4x4's and the low emission zone...

[Bernie Garland]

I'd have to say yes Bernie. If you are going to tax pollution, then you have to tax how much fuel a person burns. We are all born equal in this life and regardless of someones personal position, there can be no god-given right for one person to make more pollution than another. Mileage is everything, a high mileage means more damage to the roads, more contribution to congestion and more emissions. The only way to put a tax on that which is totally in line with the level of emissions produced, is on fuel. You burn more fuel, you make more pollution, you dont burn fuel, you dont make pollution.

I'm not necessarily saying this is what we should do, but if the government feels it is necessary to inflict economic pressure onto high polluters, then taxing fuel is the ONLY way to go. Singling out particular vehicle types is not only ineffective, but is absolutely wrong. Simply having a JCB parked in your garage doesnt necessarily mean you are polluting, you need to turn the engine on and drive it somewhere to do that ...and that requires ....fuel.

at the end of the day martyn, its nothing to do with emmisions or polution, its down to another mony making scam by the goverment,the uk is a dot compared to the us and china, what will are little bit do, jack s##t. are the Chinese and Americans and all the other countries in the world doing there bit no just us, just check the exchange rate with the states, how is it i can buy a product from the states half price than here, and if the products from china, it would cost more to get it to the states than here,so why is it more expensive here,an example a roll of tandy waxed thread here is £18 i just recieved from the states three rolls and the postage for the same price.how much pollution did that make getting it to me,its all just another way to hit you in the pocket, nothing to do with anything else

 

[Martyn]

at the end of the day martyn, its nothing to do with emmisions or polution...

You are right of course, it's political tokenism. The green lobby are concerned about the environment (rightly so) and apply pressure to the government. The government pretends it is addressing the issue by attacking small minorities and imposing restrictions on them. It does nothing other than generate revenue and does not address the real issues which are too big for them to deal with. International trade, hauliage, mass consumption of oil derivatives and products, electricity, industry and the oil that everyone burns in their cars are responsible. The gov just dont have the spheres to tackle this head on so they are happy to appease the lobby groups by attacking certain minorities.

China is a massive offender. They increase their CO2 production each year by more than our total production. The US is also a massive offender, but Bush is completely unwilling to legislate - he steamrollered the issue at the G8 summit. The total production of CO2 from 4x4's in this country is a gnats-burp by comparison.

 

[Bernie Garland]

You are right of course, it's political tokenism. The green lobby are concerned about the environment (rightly so) and apply pressure to the government. The government pretends it is addressing the issue by attacking small minorities and imposing restrictions on them. It does nothing other than generate revenue and does not address the real issues which are too big for them to deal with. International trade, hauliage, mass consumption of oil derivatives and products, electricity, industry and the oil that everyone burns in their cars are responsible. The gov just dont have the spheres to tackle this head on so they are happy to appease the lobby groups by attacking certain minorities.

China is a massive offender. They increase their CO2 production each year by more than our total production. The US is also a massive offender, but Bush is completely unwilling to legislate - he steamrollered the issue at the G8 summit. The total production of CO2 from 4x4's in this country is a gnats-burp by comparison.

well for once martyn we see eye to eye

 

[demographic]

can a petrol car be converted to run on chip fat and how big of an area would i need to process it?the car is a merc a140

Nope, vegetable oil can only be used in diesel engines and even some of those are not keen on it.

Usually ones with common rain injection systems (that an injection specialist I was recently talking to said were struggling to get out of warranty without knackering up) and also those with lucas injection pumps.
I am also in agreement on the idea that THE ONLY way thats going to make a difference to how much fuel people use is to put all the tax on fuel.
All this stuff about toll roads and numberplate tracking is a red herring so we swallow Orwellian style tracking.
Get rid of roadtax and put it on the fuel, its not rocket science.

Just for the record though, IF I am working close enough to home on a site where I can leave my tools in the container I just walk in, its just that its not often that I do.

Also, it does seem slightly strange that the people that buy the houses I build need a 4WD to get there in winter when I have managed perfectly well in my two wheel drive Transit
I am not saying that nobody needs one but a huge part of big 4WD ownership is that its percieved as a status symbol.




