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Comment by eanzenberg | Hacker News Reader

Unfortunately, production of cars (and consumerism in general) is extremely bad for carbon emissions and for the environment. Carbon emissions from the production of 1 car generally rival the lifetime emissions from the tailpipe [1]. If you have no choice but to replace an old car for new then sure, get a more efficient one. If you're replacing cars every 3 years like an average westerner, given the age of cars I see on the road, you are doing extreme harm. Old cars that are running should be incentivized to continue to be on the road, barring any other pollutant or smog issues.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/20...

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Consumerism is bad for the planet, 100% true. However the "every 3 years like an average westerner" remark needs citation. In the context of the article (Denmark) it is certainly not true. Cars are so expensive (the 180% tax is absolutely real - I've paid it) that people hold on to cars longer and buy used more. In fact, the number of people with zero cars would be hard to believe if you come from California.

Alas, the politics are made by city people (who have access to really good public transport) and paid for by people in suburbia who _have_ to own a car to survive (and no, we can't just move everyone to the city).

EDIT: typos

> (the car tax is) paid for by people in suburbia who _have_ to own a car to survive.

I have been wondering for a little while now if the extreme libertarian position on private roads has been vindicated. I am not sure yet, but it seems possible where once it was ridiculous.

Starting with (let us say) World war two, cities and states built out substantial, publicly funded roads and road networks in order to connect up newly developed sub-urban centres that were designed for car owners. These new centres were affordable for the emerging middle classes, who migrated there en-masse. This co-incided with the baby-boom, which was partly possible due to cheap housing.

But this left the inner cities to die slow deaths where immigration was not high. (Side note: This is more true of American towns, in Australia I don't know that we had the dramatic changes seen in the highly industrialised centres of the USA.) So it possibly boosted the middle class at the expense of the lower class (?) and it created huge urban sprawl.

Would private roads, paid for collectively by the developers or residents of those suburbs, have helped to alleviate or reduce the problems outlined above?

I am spitballing here, and it is a little off-topic, but please indulge me!

Japan has a majority- privatized highway network, funding it requires tolls way higher than would be politically feasible in any western country. Gas and tolls make taking the bullet train cheaper for some distances if you're alone (the equation changes if you load up your family).

I live here and have to pay the tolls but I still prefer it from a "user pays" justice POV.

It doesn't have to be privatized though - Singapore is introducing a GPS-distance-based congestion charge on their roads ("ERP 2" if you want to Google it)

As a recent example, the cost to travel by train into Tokyo from Narita cost me about ¥800, but the tolls from driving cost about ¥2000. So, if you travel with 3+ people in a car, it's cheaper to drive, provided you already own a car.

A lot of roads were build by private developers at the time of original suburban expansion, where later they get handed off to the city to maintain going forward.

In the United States, it was somewhat more complex than that. The highway network was and is primarily part of the nation's military defense infrastructure, so that weapons and personnel can be moved around in a time of crisis. (Something from Germany that impressed the U.S. during WWII.)

This is why the system is named after a general who was also a president ("The Eisenhower Interstate Highway System").

It's also the reason why the rails are not usually removed from abandoned railroads anymore: So they can be rehabbed in an emergency.

There's also a lot of social studies involved, including the baby boom.

Like all large human endeavors, it's messy.

[Edit to add:]

Would private roads, paid for collectively by the developers or residents of those suburbs, have helped to alleviate or reduce the problems outlined above?

One of the many contributing factors to the U.S. Civil War was the notion that the North wanted to shed its remaining privatized roads and federalize the whole thing, while the South wanted entirely private road systems.

> In the United States, it was somewhat more complex than that. The highway network was and is primarily part of the nation's military defense infrastructure

You are right. I am not contesting the Highway system, which actually still seems to be a good case for Federal public spending, both because it benefits the military and because it is inter-state.

My point is entirely regarding the roads that were built out from the dense urban cores to connect with sub-urbs, and the roads built to connect sub-urbs with one another, and those inside of suburbs too. If these were paid for by those who used them (and not inner-city dwellers) then perhaps urban sprawl would not have happened, and we would have saved ourselves from a whole host of externalities we are only discovering now.

If these were paid for by those who used them

Well, they are. That's the 9/10th of a cent that drivers pay on each gallon of gas they purchase.

IMO, it should be closer to an even five cents, with half of it going to mass transit. But then I also drank milk and Pepsi mixed together when I was a kid, so I'm not exactly reliable.

Does that cover the cost of the roads? Finnish fuel tax is 68 euro cents per litre (2,57€/2,95$ per gallon) and 2/3 of that covers the road maintenance. That is 328 times the amount of your fuel tax.

If you're speaking about the federal gas tax which goes to the Highway Trust Fund[1], it's currently $0.184 per gallon of petrol and $0.244 per gallon of diesel.

There are also state gasoline taxes, vehicle weight fees (for commercial interstate trucks) registration fees, and tolls[2].

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_Trust_Fund 2. https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/07/us-transporta...

