Toyota Prius, transport, and the future.

In fear of derailing this thread into a general environmental thread, I did notice that MCN had a hydrogen fuel cell burgman in todays. Haven't yet had a chance to read the article, but it does show that its possible to do in bike sizes.

Originally Posted by fizzwheel

I dont own one. But my brother used to work at the local Toyota garage and had the pleasure of driving / servicing one.

His words

"utter sh8te" Like you say, heavy, when not on the batteries, the petrol engine has to be worked hard to keep up with traffic and thus the MPG is rubbish...

He reckoned and I agree, its more economical to buy a small diesel engined car that returns something like 60 odd mpg.

I might be wrong on this, but I dont think the batteries or the production of them that the Prius uses are paticularly "green" either.

My Toyota Avensis 2L diesel estate does better mpg than a friend's Prius, I'm pretty sure that the recycling rates will be much better for the Avensis as well.

Recall--------as a matter of interest caddy what have they said regarding your car?

I agree that the Co2 emissions created in building the car and scrapping one would be a lot higher for a battery/cell/engine powered car as against what we consider a conventional vehicle
Trying to find an alternative power source lower in Co2 is a different matter but why persecute the people who can't afford the new technology in favour of those who can. Cars have a life span and the will end up being scrapped naturally at some stage or another anyway.I'm no genius but i just don't get the thinking behind scrappage schemes considering the amounts of energy used and Co2 created in
producing hundreds of thousands of new cars
If the governments were honest and said that it was to generate employment I could understand that but they have bombarded us with the emissions theory

[yorkie_chris]

Originally Posted by Dicky Ticker

but they have bombarded us with the emissions theory

Just like the adverts saying cars are "the biggest single producer of CO2 emissions". Last figures I saw showed industrial use and power generation as about 4x the size of personal vehicles but I could be wrong.

[ophic]

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

Just like the adverts saying cars are "the biggest single producer of CO2 emissions". Last figures I saw showed industrial use and power generation as about 4x the size of personal vehicles but I could be wrong.

They probably subcategorise the industries into smaller sectors, just so that they can uphold that particular statement.

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

What was the cost of the car?

I would put money on the fact that you will lose more in capital costs and depreciation (and fuel!) than you will ever save in tax.

Oh and when your prius is out of warranty, god help you!

The car was £29,000, but it's a company car, so we only pay the tax, hence not caring.It can spontaneously combust and we don't pay for it. We get a different one every 3 years, but this is so cheap tax wise, we had an alfa and paid £300 a month more in tax than the prius.

[yorkie_chris]

The average person who has to put their hand in their pocket would be nuts to buy a prius, still!

£300 a month, that's mental, in my world that would be a new car every month

[Viney]

The reason that Hybrids are so 'Now' is that they fit in with the idealolgy that is the car and the way with live with it now. You get in, you drive, it runs out of petrol, you fill it up, and it has the added benefit of being 'green' when in town, without taking the production methods into account that is. Sparky cars are not liek this. Yes they are sutied to town and city driving and thats where most of them are. In london wall car park there are about 12 G-Whizz's!
The only fuel that will give us what we need in the way cars/Trucks/Busses etc are currently used, driven and appreciated is Hydrogen. It works like fuel as in you can fill up and continue your journey in a matter of minutes, not a 2-24 hour charge! The issue behind this is the collection of hydrogen. It is the most abundant thing in the universe, but 'harvesting' it is difficult but as far as im aware relativly harmless (Open to be corrected there please) So this is the technology that we need to invest in as it will keep the human races need for how it percives a car or motorised transport should be. But like all things, governments do not want to jump on any bandwagon. No matter what the human race does, it will be the wrong thing, plain and simple, there is always going to be a downside, it limiting this to be as least an environmental impact as it can be. It wont happen in our lifetime thats for sure, but hopefully we'll see the seedlings of this technology, or alternates before we depart this mortal coil, and lets hope the Hearse is Hydrogen powered

[the_lone_wolf]

Originally Posted by Viney

The issue behind this is the collection of hydrogen. It is the most abundant thing in the universe, but 'harvesting' it is difficult but as far as im aware relativly harmless (Open to be corrected there please)

Electrolysis is used to split water into oxygen and hydrogen gas, nothing particularly spectacular unless you're smoking a ciggie when the equipment starts leaking...

Viney is right, hydrogen is the key to continuing to operate motorized transport as we know it. Stuff like the Volt (and other 'plug in' hybrids) are an important step along the way, though. Yes, after a certain distance the Volt starts up its ICE to power the electric motors but for your mundane daily commute it'll run entirely off electricity. Yes, there's the issue of how that is generated but like I say, still an important step.