Green tax! A threat to retroers....

Mankind is responsible for only 3.5% of total global carbon cycle CO2 emissions, and cars are responsible for only one-seventh of that 3.5%. This amounts to just 0.5% of total emissions. If every car disappeared from the surface of the Earth overnight, there would be no measurable drop in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, and absolutely no impact whatsoever on climate change.

In fact there would probably be an increase in carbon dioxide levels, since it is highly unlikely that all of the journeys undertaken by car are totally pointless and would not need to be made by other means, which translates to public transport for all but the shortest of recreational travel. Since public transport would struggle to cope with any major influx of passengers, there would need to be more buses and trains in use. And since Automotive Advisers and Associates of Hilden, Germany, have shown that public transport consumes 60% more energy per person transported than cars, this lower level of energy efficiency would likely give rise to higher levels of carbon dioxide emissions.

Unless all buses and trains become zero emission vehicles. The UK's Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott, in a taped interview with motoring journalist Mike Rutherford, estimated that it would be 2017 before the bus pollution problem would be solved, and under present policies this seems highly optimistic.

Accordingly major cities like London, which incidentally has cleaner air now than at any time for over 400 years, should follow Delhi's example to obtain even cleaner air — while London seeks to limit access by car, Delhi has banned diesel engined buses. The UK's National Environment Technology Centre (NETCEN) has shown that a single diesel engined bus emits as much pollution as 128 modern cars, while Japanese scientists have identified one of the most carcinogenic chemicals known to science (3-nitrobenzanthrone) in the exhaust fumes of diesel engined buses when their engines are under load — as they are when pulling away from High Street bus stops in every village, town and city in Britain. Meanwhile the air in the average UK home is 10 times more polluted than city smog, according to Dr Jeff Llewellyn of the Government Buildings Research Establishment, but these issues are of no apparent concern to politicians since there would be difficulties in introducing a tax on air in homes, and polluting buses are in vogue at the moment.

Buildings happen to be the source of twice as much carbon dioxide as transport, which takes us back to where we began — with CO2 emissions. Yet tax on heating fuel in the UK is a modest 5% while tax on mobility fuel (petrol) is a whopping 300%. On environmental grounds, based on carbon dioxide considerations, petrol should surely be taxed at 2.5%. However, since the environment is a mere flag of convenience to excuse high taxes, where it suits politicians to levy high taxes, we cannot expect there to be any logic in this.