UK Government reportedly considering increasing tax on Diesel; MPs call for scrappage scheme

[Morgen]

[QUOTE]A Conservative MP has joined fuel campaigners to demand the Government introduce a scrappage scheme for diesel cars amid fears that Ministers are considering increasing taxes on motorists.

Jason McCartney, The RAC and Fair Fuel UK have warned it would be unfair to increase tax on those driving diesel cars in a bid to cut nitrogen oxide pollution, after previous Governments encouraged families and businesses to swap their petrol cars for low-carbon alternatives.

Howard Cox, the founder of Fair Fuel UK, accused the Treasury of attempting to "fleece" hardworking people by charging them more and added that a scrappage scheme would cut emissions fairly.

It follows remarks by Patrick McLoughlin, the Government's Transport Secretary, suggesting George Osborne could look at increasing diesel taxes or cutting back on schemes that encourage people to buy diesel cars.
...
Mr McCartney said: "I would be very concerned about a knee jerk tax rise on diesel and I am very well aware that the heart of our UK economy is driven by diesel, so jobs would definitely be at risk if the price was increased.

"I would certainly like to see some kind of well thought out and innovative diesel scrappage scheme so that we can have a sensible and responsible debate about how to incentivise owners of dirty engines to transfer to cleaner ones."

A scrappage scheme would allow motorists to trade in their diesel vehicles for alternative cars at a lower cost, funded by the Government.

The idea has the backing of the former Mayor of London Boris Johnson and current Mayor Sadiq Khan, as well as a number of influential MPs, but Ministers are not supportive.
...
"Gordon Brown in 2001, on the advice of the EU, lowered the duty on diesel because it was considered a greener fuel than petrol.

"50% of UK consumers swapped over to oil burning cars and that single policy decision drastically changed the quality of the UK’s air in a single decade.

"Why should these good intentioned drivers be penalised by a Government blunder? It would be an injustice if these drivers were penalised for their gaffe.”

A Government spokesman said: "A national scrappage scheme cannot guarantee reducing emissions as effectively as these other measures, because air quality issues are often localised and can be managed in other ways.”
[/QUOTE]
[URL="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/08/mps-and-campaigners-call-for-diesel-scrappage-scheme-amid-concer/"]Source[/URL]

Personally I think the scrappage scheme would be the best way to go, so people don't get taxed to the point they can't afford to drive and aren't able to afford something cleaner. BEVs and maybe PHEVs need incentives though.

[LineArc]

What I have a hard time understanding is the older pre-emission diesels typically get DOUBLE the fuel mileage of the new ones (at least with the pickups in Canada).

So on one hand, the new vehicles polute less, on the other hand they use more fuel? Nothing really becomes of it?

And making new vehicles isnt exactly the cleanest process in itself, keeping old ones on the road with proper maintenance would be the best route... but most A-B commuters just want to turn the key and thats it.

[Morgen]

[QUOTE=Valon Kyre;50480706]What I have a hard time understanding is the older pre-emission diesels typically get DOUBLE the fuel mileage of the new ones (at least with the pickups in Canada).

So on one hand, the new vehicles polute less, on the other hand they use more fuel? Nothing really becomes of it?

And making new vehicles isnt exactly the cleanest process in itself, keeping old ones on the road with proper maintenance would be the best route... but most A-B commuters just want to turn the key and thats it.[/QUOTE]

It depends on the method you use to clean the NOx from the exhaust emissions. There's NOx traps which soak up nitrogen, then get fuel injected into them and the NOx and fuel react to create benign substances. This reduces your MPG, and it was the method that VW used, and ended up disabling in normal conditions due to the negative impacts it has on MPG and performance.

The alternative method is Urea injection into the exhaust gasses, which cleans out most of the NOx, and doesn't have a big impact on MPG or performance. But the reaction to manufacture the additive does emit CO2 as a byproduct, and you need to refill the Urea tank.

[sb27]

[QUOTE=Valon Kyre;50480706]What I have a hard time understanding is the older pre-emission diesels typically get DOUBLE the fuel mileage of the new ones (at least with the pickups in Canada).

So on one hand, the new vehicles polute less, on the other hand they use more fuel? Nothing really becomes of it?

And making new vehicles isnt exactly the cleanest process in itself, keeping old ones on the road with proper maintenance would be the best route... but most A-B commuters just want to turn the key and thats it.[/QUOTE]

Harmful emissions and fuel consumption only have a very loose correlation. Take any economy kind of hatchback from the 70's, and chances are that it will be more harmful in terms of emissions than a large sedan with a V6 made today. Although that large sedan will typically use much more fuel.

Emissions per litre of fuel consumed have dropped dramatically, but fuel consumption per distance travelled has not necessarily dropped (but we are starting to see that in the past decade).

[JennyC6]

Scrappage schemes are asinine and should be banned on the world stage for all the environmental hell they cause. Perfectly good cars being scrapped, in and of itself, creates a disaster at the scrapyards and causes shittons of greenhouse gas emissions during the recycling process, then there's building, shipping the new car. New resource mining. IT's greener to keep your old car running well than it is to scrap it and buy a new one.

[Morgen]

[QUOTE=TestECull;50480919]Scrappage schemes are asinine and should be banned on the world stage for all the environmental hell they cause. Perfectly good cars being scrapped, in and of itself, creates a disaster at the scrapyards and causes shittons of greenhouse gas emissions during the recycling process, then there's building, shipping the new car. New resource mining. IT's greener to keep your old car running well than it is to scrap it and buy a new one.[/QUOTE]

Probably gonna end up being scrapped anyway if people can't afford to run them. People without the money to buy a new car will just end up sticking with what they have and not being able to afford a cleaner one because they are paying so much for fuel. Then when the car has been run into the ground they have to buy some shitty old banger that's just as bad because they couldn't afford to save up much with the increased fuel prices.

Plus the issue isn't greenhouse gasses here, it's NOx emissions that impact people's health.

[editline]9th June 2016[/editline]

If a scrappage scheme encouraged you to buy an full electric car or even a PHEV then a scrappage scheme that got NOx producing vehicles off the road ASAP, at the cost of a small increase in CO2 emissions for the transition it might be better in the long run. A Tesla Model S offsets it's production emissions after about 10,000 miles based on the US electric grid. The UK grid is probably about the same.