Tyre Extinguishers target SUVs on home turf of the ‘Chelsea Tractor’

A hybrid or electric SUV is a SUV.  Too many TLAs but do you mean an ICE SUV?

(And yes - I did see this and was momentarily surprised.)

Well it says 'hybrid and electric cars'...so not even SUVs....just vehicles in general that use precious earths.... I wonder if I should start an anarcho-syndicalist movement targeting housing with less than an EPC rating of B?  They certain emit more CO2 than my car which is parked 25 days a month... 

Seems entirely legit.

If you just target expensive houses road.cc might even give you some coverage.

Chris Hayes wrote:

Looking at their rudimentary website it seems that it's not just SUVs they are targetting: 

"Hybrids and electric cars are fair game. We cannot electrify our way out of the climate crisis - there are not enough rare earth metals to replace everyone’s car and the mining of these metals causes suffering. Plus, the danger to other road users still stands, as does the air pollution (PM 2.5 pollution is still produced from tyres and brake pads)."

That's the elephant in the room with EVs - how do we recycle the batteries when they lose their effectiveness?

https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/recycling-will-be-key-to-the-electric-vehicle-future/

hawkinspeter wrote:

"Hybrids and electric cars are fair game. We cannot electrify our way out of the climate crisis - there are not enough rare earth metals to replace everyone’s car and the mining of these metals causes suffering. Plus, the danger to other road users still stands, as does the air pollution (PM 2.5 pollution is still produced from tyres and brake pads)."

That's the elephant in the room with EVs - how do we recycle the batteries when they lose their effectiveness?

[/quote]And the other elephant, congestion, which EVs will make worse.

eburtthebike wrote:

And the other elephant, congestion, which EVs will make worse.

Only if you think purely in terms of cars. E-scooters and e-bikes are also electric vehicles, but they should help with congestion. Also, as they are significantly smaller, the recycling problem is substantially reduced.

I've always thought that EVs are fine until everyone wants one....then you have grid issues.  The counter-argument is, of course, that EVs can sell energy back to the grid when not in use - and the batteries can be used in static power packs once they're no longer capable of powering a vehicle. But that's the future. 

We've been considering an EV for a while now (well, a Tesla as no one else has a supercharger network), but our driving patterns - long infrequent journeys with a car full of weekend and holiday acoutrements - don't really lend themselves to it....

We're in exactly the same boat.  Barely any use for a car during the week apart from emergency school runs, 40 weekends a year need 4 seat kid transporter, 10 weekends a year we need a Estate/SUV class boot space to transport 2 kids and 2 dogs 300 miles for various leisure and family occasions.

We currently have an ICE estate!

Exactly that...plus bikes, canoes, tents, etc. and the coffee machine when we go to France on holiday!  Just popped down to the garage to have a look around one of my neighbour's Tesla X.... they don't wear well....May as well run mine into the ground now...or until someone bans it. Or makes me put a sail on it. 

Nissan are reselling used batteries as home storage.

They can also be dissolved and then recycled apparently but I dread to think the chemicals involved in that.

Yep - in theory the older lead-acid were at least entirely recyclable.  Unfortunately - like most "mainstream" technologies - loss rates even in more "controlled" environments were significant and lead is not a good pollutant to deal with.  However although lithium is much nicer the recycling issue is not practical as yet and you still get some bonus heavy metals with them.

Trawling tech history a power "dead end" at the time was compressed air - used for both static power and motor vehicles.  There has been some experimental interest more recently.  Clear environmental win in that that aside from the tank and general vehicle materials the working fluid is available everywhere and environmentally innocuous.  The downside as usual is energy density.

joe9090 wrote:

Not enough road tax (sic)!

Compare whatever the annual vehichle duty in the UK is for a top of the line 3.0L Range Rover swankypanzer is to the taxation here in NL (Amsterdam for this car): drum roll...... 2520 euro per year. And fuel is of course taxed higher in NL.

