Meanwhile the Chinese are much more down to earth 

 

"Zero emissions" my leg!


Even if the electricity all came from renewables, there will have been loads of emissions during manufacture.

Nice Toy pickup!

Sparkingchip:

Meanwhile the Chinese are much more down to ear

The rear wheel drive would be a problem in climbing hills in snow ........ unless driving in reverse; but a useful vehicle.

Jaymack

Chris,   or just buy an old Land Rover,  very green..embedded carbon footprint is minima,   instead of this consumable.    older cars are greener because they are still here.  the fuel emissions are really low versus manufacturing emissions + shipping and all the other added emissions.   someone tell me I'm wrong....    PS    went to South Korea and the sky was brown.

According to this 11 year old article  they suggest

The carbon footprint of a new car:

6 tonnes CO2e: Citroen C1, basic spec

17 tonnes CO2e: Ford Mondeo, medium spec

35 tonnes CO2e: Land Rover Discovery, top of the range

Quite a large chunk, perhaps 5-10 tonnes comes from the way the steel is made, so improvements in steel-making help the case for cars as well.


Of course that was when quite a lot of our electricity was generated from coal, rather than gas and back then almost none was from wind or solar.

(reference )

Electric cars have a similar amount of steel, so are not really 'zero emission', just that has occurred before it was sold.


Also since then we know that the car makers have put a much greater emphasis on less wasteful manufacturing processes, and Landrover at least claim to have reduced embedded emissions by a third in the last decade.


Even so at 150grams per km, you do need to drive a long way, perhaps 60,000 km even in a small car before the break even point of emission from burning the fuel matching those already made in manufacture - so early "scrappage" schemes only make sense for very polluting vehicles.

Mike.