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May 5, 2009 06:15 PM | 15
The President and Congress may not be in agreement about how best to deal with climate change, but it appears that they do agree on at least one thing: they'd like to give you money to trade in your old (polluting) car.
Under the terms of a provisional agreement between the president and Democrats in the House of Representatives, a "Cash for Clunkers" program would look something like this: Anyone who owns a car that gets less than 18 miles-per-gallon could trade it in for a voucher to offset the purchase of a more fuel-efficient car. Depending on exactly how fuel-efficient that new car or truck is, that voucher could be worth as much as $4,500—at least for the lucky first one million trade-ins.
But how enticing will any "cash for clunkers" program be? The appeal of fuel-efficient vehicles tracks with the economy and the cost of gas, said Brett Smith, director of the automotive analysis group at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Michigan. "It's driven for most people by fuel prices and economics," Smith told ScientificAmerican.com earlier this year. "As incentive decreases, you find out what that true percent of the market is that’s buying for environmental passion than the economic incentive." The voucher will, at least, create an economic incentive that backs up the environmental one.
Regardless, all of this will be on hold until the details of the overall climate bill—of which this "Cash for Clunkers" program would be part—are finalized.
Image: © iStockphoto.com
Tags:
climate change,
obama,
miles per gallon,
fuel efficiency,
global warming,
cash for clunkers,
democrats
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15 Comments
Add CommentYes, I traded in an old banger for a new car. But alas! there are no fuel-efficient cars on the market. It is possible to make cars that will do 100mpg, but car companies do not market them. This proves the lie about so-called free competition forcing prices and costs down...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt seems to me that if one got good money for an old polluter, the amount could be coupled to the improvement much in the spirit of carbon offsets. The worse the car, the more the reward, but only one to a customer to keep people from mining the wrecking yard for profit.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAny co2 save by the difference in gas mileage between my 21-year old truck and a new model is dwarfed by the amount of co2 required to build the new vehicle. Brown Betsy runs until she dies. Besides, why should the government subsidize me to buy a new vehicle I do not need? A waste of tax dollars and further dependence upon a Social Government.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd every single one of those "clunkers" will be shipped to Mexico or some other 3rd world county so somebody can make that money back.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour cruddy 21 year old truck isn't just producing excess carbon, it's giving off particulates (smog), and probably carbon monoxide and NOx. Everyone would be much better off if you put Brown Betsy to sleep.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnyway, the government is already giving Detroit relief money, so we might as well upgrade our environment at the same time.
Who has ever seen a car that gets more than 100 miles per gallon from an internal combustion engine? I have a 450 cc four stroke modern motorcycle that only gets 70 miles per gallon. How would you get a car that holds four people, that weighs at least 4 times as much to get at least 50% better gas mileage? The conspiracy theory sounds good but maybe you could tell us where you have personally seen or heard of this amazing vehicle.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisneuroto, I've been driving this amazing vehicle for 9 years now. It's a 2000 Honda Insight and at 156,000 miles still gets 80MPG highway but in it's prime 110MPG highway was a regular thing. A couple years ago some guys got their Insight to go 179MPG for a whole tank. In 1985, I had the predecessor, the Honda CRX-HF which regularly got 60MPG highway. We don't have better efficiency because gas is so cheap fuel economy isn't that important to most drivers as long as it's over about 30MPG, they'd rather have more power.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTheo, that would depend on how many miles Betsy gets a year. If she's going 1000 miles a year, the pollution of building a new truck would far outweigh what she's putting into the air but if she's doing the usual 13,000 miles a year it'd be better for the old girl to retire.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOh, well then let's turn in the older, less mpg-efficient authomobiles for oxen until the 100mpg models are being sold to the mass market.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI had a 1985 Honda CRX-HF that got just over 50 mpg. Put 150,000miles on it before it rusted out. But Honda learned from Detroit - replaced the CRX-HF with another two seater, Del Sol, that was powerful and cost 2 times as much - sigh. Then Ford brought out the Focus in Europe - 1600 cc - went 110 mph on the autobaun. We came back to the states and waited for it to be sold here. Good news: it only took three years to reach the states. Bad news: only available with a 2400 cc engine - wadda ya need 2400 cc for if 1600 cc will go 110 mph? I can still hear Ford complaining that they can't POSSIBLY meet proposed mpg standards - I think I heard them whining about that from their corp. jets flying above my hometown.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is a green fallacy. Producing a brand new car pollutes and uses a lot of energy. Newer cars also contain more environmentally destructive materials especially hybrids and their batteries.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUsing an old car, while polluting more on a daily basis, requires zero pollution to produce, since it's already been done. Plus, junking a perfectly usable car flies in the face of 'conservation', which is a bedrock of environmental thinking. Not to mention the thought of the government paying people to discard perfectly usable goods to 'stimulate' the production of these goods is absolutely ridiculous. What will happen when cars start to last 15 years without any problems? Sales will plummet, then will Uncle Sam pay us to throw them out just to save car comapnies yet again?
Basically we're bailing out auto companies once again by subsidizing car purchases. It's just stupid.
Now if you were to actually trade in your old gas sucking truck, get the new vehicle (which will release CO2 to be manufactured), and then keep this new more fuel efficient car as long as you have kept your current car, in the end you would be preventing a good amount of CO2 from entering the atmosphere.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually if the car companies made cars that got 100 MGP. They would sell phenominally. That wont happen though not because lack of demand, but government intervention and ties to oil companies. OPEC countries would go up in flames if the US started producing cars that got 100 mpg. Imagine what that would do for our foriegn policy in the MidEast.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNeuroto : If you get such poor mileage from your motorbike, then maybe you should fit it with an econostat and learn green driving methods. With an econostat fitted to a renault 11 I doubled my mileage, but kept getting tail-gaited by gas-guzzlers who were unhappy driving at 50mph... And remember, technical college students get over 3,000 kilometers per litre with home-made prototypes, so why can't car manufacturers get better results? Two-seater lightweight cars are the answer!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis bill would put every charity car donation program in the nation out of business since the amount of the voucher would be much greater than the tax deduction. The solution is to simply allow the charity to issue the voucher in lieu of the tax deduction. The charity would then junk the car in accordance with the bill. This way, everyone wins, the car dealer, car maker, car buyer and the charity.
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