Yep - we tax the bejezuz out of those fools. I would double it personally to 5k a year if I was in power. If they would be forced to pay that much tax just to drive to Harrods every now and then I am OK with it. 

This. If we can't stop people driving these monstrosities at least make them pay something towards the cost of the damage they are doing. Where I live a Range Rover seems to be the car that so many people aspire to, and not only the rich. I live in one of the cheaper neighbourhoods and yet the number of Range Rovers and other luxury cars I see parked on peoples drives is astounding, often with their houses in a state of disrepair. I recnetly noticed one run down house nearby with a Range Rover AND a Porshe Cayenne on the drive! What is wrong with these people?

My morning commute takes me through some of the less salubrious areas of town and I pass several houses like that.

I wonder if it's because money laundering regulations apply when you buy a hous but not when you buy a car?

Maybe they are levelling themselves up?  There were a few obviously more expensive cars round my old estate - not a "salubrious" place (though I didn't have any trouble aside from the dogshit, smells and noise.  I just stayed away from large collections of youths).

Oddly one or two didn't seem to be driving to an office, factory, restaurant, hospital or building site during the day - often mostly round the estate (WFH, that's how I know).  Never figured that out.

How many people actually buy a car these days? I thought at least 90% rent them - a way to achieve status.

We've always held onto a car until it is uneconomic to maintain and I hope the currrent car will be the last one we have.

I think those stats cover all purchases, leases, HP etc.

I have known a few people who didn't own a house or even rent but lived out of their vehicles if that's a helpful data point?  A Luton truck, a canal boat and a van if I recall.  I seriously dobut any of them were in the target market for SUVs though.

My neighbour opposite has those cars out front, it's probably the cheapest street in the area. The daughter doesn't possess a winter coat and wears plimsolls like we did in the 80s. Priorities completely wrong

Pyro Tim wrote:

My neighbour opposite has those cars out front, it's probably the cheapest street in the area. The daughter doesn't possess a winter coat and wears plimsolls like we did in the 80s. Priorities completely wrong

Well, they wouldn't spend so much on advertising if it didn't work

Maybe - but maybe not entirely.  Because "fake it before you make it" sometimes applies to humans.  Recall Primo Levi's "The Truce":

Wikipedia wrote:

Levi himself reminisces a bit about a character in the book in his The Paris Review interview: "Have you read my book The Reawakening? You remember Mordo Nahum? I had mixed feelings toward him. I admired him as a man fit for every situation. But of course he was very cruel to me. He despised me because I was not able to manage. I had no shoes. He told me, 'Remember, when there is war, the first thing is shoes, and second is eating. Because if you have shoes, then you can run and steal. But you must have shoes. [...]'

From Wikipedia reference here (part paywalled): https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1670/the-art-of-fiction-no-140-primo-levi

Pyro Tim wrote:

My neighbour opposite has those cars out front, it's probably the cheapest street in the area. The daughter doesn't possess a winter coat and wears plimsolls like we did in the 80s. Priorities completely wrong

joe9090 wrote:

......here in NL (Amsterdam for this car): drum roll...... 2520 euro per year. And fuel is of course taxed higher in NL.

So that's how they pay for the cycle lanes.

Some places believe they "pay for themselves" [1].  People are even keen on the numbers in reports compiled for the UK government.

The full picture of course is you only get the benefit if you have mass cycling.  That needs a functioning network of cycle infrastructure above a minimum quality.  Plus the means to safely leave / store bikes at either end.  That means more up-front cost than the UK government has ever shelled out for cycling.  It's just cheap (a net benefit) in comparison to what you get if you just put in motoring infrastructure.

hirsute wrote:

I think I'd be happy if they targeted this driver

Cycle only lane, pavement, live cable left over the pavement.

im shocked it has both wing mirrors still attached.  Really easy to wobble into them just there I'd have thought. 

nosferatu1001 wrote:

im shocked it has both wing mirrors still attached.  Really easy to wobble into them just there I'd have thought. 

Oh Nooo! That'd be private property damage!

**clutches pearls dramatically**

Pearls?!  To the scaffold!