> that people hold on to cars longer and buy used more

And yet the average age of the car in Denmark is 8.9 years [1]. For comparison Germany is at 9.3 year, and US is at 11.6 years [2]

[1] http://www.aut.fi/en/statistics/international_statistics/ave... [2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/261881/average-age-of-li...

The two sources is different, so it might be good to be wary about comparing them. Could be right though.

But anyway, these average ages may be due to little used old cars being taken out of registry, to avoid annual fixed taxes? This has not much impact on the average age of cars used in daily traffic.

FWIW, I'm from Finland, also with a history of high car purchase taxes, and the average in above data is almost 12 years. The oldest cars, however, have lower annual car tax (they had the highest tax at purchase time).

BTW I understand Denmark was about to lower the car purchase tax from 180 % to 100 % or so?

No, I think they did lower it to 180% last year..

85% below and 150% above the cutover, since ~2015 I believe.

It is the same source for Denmark and Germany. Since US is not a part of EU, so I had to come with a different source.

As for your other argument - both reports count "vehicles in use" (ACEA) or "vehicles in operation" (US)

Denmark and Germany are in EU, but that does not mean that statistics are made in the same way.

Also, the "vehicle in use" is not necessarily such a clear definition.

For instance, several of my colleagues own historical vehicles from 1960's and 1970's which are "museum registered", which here means that they must be at least 30 years old, can be used only on 30 days each year, and they are not subject to annual "MOT check" (but a different kind of check every 2-4 years).

Are they included in the "vehicle in use" statistic? I don't know. And I don't know what are the specific regulations for similar vehicles in other countries. Because the cars are 40-50 years old, even a not very big number of them would skew the statistics of average age of cars.

The max rate was lowered from 180 to 150 about 2-3 years ago.

It surprises me and doesn’t match my observations, but there at least one element to take into account: weather. There’s a reason the California car is treasured. Snow and the salt used to fight it is really corrosive to cars in Denmark.

BTW, this has changed with many brands about 15 years ago. Cars made until that tend to disappear from traffic due to corrosion. In around 2000, it became common to galvanize the steel bodies of cars.

Renault actually advertised this at the time: "will rust like a fish", with a picture of a car immersed in water. Seems to be legitimate: corrosion problems have become much more rare.

>"(the 180% tax is absolutely real - I've paid it)"

This statement requires a bit more detail. It wasn't a flat tax rate, it was graduated, so below a certain price, there was a lower rate (105% IIRC), to incentivize smaller cheaper cars, and as a luxury tax on expensive vehicles.

As it is now, the rate is 85% below ~190K DKK and 150% of the value above that. The cutover has been steadily going up over a couple of years now.

So no, it has not ever been a flat 180%, as some people like to claim. It's still high, but there are tons of cars out there that don't hit the tax cutover point, even family cars.

Edit: And the rates are lower for motorcycles, hybrid cars and such.

All the Life cycle analysis I've seen (don't have the sources handy) have shown that the vast majority of an ICE's car's impact is from the fuel that is burned and not from production, usually around 80% driving and less than 20% production.

If you look at page 29 of this LCA by Audi, you can see that they show an ICE car's impact at about 20% manufacturing, 80% usage, and around 1% recycling at the end of life:

https://www.audi.com/content/dam/com/EN/corporate-responsibi...

When the factories and steel production run on green power that 20% will drop very low.

The problem is that the fossil fuel lobby has been exceptionally successful in putting the transition back by 30 years. Had they expended the same energy pivoting to green power then we'd be having a totally different discussion now.

Mmmhh, Audi is Volkswagen (and Audi's cars were involved as well in the emissions scandal), so I'm kind of sceptic about their credibility (meaning "let's not forget too quickly").

As they have as well a direct interest in saying "buying new/our cars isn't that harmful as you think", their doc makes me even more sceptic... :)

There are many other LCA studies, go find them. They all say similar things, and it makes sense when you think about how many gallons of gasoline or diesel a car can burn over its useful life (15-20 years).

Yep, I can agree with that :)

> If you're replacing cars every 3 years like an average westerner, given the age of cars I see on the road, you are doing extreme harm.

Those 3 year old cars aren't just scrapped, the used car market is much larger than the new car market.

That would be fine except that cars release poison into the air, old cars especially. Eventually banning ICE cars is an essential public health measure.

That's a shame because there are some remarkable cars, both modern and classic, that will no longer be able to drive on the roads if we ban all ICE.

It would be the equivalent of banning steam engines, which although no longer in normal use, are still running as tourist attractions and remarkable pieces of engineering that are fantastic to see and experience.

I think this policy would ban new sales, not outright ban all old cars.

Both policies exist actually. For instance old cars and motorcycles are getting banned in Paris (outside of weekends IIRC). Even if as the grandparent points out making a new car generates a lot of pollution at least it would reduce the more local problem of having a heavy smog on windless days (and all the health issues that go along with it).

Banning old cars from inner-city driving is a nessesity. With how densly cities pack both cars and buildings, suspended particulate matter is a serious public health risk. But we can still allow them everywhere else where we aren't already struggling with keeping particluate levels at a reasonably safe level.

