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Banning non-Electric Vehicles
Recently, more and more cities and countries around the world have been talking about their environmental concerns for dealing with their air pollution. In many cases, the primary target is the automobile. Or more specifically, the internal combustion engine vehicle.
It’s no secret that cars are a contributing factor to air quality throughout the world. However, we also know they are not the only factor, but in this article, we are going to focus on the automobile.
According to the EPA, motor vehicles collectively, which includes cars, trucks, tractors, bulldozers, boats, trains, etc, cause 75 percent of carbon monoxide pollution, which accounts for about one-third of the air pollution that produces smog throughout the world. Transportation overall causes 27 percent of greenhouse gas emissions.
But there is evidence that suggests banning motor vehicles will improve the air quality of our cities and major metropolitan areas. In February 2020, during the outbreak of the Coronavirus in China, several major cities were put into home quarantine where citizens were not allowed to drive or go to work. This prevented the vast majority of cars from being used, and factories shut down. As a result, their air quality improved dramatically over the course of a few weeks.
Recently, several nations or cities have announced that they plan on banning all non-electric vehicles in the future.
In May of 2019, Amsterdam committed to banning all motor vehicles by 2030. They are taking a four-phased approach whereby 2020, diesel cars more than 15 years old will be banned from the city within the ring road surrounding the capital. By 2022, phase 2 will have public buses and coaches that emit exhaust will be banned from the city center. By 2025, phase 3 will have exhaust-emitting boats, mopeds…
