Quote:

"Following yesterday?s official launch of their 10-year initiative, Global Cool descended on Downing Street this afternoon to show Tony Blair and Environment Secretary David Miliband just what they?re about. Joining the Global Cool team as they presented to both MPs and business leaders were acclaimed singer/songwriter KT Tunstall and Hollywood actor Josh Hartnett, "


Josh Hartnett was interviewed by the BBC this morning, the following is an e-mail that I have sent to Global Cool based on what he said:

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Hello,

Firstly to say Global Cool is a great initiative, messages like switch the TV off at the wall etc are right on line. However saying things like *if you buy a Prius or a hybrid car it will save 3 tonnes of carbon* dilutes and detracts from these small though important actions that every one can take.

Not everyone is in a position to be selective about the car they drive however more fundamentally this assertion is simply untrue.

Firstly small turbo diesel cars like Toyota's own Yaris D4D, a Ford Focus etc contain as much as 50% less embedded carbon (carbon produced in manufacture and disposal) than a Prius and produce a comparably low amount of C02 in use. However more broadly from an automotive perspective carbon would be reduced more quickly if car production decreased therefore it would be much better if we all continued to drive our current vehicles until they simply stopped running. The maths on this are as follows:

[ [ The amount of carbon produced in manufacturing and disposing of a hybrid + the amount of carbon produced by a hybrid over it's life time ] -The amount of carbon my current car will produce over the same life time ] = The amount of carbon used or saved by buying a hybrid.

If the answer is is a positive figure then that is the amount of extra carbon produced by buying and running a hybrid, for most people the answer will be a positive figure.


I would be interested in you thoughts on this.



Regards.
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