No real need to ban old cars, they tend to quickly phase out on their own. Heck, the state I live in has uninstalled all the expensive dyno equipment they used for pre-OBD2 cars because there just aren't enough left on the road to justify maintaining the test. They still sniff, because that's cheap, but not on a dyno.

Given that we still allow horses and Model T's on the roads (aside from freeways, due to inability of century-old cars to maintain that speed), I can't imagine why we'd bother banning them. The nostalgia is nice and their impact is negligible.

The irony is that the state that loves to pat itself on its back for being so environmentally conscious is also that last state where you could buy leaded gas in the U.S.

California: 1992.

Ya I'm visiting my mum in a rural area and I went for a jog today and I couldn't believe how bad the exhausts were that drove past me. I don't think they'd pass the emissions test in the city I'm from.

>If you're replacing cars every 3 years like an average westerner, given the age of cars I see on the road, you are doing extreme harm.

Do you have any sources for this claim? I think I only know of a single person who changes cars in 3 years due to leases and only did it once.

According to the US government the average age is 11, almost 12 years.[1]

[1]https://www.bts.gov/content/average-age-automobiles-and-truc...

This is why I consider my 1990 Volvo a comparatively environmentally friendly car. Very reliable and much cheaper to maintain and repair than a new electronics laden alternative.

However, it's not great for local air quality.

If you live in the countryside and rarely visit towns, it's a reasonable choice. If you regularly drive slowly through a city, it's awful!

My 1995 Volvo 940 Wagon (Estate for you EU?) is probably the best car I've ever purchased. It's comfortable, reliable, easy to work on and doesn't drink that much gasoline. I've had new cars, old cars, fast cars, slow cars, and the Volvo is seriously my favorite. Purchased for $800 a year ago and immediately drove across the USA with it. Only issue was a short in the tail lights. :) Maybe I shouldn't be sharing this information.. I don't need them to become expensive!

But you do. An increase in price means your car's resale value will go up.

Ironically, a big reason people buy new cars is because their old one failed emissions screening, and wasn't economical to repair.

I always wonder at this. I've seen those expensive repair bills and they're usually expensive relative to the value of the car to be repaired, but they're cheap relative to the cost of a brand new car.

You can get a loan for a new car, you can't get a loan for repairs. If you manage money well this is rarely a problem, but if you don't then you have no savings to pay for the repairs. The other problem with repair is what else is wrong and what will that cost to repair.

I've been told that there are people who trade their cars in when the tires are worn out - it kicks the payments down the road a month (they have to budget next month lower than this month, but it doesn't use cash they don't have) Remember, nearly anyone can get a car loan no matter how bad their credit is. Even a credit card has higher standards. Since we are talking about people who are bad with money it is at least believable.

My experience has been exactly the opposite. Everyone I know who trades out cars every year or so does it because they want the latest and greatest, or just something new and different, not because they can't afford to repair it. The people I know who have more limited means tend to drive their cars until the wheels fall off, and they are pretty familiar with their mechanic. I'm a little too impatient for that myself, I have a fairly low threshold of 'how many is too many repairs' before I dump a car and get something with less hassle.

Just went through this calculating a few months ago.

Had a 14 year old car... 225k miles on it... a couple years ago had put in $1k or so, but the last 18 month had put in less than $500 in repairs (tires, oil changes, some other issues).

However, there was an oil leak, and some damage to front-end suspension. Oil leak had been going on for a while, but getting worse. Finding it would have meant taking the engine apart, and the front-end stuff was also expensive. Even without the engine leak, I was looking at probably $1500 to get this to pass inspection this year, and... there's no guarantee that all the fixes wouldn't have left me with something with a broken transmission that needed an overhaul or replacement. Fixing it all would probably have been north of $3k to feel good that it would be road worthy for at least another few years.

As much as a I hate change, I bit the bullet, and got a 'newer' car for $11k. 'used' but still relatively new (2016) and it's far more fuel efficient - getting around 40mpg vs the 25 I was getting before. The fuel efficiency won't totally make up for the entire diff in fixing vs replacing, but I have something that's more modern, more comfortable, gets better mileage and better safety features. The 'brand new car' comparison - yeah, but loads of people are fine getting a 'lightly used' car vs 'brand new'.

A friend went through similar decision within 10 days of my process, and he ended up getting a lightly used car (2017?) but it was $21k - I just can't bring myself to pay that type of money for a car right now. I was looking sub $10k; my wife pushed me to go a little higher.

Which is why the "Cash for Clunkers" program was a giant environmental disaster. There's no way the fuel efficiency gains made up for the fuel burned manufacturing the car.

I think the motivation was reducing pollution. A small minority of badly running cars emit most of the particulate and nitrogen oxide pollution. In certain areas like Los Angeles in the 1980s, smog (caused by nitrogen oxides) was killing people, and removing a few clunkers made a significant difference.

I recall the motivation was improving fuel efficiency.

"intended to provide economic incentives to U.S. residents to purchase a new, more fuel-efficient vehicle when trading in a less fuel-efficient vehicle."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car_Allowance_Rebate_System

I think part of the motivation was preventing open rebellion by a hurting voter base. Those were bad years.

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