Keeping quiet about my two 500 CC twostroke motocrossers and GSXR 750 <Whistles>

 

[Bernie Garland]

The Party's Over: Oil, War and the fate of Industrial Societies" by Richard Heinberg - ISBN 1902636457.
This is probably the most important book published in recent years. Our entire modern civilisation hinges on us having access to large amounts of energy from oil. Not just cars - food, clothing, shelter - it all takes energy to make. Our oil use is equivalent to 90 full-time servants for every man woman and child, which is why we have such complex and comfortable lives. And we are addicted to this level of consumption, because that's how the 'system' works - can you imagine trying to change it radically and it all still working?

This book is a very readable, rational, scientific, well thought-out analysis of how we've got to this state. It is pretty convincing that the problem is not that we will 'run out' of oil, but that by about 2006 - 2010, total demand will start to exceed total production. The potential consequences are immense, as some of us (who? and in which countries?) will have to do without our '90 servants'. World leaders are no doubt aware of the problem - look at current events in Iraq, Iran etc. But it would be good if everyone else knew why we are doing these things too.
this book is interesting and well worth reading

 

[irishlostboy]

interesting view on things, and funny as hell.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?d...987&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

now h20 may not be an eco warrior, but i am . one mile or seven, cycle. as for being sweaty, get fit, you will stop sweating. so the pair of you are bone idle. i do on average 25-30 miles a day on my bike. not only do i have massive legs, fit as hell, but i also get a great feeling of superiority over every one else. ner ner ni ner ner!!!! LOL

 

[Martyn]

Well if the boffins are to be believed, we have already reached peak oil and are now in a production decline. At least that should be an end to global warming. Every cloud....

 

[h2o]

damn at least you wont have far to walk to work martyn .i m gonna have to wake up about 4 am and bike it.i wonder if nuclear powered cars are an option!!!

 

[Dano]

You know I was just going to post along the same lines as Bernie, I have been to India twice this year and seen the pollution in a small part of that country and I can tell you that no matter how far you cycle, tax 4x4’s or recycle baked bean tins in the UK we have virtually no impact if any on global pollution, I do however think we should set an example but I don’t think taxation is the answer, perhaps Red Ken needs the money for his bendy busses

 

[Martyn]

interesting view on things, and funny as hell.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?d...987&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

Really funny - thanks for the link. Well worth a watch.

 

[Bernie Garland]

You know I was just going to post along the same lines as Bernie, I have been to India twice this year and seen the pollution in a small part of that country and I can tell you that no matter how far you cycle, tax 4x4’s or recycle baked bean tins in the UK we have virtually no impact if any on global pollution, I do however think we should set an example but I don’t think taxation is the answer, perhaps Red Ken needs the money for his bendy busses

red ken needs the tax's to pay for the Olympic village and whatever is needed for the games. how much pollution is all the heavy plant down there chucking out,i was driving a 50 ton digger on the millinium dome project another big rip off of tax payers money,money backhanders every where,it will be the same at the olympic complex,on the millennium complex i had 10 dumptrucks under me, and for 6 months just kept moving a pile of **** from one place to the next so it looked like something was being done,and thats whats going on down there now

 

[Dano]

for 6 months just kept moving a pile of **** from one place to the next so it looked like something was being done, and thats whats going on down there now

Why does that not surprise me?

 

[mr dazzler]

I have been to India twice this year and seen the pollution in a small part of that country and I can tell you that no matter how far you cycle, tax 4x4’s or recycle baked bean tins in the UK we have virtually no impact if any on global pollution

This is the issue. Its like pissing in the wind (or pissing to make patterns with the steam, as my Grandfather used to say ).
Even if every single Uk resident was to become the model eco green recycling zealots that the german's, dutch and scandies are supposed to be, what real impact would it have on the affects of green house gase's, pollutions etc in a global sense?? huh? Isn't a lot of this gesture politic's, "tokenism" as Martyn sudgested, or put more crudely, opportunistic exploitation of a sensitive and trendy issue to rake in money? We're constantly being stigmatised and stereotyped in UK media and local govt propaganda news letter's etc as greedy iresponsible consumer's and bad recycler's by the UK's PC bosses because we dont perform as well as them "european colleuages", when in fact the REAL driving motivation is the threat of EU fines if they dont dramatically reduce the amount of waste going to landfill, thats why they are so panicky, the green eco fear just gives them a convenient political reason or excuse for imposing these new waste management method's. (In france they collect rubbish twice a week not once a fortnight, maybe they should learn a bit from them foreigners in other way's, and any way wasnt it the French who were traditionally stereotyped as dirty people ) I mean, how is me washing yogurt pots and tin foil going to stop global warming when china is using TONS of coal to power a fleet of new electric generation plant's, plus more and more cars, steelwork's,chemical's paint manufacture etc, they probably laugh and think what sap's, as if they are they going to listen to a few forlorn bleeding heart socially decadent western eco militant's, when the Chinease, industrially speaking, are in the driving seat, providing the support base that under pin's western consumerism, and couldnt give a ##### what anyone else think's.

