Here we go again. Another liberal misconception or more accurately a lie to laden us with more tax burdens and controls.  In this particular scenario they have made diesel cars the bad guy.

 

I bought my first VW diesel eight years ago so I could be environmentally friendly plus drive a car that is cheap like borscht to operate. I was happily achieving 5.4 l/100km combined and 4.8 on the highway. Gas operated equivalents were only getting 10.5 to 11.5. Quite a difference to say the least.

 

Then along comes the emissions testing scam by VW. And Fiat and Renault. VW was raked over the coals while the other two are being left completely alone. One has to wonder why? And if that’s the case, one has to also wonder just how deep this goes with Ford, GM and  Dodge Ram with their diesel trucks.

 

So in my mind I simply cannot figure out how in the hell a diesel car that burns half of the fuel of its gasoline counterpart is being harder on the environment. In Canada there are only 250 thousand of these vehicles on the road. Twice as many pickups that consume diesel and spew out garbage in much greater quantities as that of a diesel car are on the road and nobody is complaining. Add to that; semi tractors, delivery trucks, trains, jet planes. Yes jet planes burn kerosene that is just diesel with different additives. Construction equipment. These combined make diesel cars look like a drop in the bucket. Yet nobody, I mean nobody is complaining about those.

 

Here is another liberal misconception. That hybrid cars are better for the environment. This one has me rolling on the carpet laughing when I hear it. One day in the Costco parking lot I asked a lady what kind of mileage she got on her VW hybrid Jetta. She told me 600 kms to a tank. What?? My diesel gets over 700 and sometimes close to 800 depending on the type of driving I am doing. So in reality the hybrid is a sham when it comes to emissions as it’s burning more fuel than mine. Further research into this showed me that a Toyota Prius attains 5.7 l/100kms combined while my TDI was getting 5.4. So where is the advantage? Add to this the fact that the batteries require a huge “carbon footprint” to both manufacture and dispose of. In the end, a hybrid has a larger carbon footprint than a diesel car over its manufacturing, service and disposal life.

 

Notley’s Carbon Tax. Actually it is a User Fee allowing the Feds to rake in even more GST. Currently the Carbon Tax on diesel is more than it is on gasoline. So for those who think this is great, think again. You are burning twice as much fuel as a diesel and therefore paying much, much more Carbon Tax than someone driving a diesel car. Once again the governments are laughing all the way to the bank.

 

Then there is the electric car. This one makes me spit in anger. I will not bore you with the calculations, but I figured out how many KWH and oil equivalent it would take to power a Tesla over 100,000 miles as well as how may barrels of fuel it would take to fuel a VW diesel over the same life. The amounts were virtually the same. There was no carbon footprint reduction with the Tesla electric car. The fuel normally used to power a car would have to be used to generate the electricity anyway. Green electricity is not consumed in Canada other than on a very small scale. Ontario sells ALL of theirs to New York and Quebec at a loss and charges the cost of the infrastructure to Ontario rate payers who see no benefit. Calgary says that it uses wind power to run its C-Train. But in reality, largely conventional and some wind generated electricity is mixed on the grid so the C-Train is NOT running on wind power. It is running on a grid mainly supplied by coal and natural gas generation plants. Then of course with respect to the transmission of electricity, radiation losses are huge compared to what is generated so the conversion efficiency is just not there when charging an electric or hybrid.

 

The only way electric vehicles become environmentally friendly and affordable is when every house and business has a solar panel/battery system isolated from the grid for charging vehicles. You have to keep the governments out of the electricity business because they are in it only for the profit and not for the alleged environmental benefits. But they will use every argument and lie to the contrary to try and make us believe them. Liberals will believe them.