If you REALLY want to be concerned about engine emissions in Australia then consider how we handle regulation.
Please permit me to take this discussion off track for a moment and look to the wider picture.
Earlier this year there was public consultation about moving to Euro 6 - the 2015 EU standard. The AU public consultation process would not deliver a decision for a year So that means we would be 3 years behind world’s best – at the very least.
I think part of the reason is that the study is being run under 3 different Ministers. That’s crazy that that something as important as car emissions has no one clear Department taking responsibility.
What they found out about VW would never have been caught in AU. The Department of Environment insists on this passive, “risk based” approach despite being severely criticized in two Auditor General reports and a Royal Commission.
Not only are we slow to adopt world’s best practice, but we let a lot of engines through the cracks. The public consultation dismissed regulating motorbikes based on a guess that they are clean because of overseas standards and they are small. Well 12 minutes of research shows that motorcycles that meet the old international standards have more emissions than a Hummer. Au motorcycles, especially two strokes are far far worse.
And let’s not forget two stroke garden equipment. A brush cutter has 10 times the emissions of a car, a lawn mower 40 times. And there are plenty of them: we buy around 1m cares p.a and 1.4 million pieces of garden equipment. The USA regulated these engines 19 years ago and since then the rest of the world including even India and China. Australia? Bureaucrats have been stuffing around with this since before 2005 – 11 years! Watch this space.
Again: I apologise to the original poster for taking the VW issue on such a diversion – but sometimes it’s good to put an issue within the broader perspective. I hope this was of interest to the community.
Gary
