Sell the BMW 540i and get a smart car?

clv101 · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:45

[TW]Fox said:
But it will all fade into insignificance when countries like China and India experience exploding car ownership...

Well it's not totally insignificant since CO2 emissions are additive, anyway, just as there are people like me and Pinter75 here saying we should reduce our CO2 emissions there are people in China and the US saying the same thing - the trend is going in that direction. There is immeasurably stronger sentiment now than 10 years ago and in another 10 years resolve will be even firmer. There is nothing to be gained by your defeatist attitude - read my article linked above, it shows how 450ppmv can be realistically met whilst not imposing restrictions on oil and gas consumptions. There is only so much scope for exploding Chinese car ownership however as they are never going to be able to get anywhere close to western per capita oil consumption.

[TW]Fox said:
Oil will never run out...

That's semantics, you know very well what he means.

Pinter75 · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:46

[TW]Fox said:
Oil will never run out, it will simply reach a point where it is too expensive to be used as a normal commodity.

True, thats what I said about it being too costly/hard to extract in the coming years.

Large petrochemical companies such as BP, are activly developing biomass fuel and solar energy. Me thinks they know a little bit more then we do.

[TW]Fox · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:47

clv101 said:
There is nothing to be gained by your defeatist attitude

Errr, yes there is, my 'defeatist attitude' leads to Pinter enjoying driving around town in his lovely 4.4 litre V8 rather than a silly 600cc Smart Car becuase he's on a one man mission to save the planet

clv101 · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:48

[TW]Fox said:
Errr, yes there is, my 'defeatist attitude' leads to Pinter enjoying driving around town in his lovely 4.4 litre V8 rather than a silly 600cc Smart Car becuase he's on a one man mission to save the planet

Urm... See above, I agree. Keep the BM. That's not the defeatiest attitude I'm talking about!

Pinter75 · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:49

[TW]Fox said:
Errr, yes there is, my 'defeatist attitude' leads to Pinter enjoying driving around town in his lovely 4.4 litre V8 rather than a silly 600cc Smart Car becuase he's on a one man mission to save the planet

Sad to say that is worked, but I will drive round feeling very guilty - does that help?

On a serious note though, I will get shot of the thing when I build this house (If I get planning permission - its a bit complicated). Can't have an eco friendly house with a great big 4.4L V8 BMW on the drive.

[TW]Fox · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:53

Pinter75 said:
Can't have an eco friendly house with a great big 4.4L V8 BMW on the drive.

Why not?

matt100 · 29 Nov 2006 at 23:56

all this talk is making me want a 540i

mind you I expect it would probably be more economic to run than my bloody focus (24mpg!)

I like the argument about "don't sell it, that means someone else will have it and use it"

does that mean I can consume all the booze/drugs/sex/violence etc to "save" you all the bother?

teaboy5 · 30 Nov 2006 at 00:09

Another point fox, is that if we got everyone thinking the same way, we can make a difference to this country.

Small things like growing food locally, and sell it locally, stop importing silly food from the other side of the world. If the whole world thought in this way, we would at least cut down on oil by a very large %. There are thousands of things we can do to save energy, so please dont be so damming all the time.

[TW]Fox · 30 Nov 2006 at 00:15

teaboy5 said:
Another point fox, is that if we got everyone thinking the same way, we can make a difference to this country

We can't even get everyone to think that stealing car stereos is a bad idea, let alone that reducing carbon emissions is good. It'll never happen, we do not live in a utopia.

matt100 · 30 Nov 2006 at 00:17

[TW]Fox said:
We can't even get everyone to think that stealing car stereos is a bad idea, let alone that reducing carbon emissions is good. It'll never happen, we do not live in a utopia.

nomination for quote of the year there...

clv101 · 30 Nov 2006 at 00:39

[TW]Fox said:
We can't even get everyone to think that stealing car stereos is a bad idea, let alone that reducing carbon emissions is good. It'll never happen, we do not live in a utopia.

But we can get enough people thinking it's a bad idea to make a significant difference. We got enough people to think drink driving was a bad idea, we got enough people to think not wearing a seatbelt was a bad idea, we got enough people thinking CFC's were a bad idea and we got enough people thinking GM food was a bad idea. It can and will happen - one day it will be seen as unacceptable to buy asparagus tips from Peru (in Tesco today).

Pinter75 · 30 Nov 2006 at 01:03

^ True, look at what happened with the banning of CFCs. The hole in the ozone layer has closed (I think).

Bit of a shame that the main thing that needs to change is heavily taxed.

If it were not, then it would be banned tomorrow :-(

triggerthat · 30 Nov 2006 at 01:20

The only reason I can think of about selling my BMW for a smaller car is that its too expensive to run and not safe. You did say you only do 5K miles a year.

How much does your BMW cost you to run?

zain · 30 Nov 2006 at 01:39

Try looking at the smart car crash test on youtube,

wassap · 30 Nov 2006 at 07:31

Nobody really cares that much about saving the planet, the vast majority only do it because its rather fashionable to do so right now, its like saving africa, give it another 5 years and nobody will give a damn again.

Stonedofmoo · 30 Nov 2006 at 08:12

Do NOT use a Smart car on the motorway. They are dangerous at motorway speeds in anything other than ideal conditions.

My ex had one and she got this advice from the police, the AA and the fire brigade. they are simply too small and exposed to gusts of wind (no joke) at speeds.

Shimmyhill · 30 Nov 2006 at 09:37

[TW]Fox said:
Whats the point? On an individual basis, none of us are in a position to do anything about it. So rather than sit on your computer blogging the end of the world and shouting WOE IS US, PEAK OIL WILL KILL US ALL, why not simply accept the inevitable and enjoy life?

Thats the attitude of an uneducated idiot. Maybe you are neither but your view is terrible 'the i'm all right jack, who cares what happens tomorrow'

One individual has minimal effect but if the attitude of one person can effect attitudes of others then soon one can become many. Keeping your attitude keeps the situation at best the same and more likely adds to the problem.

Reducing your carbon footprint is commendable but asking whether to go to a smart car from the current flavour of the month Bimmer is asking for trouble ! Remember if you do sell your car on the person who buys it may have been buying a new car so getting yours is another bonus - i assume the people saying someone else will buy it and kill the environment think that person will suddenly not own a car if he/she doesnt buy yours. Buy a nearly new car and you havent added to your carbon footprint as it has already been produced. Lots of info on the web about what you can do - sounds like you do a lot already so im sure you have read up on this.

Diesel · 30 Nov 2006 at 09:46

Pinter75 said:
Large petrochemical companies such as BP, are activly developing biomass fuel and solar energy. Me thinks they know a little bit more then we do.

This is why by the time that fossil fuels run out, these massive petrochemical companies will have come up with some other way of fuelling our dirty gas-guzzling monstrosities.

Perhaps they can keep the green lobby happy and invent a fuel whose only emissions are fluffy white kittens (although the animal rights brigade will probably have a problem then!).

clv101 · 30 Nov 2006 at 10:23

Diesel said:
...a fuel whose only emissions are fluffy white kittens...

Can you imagine the horror... billions of tones of kittens shredding the planet - I'll take my chances with the CO2! PS the alternatives can't provide the magnitude of liquid fuels we use today so massive reductions in energy consumptions are needed.

[TW]Fox · 30 Nov 2006 at 11:06

Shimmyhill said:
Thats the attitude of an uneducated idiot. Maybe you are neither but your view is terrible 'the i'm all right jack, who cares what happens tomorrow'.

It's not the view of an 'uneducated idiot' at all. It's the view of someone who realises his efforts alone will make NIL difference and if nobody else is bothering, where is the incentive?