 

[Graham_S]

I'm not too worried, I may drive s 4x4, but it's not a deisel, I don't live in london, and I drive around 3000 miles a year if I'm lucky. not a massive carbon footprint there.
Although I fly to work, It's only once every six weeks and the carbon footprint of the flight is shared amongst all the passengers.

now if you want to talk about saving the environment, what about all the Xmas lights that are on around the country? how much co2 is generated by having all those lights switched on all the time?

 

[h2o]

interesting view on things, and funny as hell.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?d...987&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

now h20 may not be an eco warrior, but i am . one mile or seven, cycle. as for being sweaty, get fit, you will stop sweating. so the pair of you are bone idle. i do on average 25-30 miles a day on my bike. not only do i have massive legs, fit as hell, but i also get a great feeling of superiority over every one else. ner ner ni ner ner!!!! LOL

i cant be assed gettin up at 4 am im not bone idle you dont even know me son.do u fit your cycling around work or are you jobless and not paying taxes into the system.or are you cycling 15 miles to work each day

 

[h2o]

and how do you get your recyclables to the recycling centre,and how do you get your firewood home?and cycling does nt actually get you that fit.best to do a couple of runs a week and some sprint training with some light weights.tryed cycling for fitness its poo,used to do 40 mile a day and still didnt lose weight not that i was fat i was cutting weight.but taring me with the same brush .bone idle. as some1 whos drives a 4x4 less than 1 mile to work is pretty cheeky.big legs small brain perhaps?

 

[EdS]

I dont think it's just commercials. My Landy is a hard top and the V5 shows it as a "light goods vehicle", yet it wont get hit with the taxes because the engine is a late model TD5 which is Euro III compliant for emissions.

I picked the story up on difflock where a couple of older Landy owners had discovered they were not compliant and would get hit with the tax after 2010.

The LEZ registration class has nothing t odo with DVLA class. For a 4x4 station wagon you can get it re-registered as a car not a good vehicle. An it doesn't effect pertol engines to start with - so ditch the 2.5td and get a 4.9V8

 

[Martyn]

and how do you get your recyclables to the recycling centre,and how do you get your firewood home?and cycling does nt actually get you that fit.best to do a couple of runs a week and some sprint training with some light weights.tryed cycling for fitness its poo,used to do 40 mile a day and still didnt lose weight not that i was fat i was cutting weight.but taring me with the same brush .bone idle. as some1 whos drives a 4x4 less than 1 mile to work is pretty cheeky.big legs small brain perhaps?

You just dont stop with the personal insults do you mate? But I see you've learned something from this thread, even if you're still prejudiced and a bit slow with maths, at least you've learned how to spell idle. Those four letter words can be tricky. Next week we can start on capital letters and spaces ...and I'm sure in time, we can get you up to using all the keys on your keyboard.

 

[demographic]

and how do you get your recyclables to the recycling centre,and how do you get your firewood home?and cycling does nt actually get you that fit.best to do a couple of runs a week and some sprint training with some light weights.tryed cycling for fitness its poo,used to do 40 mile a day and still didnt lose weight not that i was fat i was cutting weight.but taring me with the same brush .bone idle. as some1 whos drives a 4x4 less than 1 mile to work is pretty cheeky.big legs small brain perhaps?

Cycling doesn't get you that fit? Where are you getting your facts from?

You are of course aware that the bloke who, when tested had the best heart and lungs ever tested was Miguel Indurain are you?
Five times winner of The Tour de france?
The chap with the resting heart rate of 29 beats per minute?

Maybe your just not trying hard anough or not training properly.

 

[British Red]

Since this is degenerating into a slanging match, perhaps we might consider locking this thread?

When all is said and done, the rules on driving inside London are probably not all that relevant to a froum on Bushcraft - perhaps a Landrover forum or "Green" forum is the right place to discuss such things as they always seem to degenerate?

Red