Swiss Young Greens to Ban 4x4s from Switzerland

Today we received welcome news from our friends in the Swiss Young Greens, who are gaining support for a federal popular initiative to ban large heavy and polluting luxury 4x4s from the Swiss market.

In Swiss law, Swiss citizens can freely form an association and propose a modification to the Swiss Federal Constitution. The association collects signatures of Swiss citizens who support the proposal. If the Initiative collects 100,000 valid signatures the proposal is voted by the whole population of Switzerland. If accepted by the People, the Government must enforce the legislative change.

According to Vincent Rossi, about 150,000 signatures have been collected so far. The vote could occur in 2010.

With this large success, the Young Greens have surprised the Swiss political scene and reactivate the debate on consumers' 'freedom to pollute'.

Technically, the Initiative requires all vehicles that are too dangerous or too polluting to be banned from sale in Switzerland. Existing vehicles can still be used, but with limited speed. "Too dangerous" means too heavy or with a too high a front end. "Too much polluting" means emitting too much CO2 or fine particles. Swiss and international studies demonstrate the relevance of these criteria.

The Young Greens have set thresholds for private cars in order to especially target SUVs and powerful roadsters: 250 gCO2/km and 2.5 mg PM10/km. Half of the SUVs sold in Switzerland would be hit, while only 6% of the family cars would. A 'light or ecological' car emits about 100 gCO2/km. A large SUV can reach 400 gCO2/km.

New Health Warnings on Car Ads

Lib Dem MEP Chris Davies and the EU Environmental Committee have started a move that may see 20% of all car ads covered with health warnings similar to the one pictured.

According to Mr. Davies, "I want to encourage a shift in consumer behaviour which will communicate to car manufacturers in a financial way that it's in their interests to reduce emissions. Manufacturers of high emission cars hate this idea."

Londoners can attest to the anger of car manufacturers when they hate an idea; Porsche recently ran an all out PR battle to have Ken Livingstone defeated when he threatened to charge their beloved gas guzzlers up to £25 per day.

Promotional material including magazines, newspapers and billboards posters for new cars must currently include CO2 and fuel consumption information, although many car manufacturers fail to comply. The European Commission is now being urged not only to enforce the existing regulations but also to extend the rules to cover television, radio and internet.

Should Greens Demand Higher Petrol Prices?

Often the green movement and transport NGOs lobby for higher petrol prices. They argue that the escalating prices at the gas pump will decrease car usage. Witness the reaction by Greenpeace in light of the petrol protests by the hauliers in 2003. They held reactive protests asking the government for higher petrol prices.

In the USA, where the price at the pump is rising, consumers are now turning their backs on large SUVs and demanding new hybrid and cross-over models. You could thus argue that the higher prices are a good thing, and should be used by central government as a blunt instrument for change in the transport sector.

However, a recent article in the Financial Times came across our desk. According to the article, the rising cost of oil has wiped out the benefits many African countries were expecting from western aid and debt relief over the past three years, according to new research by the International Energy Agency.

They reported: "Surveying 13 non-oil-producing African countries, including South Africa, Ghana, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Senegal, the IEA found that the increase in the cost of oil bought by the countries since 2004 was equivalent to 3 per cent of combined GDP. This was more than the sum of debt relief and aid received over the past three years by the countries, which have a combined population of 270m, of whom 104m live on less than $1 a day."

So, the increase in oil prices in the markets is having a much wider effect beyond the pumps. The rise has real social effects around the world.

The higher prices also stimulate an uncontrolled international gold rush towards mining ‘unconventional oil’ from dangerously toxic projects including tar sands and coal-to-liquid extractions as well as new policies promoting biofuels, which have the disastrous effect of hitting the poor much harder (food scarcity, higher food prices) than they hit us.

Therefore, pushing for low carbon cars is one of the most important measures we can take to manage oil consumption and help bring oil prices down again.