This is not going to be a documentary on how maximising compression ratios or ‘squish’ improves the burning levels within a combustion engine or the use of extra enormous catalytic converters to wash burnt exhaust gases before they arrive at our lungs.

This discussion is how a car manufacturer can become green, when it manufacturers engines.

Car engine makers, which is the best way to go green.

Broadly speaking, today, we can see three different approaches taken by manufacturers looking to become or be seen to be green, while still making an honest living.

  • They don’t make internal combustion engines, they only make electric models – and somehow avoid looking at the initial stages of the production of motor vehicle batteries and all their inherent mining and exotic material issues.
  • They lobby their own countries government, in Europe, and ‘adjust’ the time frame agreement which said all production of ICE vehicles would be stopped by data X and only electric vehicles would be produced (see option1.)
  • They keep making the engines, in their existing engine factory, but sell them to countries who haven’t yet signed up to an agreed move to electric only propulsion.

Now, looking at the options above you may decide that those manufacturers choosing route (3) are, in a way, cheating or going against the spirit of the thing.

You may think that the manufacturers taking route (2) and taking advantage of their huge employment levels and contribution to GDP (a countries overall profitability) to influence circumstances to their own advantage.

And, you may come to the conclusion that option (1) followers are being slightly deluded if they think the running cost, the ownership cost by the driver, is the only ‘green liability’ associated with the cars production.

We all have our own view.  Depending upon your country or origin, that may be :  Germanic, northern European, stand up Germany, who are running a route (2) programme and intend to continue to continue producing engines ‘ . . . as long as they run on sustainable fuels . . .’

The western European countries, France and Portugal, through the manufacturing plants associated with Renault are focusing on route (3). ‘. . . .lets keep making ICE engines, we can sell them to other countries . . . ‘

And then the Swedish, Volvo in this instance moving to a electric, battery only model.  Definitely on paper, the cleanest most planet friendly route.

So which is really the best?

If we all try to step back from the edge, the majority of motoring organisations, press and commentors are generally all of the opinion that the electric, battery only / charge at home or for half an hour at the side of the road, is a bit of a dead end.  The Betamax equivalent to the eventually sensible VHS for videos before DVD came along.

Progress. Is it real, is it expensive, is it better.

And while looking at that comparison, how long has DVD been the complete replacement for an old VHS tape.  If you look at sales figures, DVD didn’t surpass VHS until the early 2000’s.  If we say ‘2004’ then that is only 20 years. 

Currently, our chosen medium is live streaming, in the overall picture DVD could also been see as a flash in the pan, certainly when you compare it to the internal combustion engine, which has been around, honed and fine tunes for over 125 years.

Progress. But for who, especially if you spent hundreds of pounds on a VHS collection, then replaced it with a DVD collection, only to find that you can just download them.

As suggested in hundreds of automotive blogs and articles, surely the way forward is ‘going to be’ hydrogen, at some point in the next 10 years.  In which case the current drive for electric vehicles carting around a tonne of heavy batteries is looking like the Betamax contender and won’t even reach the dizzy heights of DVD acceptability.

The three main routes mentioned at the beginning of this article only go to show that there is more than one way to look at this problem / opportunity, and not all manufacturers are working in the same direction.

Governments need to stop reacting to ecological news feeds, and ecological campaigners need to, realistically, look at what advances the automotive industry have been able to make in the past 5 years. Think about what they could achieve if they were TOLD that the way forward was going to be Hydrogen.

Cars that can already run on it (see JCB conversions)

Easy / ready built supply points (petrol stations)

Reduced end to end emissions. Let me know which route you prefer.  Whoever guesses the right answer and gets a product to market first – that can be marketed, will win the real race.