Lock Down Exposes Diesel Ban Folly As Air Quality Fails To Improve …Other Factors In Play

Cars are not as dirty as claimed.

Once again we find in Germany another article reporting how pollution from diesel cars has been massively over-hyped. Despite a massive reduction in car traffic due to the COVID-19 lock down, nitrogen oxide levels still remain high, reports German weekly FOCUS here. The air is no cleaner than before the lock down.

This virtually disproves the basis of the diesel bans that environmentalists have been hotly pursuing across over the recent months. The diesel engine, they told us, was the primary source of fine particle pollution in German cities and that it was high time to ban them. This prompted activist city administrations to plan action against cars in cities. Diesel emissions, they said, were causing millions to die prematurely.

The science, they claimed, told us there was no choice. COVID-19 has since exposed that claim to be fake.

That’s no surprise because for months skeptics accused officials of relying on dubious data and studies on which to base the bans. But they were ignored. Now the skeptics feel vindicated.

Air quality has not improved

FOCUS reports: “According to a random evaluation of air quality data from the Federal Environment Agency (UBA) over the past ten weeks by the news magazine FOCUS, nitrogen oxide levels at Stuttgart’s Neckartor and Landshuter Allee in Munich, for example, initially decreased gradually after the corona shutdown on 23 March, but then rose again.”

“Ban is off the table”

Steffen Bilger (CDU), Parliamentary State Secretary to the Federal Minister of Transport, told FOCUS: “In my view, the subject of diesel driving bans is finally off the table. Why the nitrogen oxide levels are not falling despite the rapid decline in traffic raises questions that the responsible environmental authorities must clarify.”

Environment Ministry (unwittingly) concedes other factors 

Yet the UBA Environment Office continues to back diesel vehicle bans, pointing out that wind, temperatures, and precipitation also have an effect on air quality and that the period of time is still too short to assess the effects of the shutdown.

Nice to see for once that a Ministry finally realizes there are more factors at play other than just CO2 and cars.




8 responses to “Lock Down Exposes Diesel Ban Folly As Air Quality Fails To Improve …Other Factors In Play”

  1. Georg Thomas

    Let’s not forget: before the Administrative Court in Leipzig — in an act of political justice — allowed the bans, the evidence clearly showed that the hype was just that.

    I seem to remember, in a rare show of civil courage among the elite, a number of German pulmonologists pointed out the sham.

    https://www.wa.de/nordrhein-westfalen/lungenspezialisten-widersprechen-who-fahrverbote-sind-voelliger-unsinn-11439762.html

    But in Germany, the government has chosen its people (in an allusion to B. Brecht), a people that defends the government from any criticism, even if they get their favourite toy taken away – that’s Germany. The German automobile industry did not even have the courage to challenge the nonsensical bans.

    Same gullibility during the corona crisis.

    Germans have lost the ability for rational self-control and any sense of caution vis-à-vis the actions of the state.

    We have got a government that cannot do anything wrong.

    The people are policing the public reception of government propaganda, attacking anyone who dares to differ with the powers-that-be.

  2. Ric Werme

    “The diesel engine, they told us, was the primary source of fine particle pollution.”

    Then the post goes off and talks about NOx. Germany must have a really, really, really strict limit on particle size.

  3. John F. Hultquist

    When walking past a diesel or gasoline engine, I tend go for a prior deep breath and then hold until beyond the plume. The size and age of the machine will be important. I still have a 1980 Chevy pickup truck. The one with the dangerous “saddle bag” gas tanks.

  4. drumphish

    Rudolf Diesel would be shaking his head in disgust and despair.

    Use peanut and/or vegetable oil, the original Diesel fuels, you will be okay.

    Rudolf invented the Diesel engine so farmers could grow fuel, not buy it.

    Using steam to power the tractor became obsolete.

    Can’t really be in denial of real progress.

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