London set to ban older private petrol and diesel cars

redux

londonTiger wrote: »

A few bits of info

1) this is proposed for 2020 (that's 6 years away)
2) cars older than 2005 will be banned from central london.

I don't see many 15 year old cars on the road to be honest. I can understand the reasons. Even the 6% banded around seems a bit on the high side.

Works vehicles dont tend to last for 15 years.

I thought the proposal was Euro 6 for diesels, which will start in September this year.

This could mean that if they take the decision in the next few weeks they might be banning some cars which don't exist yet.

silverwhistle

So to summarise this thread it would seem that:
1) some people don't seem to worry about pollution at all,
2) some people don't seem to worry about pollution elsewhere,
3) it's not my fault anyway, guv',
4) it's all the fault of the greens for introducing the concept of pollution or trying to combat it (not sure which, it's not always clear)..

I've relatives who live in London and Brighton and am aware of the issues traffic and pollution cause, and the fact that it's often a good idea to use alternative methods of transport to the ICE, depending on needs (i.e. I've used both). I can't see a free-for-all benefiting anyone.

londonTiger

I'm out of this forum due to constant bullying by forum members

Iceweasel

For those who may wish to look for examples of how other countries are dealing with this see here:

http://www.lowemissionzones.eu/

In my opinion (for what it's worth) the German system seems to be the easiest to set up - and enforce. The red amber and green stickers are easy to understand and for a fee of €5 are a one of purchase for the vehicle. Loads of places to show your car registration papers and buy a sticker. And the stickers are good for any LEZ in Germany.

Without any high-tech computer ANPR system everyone can see if a vehicle complies and any Policeman can impose a €40 'fine'.

The UK London system doesn't check foreign vehicles easily - neither trucks nor tourist cars. London needs tourists.

If you want to see how NOT to do it - check out the Italian system - it has rules even for mopeds and different seasons of the year and different hours of the day/night. Very, very complicated.

redux

silverwhistle wrote: »

So to summarise this thread it would seem that:
1) some people don't seem to worry about pollution at all,
2) some people don't seem to worry about pollution elsewhere,
3) it's not my fault anyway, guv',
4) it's all the fault of the greens for introducing the concept of pollution or trying to combat it (not sure which, it's not always clear)..

I've relatives who live in London and Brighton and am aware of the issues traffic and pollution cause, and the fact that it's often a good idea to use alternative methods of transport to the ICE, depending on needs (i.e. I've used both). I can't see a free-for-all benefiting anyone.

I'm not sure that more than one or two people have said any of those things.

What is odd is that the people about to take the decision seem to think banning all diesel cars ever made so far is the best approach, when there isn't really much solid information that implies this would work.

Petrol cars produce much more pollution before the catalytic convertor system is warmed up to full operating conditions, and it seems instinctively unsupportable that the ratio of emissions between diesel and petrol can swing from 15 or 30 one way to 40 or 50 the other.

Emissions control standards on cars have been improving all the time, and maybe relying on that fact on its own would be just as good or negligably different to such a blanket ban for years.

Someone who currently owns a diesel with emissions at the most recent standard might change ownership to a petrol fuelled car which is 2 or 3 times worse, even under ideal conditions, and 50 times worse when cold.

They seem to freely admit that half the fine particulates associated with cars come from tyres and brakes, which doesn't favour petrols over diesels, and that not all particulates in the metropolis come from transport

There don't seem to be any parallel measures designed to ban diesel powered buses and taxis, or trains, or private or public heating systems, or lobby for improved fuel quality for these.

Or if there are, there has been less publicity.

Discussing any of these or other points doesn't constitute a who cares approach. London may or may not be the worst case, but other places will also be interested.

buglawton

Interesting to know that in Beijing, a city with serious pollution issues:

- Diesel private and light commercial vehicles have never been permitted.
- All taxis run on compressed gas, have been for over a decade.
- HGVs are only permitted on the roads overnight.

Do they know something Boris doesn't?

Nilrem

Doesn't Beijing still use an awful lot of coal both in housing, and in nearby industry.
I seem to remember that the quality of the coal they is also very low, and they tend to be using a "dirty" (brown?) coal because it's cheap, rather than higher quality (and more expensive) coal, and don't both with filtering it very well in industrial applications.
Something that isn't the case in most of the UK
IIRC pretty much all coal sold for use in the UK tends to be higher quality, and in many cases using coal is not allowed for heating, or you have to use a "smokeless" type.

I think they've also got (or had) very lax laws on engine efficiency/fuel quality in general.

I can't remember the exact details, but it was basically something along the lines of what London was like in the industrial revolution, but with internal combustion engines added in.

cepheus

Yeah Coal is a problem in China. Indian cities have a lot of dirty old vehicles, although cooking over wood stoves is the main problem there.

buglawton

Coal burning is dirty but does not produce so many nano particulates.
The average age of vehicles in big Chinese cities like Beijing is quite low, since mass car ownership is quite a new thing and petrol cars have catalysators.
Beijing has had radical solutions in place - e.g. all taxis use LPG - for over a decade while London has been sleeping on the problem.

Arfa__

cepheus wrote: »

Dunno about you. but the way I interpreted that graph was that we should all be riding motorcycles and banning all the diesel taxies... That'd certainly make me happy!