the time the vehicle is licensed, and for it to be an ongoing thing as a result.

2. We should be able to register and insure our vehicles under a blanket policy. A lot of people would only use their trucks on the weekend and drive something more efficient the rest of the time, but the high cost of insurance encourages them to only own one vehicle. If they could just license the most expensive one (in this case the truck because of a gas guzzler tax), it would encourage ownership of a secondary, efficient vehicle.

3. The next auto industry CEO that whines about this should be chained to a Hummer and dragged around the parking lot a few times. These are the people that have opposed every piece of proposed safety and environmental legislation ever brought in. They have claimed that everything from the seat belt to the catalytic converter would bankrupt them. They were lying then, and they are lying now.

4. We need to put money into rural road maintenance. My father never owned a 4x4 in his life, but he had to buy one a few years ago. A normal 2wd pick-up truck couldn't get him home all of the time because the roads weren't ploughed.

5. Any regulation needs to be based on fuel efficiency and environmental friendliness, not vehicle size. If a Hummer is run on a fuel cell, that's environmentally friendly. If its run on on electricity that is environmentally friendly only if the electricity is generated by hydro or wind power, not if it's generated by coal.

 

[whicker]

Rev, didn't we have a thing a few years back where the cost of the plates was different for the size of engine?
If people are going to be exempt from large vehicles due to work then they should have to prove it each and every year.
The biggest problem I see is the mfgers. They are the main point for the building of vehicles. If they put out vehicles that were of a standard efficiency I don't think there would be too many that would not buy what was on the market. They may scream and weep and wail but they sure aren't going to walk.
Auto ceos should have to drive the worst of their vehicles every day of their lives (the ones with the stupid designs, crappy workmanship, high maintence, low value lemons) and then their might be a change. Of course, the cost has to come out of their pocket.
What is the point of a hummer - other than military?

 

[Reverend Blair]

What is the point of a hummer - other than military?

To make men with extremely small penises feel adequate? :?:

Rev, didn't we have a thing a few years back where the cost of the plates was different for the size of engine?

We still do here, at least by number of cylinders. It's not based on fuel mileage though, but the chance that you'll crash. The difference between licensing my blue truck with its slant-6 engine that gets over 25 mpg and licensing the same truck with 360 ci 4bbl that gets 12 mpg is less than ten dollars. Nobody is going to seriously worry about ten bucks a year.

If people are going to be exempt from large vehicles due to work then they should have to prove it each and every year.

That's why I'd like it to be part of the licensing. If a legitimate contractor buys a new truck and is exempted from the gas guzzler tax , he can sell that truck in a year to somebody else. The tax has already been exempted though. If you attach it to licensing the vehicle, that loophole is closed.

The biggest problem I see is the mfgers. They are the main point for the building of vehicles. If they put out vehicles that were of a standard efficiency I don't think there would be too many that would not buy what was on the market. They may scream and weep and wail but they sure aren't going to walk.

They are the biggest problem. The flip side of what they've done with their marketing of trucks is screw the people who need them by pushing the prices up.

In 1986 my father bought a 1986 GMC. Just a normal pick-up truck. He paid $12,000 for it. Today the same truck costs about $30,000.

 

[peapod]

What is the point of a hummer - other than military?

EGO :wink:

 

[Hard-Luck Henry]

What is the point of a hummer - other than military?

Nick Paton Walsh in Moscow
Saturday February 26, 2005

Guardian

It's not a car for nipping around town. But it might take more than an anti-tank missile to run you off the road.
The Russian-made Kombat car has become a favourite of the country's nouveau riche elite - and Britons with a taste for heavy metal chic will soon have a chance to buy one.

The St Petersburg manufacturers plan to market 100 of the luxury armoured cars in the UK to compete with the American Hummer. Compared to the US vehicle - a civilian version of the military Humvee - the Russian Kombat is bigger, faster, heavier and thirstier.

The basic Kombat costs £82,000 but that soars to £180,000, depending on the thickness of armour plating required.

Dmitri Parfenov, the designer, said the cheaper models offer defence "against AK47 and sniper rounds, while the most expensive protects passengers from 12.7mm heavy machine gun or anti-tank rounds".

While weathering the attack, the driver can make use of the mini-bar, DVD player and TV screens. There is a navigation system to plot the appropriate escape route. The armour, thought to be considerably stronger than the latest standard military Humvee protection, is clearly designed for a particular type of client.

Mr Parfenov said most of his customers were rich people. "You know the life of the rich [in Russia] is not very secure and many want a well-armoured car."

He recalled an assassination in Moscow last year in which a bomb was placed on the roof of an advertising executive's car - the only weak spot in its armour - and killing all those inside.

That could not happen with the Kombat, which has a double-lined armoured floor and windows 50-70mm thick.

Since the first model was hand assembled in St Petersburg in March of last year, only nine custom-built vehicles have been sold to customers, ranging from a Russian shipbuilding millionaire to an aviation magnate.

The Kombat is also about 50km per hour faster than its American competitor, and, because of its lower centre of gravity, is said to handle the road better.

