UK Government announce a ban on new petrol and diesel vehicles from 2040 to tackle pollution.
With a likely announcement of a £250m fund for councils to help tackle emissions, are we going about this the right way?
Clean air zones…
It is understood that grants will be used to invest in bus routes, make them cleaner and complex traffic control systems. This has not been proven to work anywhere yet. Additionally, no government will punish the drivers of diesel cars, thus the 23 year time scale to avoid a scrappage scheme.
CarLease UK’s Thoughts…
Air pollution accounts for about 40,000 premature deaths each year. Will this time scale achieve what we need? We don’t think so. The natural shift to smaller, electric cars is already happening faster than this timescale and it is accelerating as electric cars and hybrids get better ranges and more affordable.
The take up of hybrid and electric cars will bring prices down to petrol/diesel equivalents, emissions will fall quickly anyway and production will swing naturally away from petrol and diesel.
