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G4EBT > FUEL 05.03.08 23:33l 204 Lines 8072 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : C28160G4EBT
Read: GUEST
Subj: Oz car fuel efficiency myth
Path: DB0FHN<DB0MRW<DK0WUE<DB0RES<IK2XDE<ON4HU<ON0BEL<GB7FCR
Sent: 080305/2037Z @:GB7FCR.#16.GBR.EU #:63802 [Blackpool] FBB-7.03a $:C28160G4
From: G4EBT@GB7FCR.#16.GBR.EU
To : FUEL@WW
This article from Public Transport Users Association Inc. (PTUA),
Victoria, Australia, caught my eye and might be of interest.
Quote:
Myth: "Cars are becoming more fuel efficient".
Fact: While it's true that engines get steadily better at using fuel,
people have responded by buying more fuel-hungry cars. As a result, the
average efficiency of the Australian vehicle fleet has not changed
significantly since figures were first collected in 1963.
Hopes that car use will become more sustainable through better fuel
economy are widespread, and often exploited for political advantage. In
2007, for example, State Treasurer John Brumby used this myth to defend
cuts to stamp duty on large new cars:
I think it is generally accepted that newer cars are certainly much
cleaner, as I said, much safer and generally more fuel efficient - not
all of them, but generally more fuel efficient.... I certainly believe
that there will be very positive environmental benefits from getting
people out of old [cars].... and getting them into new cars.
John Brumby, Victorian Hansard, May 2007
Such hopes have been likened to walking down an 'up' escalator. Even if
vehicles become on the whole more fuel efficient, motorists can be
expected to respond much as they would to a drop in petrol prices - by
driving further and more often.
However, there is little indication that the cars we actually drive are
becoming any more fuel efficient. In Britain, the Royal Commission on
Environmental Pollution found that while the fuel economy of new British
cars improved during the oil shock of the late 1970s and early 1980s, fuel
economy has actually worsened since then.
Australian figures for fuel economy tell a similar story. For some
decades, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has conducted a Survey of
Motor Vehicle Usage, which estimates the average fuel consumption of all
Australian passenger vehicles on the road.
This figure has hovered slightly above or below 12 litres per 100 km over
the entire period for which data have been collected. The most recent
available figure (from 2006) of 11.4 litres/100km is identical to the
very first figure collected over four decades earlier!
Year Average fuel efficiency (passenger vehicles)
1963 11.4 litres/100km
1971 12.3
1976 12.6
1979 12.5
1982 12.5
1985 12.1
1988 11.9
1991 12.3
1995 11.5
1998 11.8
1999 11.7
2000 11.9
2001 11.4
2002 11.3
2003 11.4
2004 11.5
2005 11.7
2006 11.4
The same ABS data tells us that cars purchased since 2000 have an average
fuel efficiency of 12.1 litres per 100km, one litre higher than the
average efficiency of cars purchased between 1990 and 1999, of 11.1 litres
per 100km. So despite what John Brumby might say, it is clear that newer
doesn't mean more economical.
It is likely, as transport researcher Patrick Moriarty argues, that
improvements in engine efficiency over the decades have been offset by
other factors:
The trend toward larger vehicles such as four-wheel-drives, increased use
of air conditioning, electronic control components demanding greater power
input, ageing of the car fleet, and compromises required to reduce air
pollution.
Just recently, hybrid petrol-electric vehicles have hit the market amid a
flurry of marketing hype that promises astounding fuel efficiencies, with
ads promising that you'll only have to visit a petrol station once a year
or less.
But in America, even hybrids are following the same old trend: the
improvements in engine efficiency are being used not to reduce fuel
consumption, but to put more 'grunt' under the bonnet.
Mark Buford is happy with the Honda Accord hybrid that he bought six
months ago, and he has already driven it 13,000 miles. He was determined
to buy a hybrid electric car, he said, and this one is clean, 'green' and
accelerates faster than the nonhybrid version.
He just cannot count on it to save much gasoline.
Hybrid technology, it seems, is being used in much the same way as earlier
under-the-hood innovations that increased gasoline efficiency: to satisfy
the American appetite for acceleration and bulk....
Consumer Reports, in an article published in May, found that in actual
on-the-road conditions the Accord hybrid averaged 25 [miles per gallon],
versus 24 m.p.g. for the 4-cylinder model and 23 m.p.g. for the nonhybrid
V-6....
If every car in the country were converted to a hybrid with that improved
mileage, the gain would be swallowed up in three to four years by growth
in driving demand.
"Hybrid Cars Burning Gas in the Drive for Power", New York Times,
17 July 2005
Australian market trends seem likely to follow the American pattern.
Like the Americans, we have seen our cars increase steadily in weight and
engine power in line with improvements in engine technology. After all,
what new car buyer can resist a bigger and more powerful car that costs
the same to run as their previous vehicle?
This is also why glowing reports of new hi-tech 'ultra-efficient' cars
like this one are of little relevance to the urban transport problem (at
least until petrol is much more expensive than it is now).
Quite simply, the factors that make these vehicles highly efficient also
make them less attractive to the typical motorist. The world record for
vehicle fuel efficiency has already been set for all time by the bicycle,
which has infinite efficiency since it requires no fuel at all.
A motorist who wishes to maximise their fuel efficiency would be well
advised to just switch to cycling. On the other hand, a motorist who
finds riding a bike unattractive is unlikely to be attracted to these
ultra-efficient vehicles for much the same reasons.
When it comes to the environmental impact of each 'unit' of car use, in
particular greenhouse emissions, things have not actually stayed the same
but have actually got slightly worse over time.
This is because the catalytic converters found in newer cars, while
reducing some emissions from unburnt fuel in the exhaust, also increase
emissions of some chemicals like dinitrogen oxide (N2O) which act as local
pollutants and also happen to be potent greenhouse gases.
Thus, the average greenhouse emissions from each kilometre travelled in a
car have increased by about 5 per cent between 1991 and 2002, or by 8 per
cent for car travel in urban areas.
Car emissions (grams CO2 equiv per passenger-km)
Year All car travel Urban car travel
1991 169 177
1995 168 186
1998 175 189
2002 178 192
Source: Australian Greenhouse Office. National Greenhouse Gas Inventory:
Analysis of Recent Trends and Greenhouse Indicators 1990 to 2002.
As the National Greenhouse Inventory also reminds us, the total
passenger-kilometres travelled in cars has increased by 18 per cent, and
vehicle-kilometres by 25 per cent, over the same period (1991 to 2002).
Vehicle-kilometres have grown faster, because each car now carries fewer
passengers on average than in 1991.
As Paul Mees concludes:
Per capita travel by car by residents of Australian cities doubled between
the early 1960s and mid-1990s, and so did the urban population. The 'up'
escalator of travel growth has run at high speed, while the downward
effect of improved technology has been nonexistent.
Mees, A Very Public Solution, p.61
End quote.
I've posted the whole article unabridged.
The PTUA does of course have a vested interest in promoting public
transport, but thaty in iteslf doesn't detract from the substance of the
article.
Copyright notice:
2007 Public Transport Users Association Inc. (PTUA), Victoria, Australia.
ABN 83 801 487 611. General copying and distribution on a non-commercial
basis is permitted subject to proper acknowlegement.
Authorised by Tony Morton, 247 Flinders Lane, Melbourne, for the PTUA
Last modified: 4 November 2007
Best wishes
David, G4EBT @ GB7FCR
Cottingham, East Yorkshire.
Message timed: 20:33 on 2008-Mar-05
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