Quote:
Originally Posted by euromodder
A Euro 1 car (the EU standard as of July 1992) is 3 to 5 times more pollutant per gallon than a current Euro 5 car in terms of HC, NOx, and CO .
The older stuff is almost off the scale in comparison.
So, keeping a 1964 car on the road is not exactly better environmentally.
It only gets worse as more miles are put on such ancient vehicles.
What is gained by not having to produce a new car, is quickly lost by the excessive pollution caused by an old banger.
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12 years ago the energy used to create a "car" was equal to 5 years of operation of said car (other older studies said 30 years), however like most things the studies left out a lot of the how did we get the steel to process types of calculations out of their study. Also not mentioned was the assumption of 18mpg and 12,000 miles per year driving in the newer study.
Also not mentioned was the type and QTY of pollution emitted by making steel, plastics, etc, etc.
Production level pollution is typically not measured in the smogger style that we associate with cars.
If I had to venture an educated guess, if you are looking at the type of pollution left from mining (which is hard to quanitfy in car terms) refining and forging steel, zinc coating and galvanizing, I would say a car doesn't emit those type of pollutants in levels significant enough to compare in day to day operations.
AKA you could probably drive a car 50 years and not emit the same pollution Erin Brochoviches chromate circles had. Even in terms of NOX, sulphur, etc I think you would be hard pressed to make as much as the coke in the forge emits.
Hard to prove without real analysis and real numbers though (and as of yet I have never seen anything that comes close to stating true cradle to grave without gaping holes and BS)
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