Talk about killing the monster that you once created yourself! Germany, the home of world’s top of the line automobiles and world’s fourth largest market, is now looking to ban all the internal combustion engines and bring only zero-emission cars on the roads by 2030.
German legislative body, Bundesrat has signed on a bi-partisan agreement aiming to ban internal combustion cars altogether, and also wants it to enforce the pact on the European Union. For now, the regulation holds little practical effect, but as we all have seen over the years, that German regulations have a greater effect on EU and UNECE regulations than any other country.
Greens party lawmaker Oliver Krischner talked about the pact while referring to other international agreements:
“If the Paris agreement to curb climate-warming emissions is to be taken seriously, no new combustion engine cars should be allowed on roads after 2030.”
Here is the extract from the EU Commission resolution,
“Review the current practices of taxation and dues with regard to a stimulation of emission-free mobility. A tougher tax burden on manufacturers could encourage them build and promote electric vehicles and other alternative energy sooner.”
Mainly due to the increased awareness, EU has seen a considerable drop in the sale of diesel cars this year. Just in the last month, Germany’s sales decreased by 5 percent, while France recorded a drop of 5.8 percent in the month of August. The Netherlands saw a whopping drop of 12.9 percent, and all this happened even before the presentation of the pact.
It is an irony that the European Union is pushing for the banning of diesel engines, as the member countries are usually credited with inventing the concept in the first place. The first ICE experiments were with ICEs were completed by physicist Christian Huygens in 1680, who hailed from the Netherlands. Then in 1859 French engineer J. J. Etienne Lenoir was able to create a continuous cycle spark-ignition engine, and in 1878, German Nikolaus Otto was successful in inventing the first successful four-stoke engine based on the “Otto cycle”.
The push for the ban has come at a time when countries like the United States have 797 motor vehicles per 1,000 people. If you think this is a large ratio, the tiny nation of San Marino had 1,263 cars per 1,000 residents in 2014; which are more cars than the residents of the country!
Over 92 percent of the energy in US transportation comes from diesel fuels, and considering the destructive effects of the technology the move is in line with the demands of global climate and pollution check.
Do you think this eventual ban will change the automobile industry for good? Comment below!