:? Now, where did I leave that bazooka?

 

[Stretch]

You guys are under the impression that this particular "global warming" is the 1st one........


re: fossil fuels.......ya dont hear anything much about diesel n (an internal combustion engine that burns heavy oil).....heavy oil....isn't gas a product of oil?
so ...if a diesel engine burns "heavy oil" doesnt it stand to reason that a diesel engine does more damage to the enviroment than an engine that burns a "lighter oil"(gas)? oh crap....forgot, there's a huge money pool for the goverment in diesel, not to mention that we "need it" to supply us with "all we need" via trucks/trailers/transport etc(fuel tax/tyre tax/excise tax/insurance tax/stamp duty/rego tax...there are probably heaps more.......

so for the "enviroment" to benefit.....why doesnt the gov put everything on rail...provide employment extending the lines.....kill several birds with 1 stone, so to speak......oh crap DUH! aint no tax in that....silly me


and "global warming" has happened several times b4......sort of "cyclical" type event
we're just lucky that we get to experience this particular one...

And Yet, Here's Another Agreement

In recent years more and more evidence, particularly satellite based observations (http://www.ghcc.msfc.nasa.gov/MSU/hl_temp_dry.html), have been shown to refute global warming and actually support a recent "global cooling".
http://weathersavvy.com/GlobalWarming4.html


http://www.intellicast.com/DrDewpoint/ClimateWatch/GW/

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/global_warming.html


never let the truth get in the way of a good story........anyway, just my thoughts on it

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: Gas Guzzlers and Foss

Stretch, the vast majority of scientists agree that global warming is happening and that we are the driving force behind it.

Has it happened before? Yes. We have a fair idea what the causes were during those previous occurrences. This time we are the variable.

You do actually hear about diesel, Stretch. That's why bio-diesels have been developed from sources like like used french-fry oil and chicken sh*t. Some farmers here are going to be making it from canola. The problem is in getting retailers to carry them.

Another innovation is a device that provides a burst of hydrogen into the compression chamber so the fuel burns more completely. That can increase mileage by 5%...a sizable reduction when attached to a fleet of semis.

 

[Hard-Luck Henry]

Re: RE: Gas Guzzlers and Fossil Fools

Re. "Global cooling"

Scientists, reviewing measurements from the last five decades, have concluded that the amount of solar energy reaching the earth's surface has been gradually falling. Paradoxically, this decline may mean that global warming is an even greater threat than previously thought.

The phenomenon - known as 'global dimming' - appears to be caused by air pollution. Burning coal, oil, wood, etc produces not only invisible CO2, but also tiny airborne particles of soot, ash, or sulphur compounds. This visible pollution reflects sunlight back into space but, since the presence of particles encourages the formation of water droplets, it also changes the optical properties of cloud, making them more reflective.

There is a concern that, by shielding the oceans from the full power of the Sun, dimming may disrupt the pattern of the world's rainfall: some scientists blame dimming for the droughts, and subsequent famines, which killed hundreds of thousands in sub-Saharan Africa in the 1970s and 80s; some fear similar trends are resurfacing today in Asia - home to half the world's population.

Dimming may also have led us to underestimate the true power of the greenhouse effect: It appears the warming from greenhouse gases has been offset by a cooling effect from dimming. This is a real problem when we consider that CO2 levels are set to rise over the coming decades, whereas particle pollution is beginning to be better controlled - what we're going to see is reduced cooling and increased warming, at the same time. Fortuitous times, indeed.

 

[whicker]

I say we all go back to the horse and buggy, bicycle, shank's mare and for the most heavy ride, a scooter
Don't know what we would do for keeping warm but maybe jogging would come in handy ;D

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: Gas Guzzlers and Foss

We actually already have the technology to meet and even surpass our Kyoto goals, Whicker. Most of it will make us more comfortable and save save us money in the long run too.

Going back to walking and bicycles is a good idea though. It relieves traffic congestion, which all of fuel cell vehicles on earth cannot relieve.

Scooters are a good idea too. I've been trying to talk Mrs. Rev into getting one so I call her Bat Girl.

 

[peapod]

Sounds like good ideas whicker

 

[no1important]

Re: RE: Gas Guzzlers and Foss

Going back to walking and bicycles is a good idea though. It relieves traffic congestion, which all of fuel cell vehicles on earth cannot relieve.

Yup that is a good idea. But most cities need to improve/create bike routes and/or trails. Here in Vancouver for instance your life is in danger trying to commute with a bike.

Scooters are a good idea too. I've been trying to talk Mrs. Rev into getting one so I call her Bat Girl.

Ha ha thats a good one. So Mr. Rev are you Batman or Robin? ha

Those scooters/mopeds are good idea and really good on gas. I see a few around here but not enough and yet again your life is in danger with all the lunatics driving out here.

If you license a moped you should get insurance free every third year or so just to encourage people to use them. You should also be able to write off half your gasoline as well(since they use so little), and that would be a good incentive on Ottawa's part.