Angry in the Great White North

When buying a car, concentrate on fuel economy to protect the environment.

That is advice given by Liberal MP Garth Turner in his 2006 edition of the Citizen's Guide to a Better Environment.

With that advice in mind, let us consider Garth Turner as an example of a citizen acting to better the environment.

Here is a picture, taken today, of Garth Turner's election vehicle:

Go ahead.  Click to enlarge it.  A Mercedes-Benz ML SUV can only be appreciate in the large.

So which sort of ML is it?  I asked and one well informed Mercedes-Benz aficionado told me that it is either a 2002-2003 ML320 or a 2003-2004 ML350.

As it turns out, it doesn't matter.  The US government Fuel Economy site ranks all these models the same (2002 ML320, 2003 ML320, 2003 ML350, and 2004 ML350).

• MPG (city): 14
• MPG (highway): 17
• MPG (combined): 15
• Annual GHG Emissions: 12.2 tons
• EPA Pollution Score: 0 out of 10

Well, that stinks.  Literally.

So I went to Google Maps to get a sense of the driving required to fight a campaign in Halton.  The riding of Halton encompasses Burlington, Oakville, Acton, and Milton.  To do a full circle, using the quickest path by road, you have to drive 118 km, taking about 1h45m if you obey the speed limits.

Let's say you do the circle once every 5 days.  Over a 37 day campaign, that means 7 trips around, or 826 km.  Actually, I'm probably underestimating the driving, because the path taken will be more star-like instead of a circle -- visit a portion of the riding, return home, visit another portion, return home, and so on.

But let's keep to the circle.  Consider it a lower limit.

So using the combined mileage of 15 mpg, which is equal to 6.4 km/l, we can estimate that the election will burn through no less than 130 liters of gas over the course of the election.

Compare that with my 2007 Ford Focus. 

• MPG (combined): 23
• Annual GHG emissions: 8 tons
• EPA Pollution Score: 6 out of 10

Using my Ford Focus, I'd go through 84 liters of gas if I was driving circles through Halton during the campaign.

Fortunately, I concentrated on fuel economy when purchasing my car, and so I'm doing my part to protect the environment.

Unfortunately others, who are forced into a situation where they have to do a lot of flying or a lot of driving, have not concentrated on fuel economy, and are instead flying 30-year-old aircraft, or driving massive SUVs.

That's unfortunate.  It rather undermines all the criticism they seem compelled to aim at the rest of us, whether we like to hear it or not, about how we ought to be doing more to protect the environment, including paying higher taxes.

How about people who drive big foreign-made SUVs pay the carbon tax, and the rest of us whose cars rank so well in GHG emissions and pollution scores are allowed to take a pass?