London Taxis are well known for being noisy and very inefficient.
There is a plan to have a hydrogen-powered cab developed to showcase zero exhaust emission vehicles during the 2012 London Olympics.
All well and good, but why have it done by Lotus? It is one of the few British car companies left.
From the outside, the taxi looks like any other black cab and it weighs a whopping 2.6 tonnes. So why produce a car thats so overweight? It only does 30 mpg!
The eco-friendly taxi service based in London, Climatecars, has opted for the Toyota Prius as its choice of fleet vehicle.
The Toyota Prius would be a much more interesting choice for the London taxi, with and excellent combined mpg figure of 72.4 mpg, zero cost road tax.
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12 comments:
Aside from the huge environmental damage caused during the production of the Prius - http://www.impactlab.net/2007/03/14/prius-outdoes-hummer-in-environmental-damage/ - I think the Government should re-invest in UK-based industry, rather than sending our tax pounds (tax dollars just sounds better, doesn't it!) abroad.
NickJ is spot on with his comment. It's all lovely and green saluting the Japanese Toyota but where is your loyalty to British workmen making British product?
You are closeted in your envirobubble - think British - you're clearly not at the moment.
I already pointed out the Lotus is one of the few British car makers left. However the design is poor, the vehicle very inefficient.
The solution, a British manufacturer that made something like the Prius. As a vehicle years ahead in technology its carbon costs will be greater than something standard, but it may well be the future. The batteries in it will have a big carbon cost, but see http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/green-living-blog/2010/jul/12/you-ask-centre-alternative-technology
My car is a Yaris, which does around 70 mpg, but its too small to be a taxi. I should point out that Japaese car companies build some cars here. http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE62G3X820100318
There are times when what's best for the environment stretched further than C02 output.
If you go to France and spot a state owned vehicle it will be a Renault or Peugeot ot Citroen; in Germany it will be a VW, BMW or Audi. This is to protect the national workforce which in a roundabout way protects the 'working' environment and in turn the environment proper.
If national or local governemt buy foreign marks (as Reading Borough Council does) the biggest 'British' export will be Japanese cars as is the case now with Nissan.
As an environmentalist you seem to regard CO2 emissions as more important than employment at home which will inevitably ensure that there is sufficient money available to make the country a cleaner, more healthy place to live - that country being Japan.
You are not reading what I am saying. A few days ago I wrote about supporting local food.
I also pointed out that some 'japanese' cars are made here, or elsewhere in Europe.
I'm missing the point of your Guardian link - how does a page suggesting that we'll all drive electric cars address the issue of the enormous environmental impact of these electric cars (and I'm not just meaning CO2 emission here, but the mining processes etc too)? Or was there a specific comment/response which you had in mind (must confess I've not read them all).
Its a good idea to adress the impact on mining, but why only do it on electric cars not petrol/diesel?
The guardian link was to a CAT report that I suggest you read.
As more people get batteries then more development takes place, lowering impact. The electric car is in its early stages, if you applies your logic we might have stayed with the horse. It might have been better if we had mind.
I did read the report, just not all the comments on it - all it seemed to say was "electric cars are coming" but not address the environmental impact of this.
As for mining, we should of course consider the impact of all mining, not just that related to cars - my concern is about introducing a new "sustainable" car which relies on often highly destructive mining processes to get at another resource of which there is limited supply. That doesn't strike me as the way to go. Should we not instead invest in truly sustainable fuel sources? Hydrogen (? - not sure what is involved in making the cells, though), decent biofuels or that methane car in your other recent post.
I suspect you have not read the report, just the guardian article on it.
Find it here http://www.zerocarbonbritain.org/
'The largest share (about
40%) of these emissions is from private cars.
In terms of distance, the largest share is from medium and long distance trips.
Fuel switching
• Electric vehicles produce about 50% less CO2 compared to petrol or diesel vehicles under the current grid mix (King, 2008) and this will
decrease to near zero as the electricity network is decarbonised. Running the entire UK car and taxi fleet on electricity would require a
quantity equal to 16% of current electricity demand (E4Tech, 2007). However, with use of smart charging, electric cars should require little or no additional electricity production capacity because cars could be set to charge
when demand is low, such as during the night.
Batteries may be charged in garages, allowing vehicle owners to simply swap flat batteries.
Improvements in battery technology are expected in the future, and concerns about supply limits on raw materials are unfounded.
In the zerocarbonbritain2030 scenario, all transport modes that can be electrified are electrified, including all private cars and trains.' from the CAT report page 22
Thanks for the revised link. I've only skimmed it at this point (can't read nearly 400 pages that quickly!) however the transport section seems to only be focussing on emissions and disregarding the wider question of the mining and production processes, as highlighted in my earlier link. Even then, it only focusses on some of the emissions. For example, it talks about gas emissions from hydrogen production but says nothing of those from lithium mining.
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