Driving ban sought for polluted German cities

[Kellanved]

BERLIN - Drivers in major German cities could be banned from the roads as a result of legal action being launched on Tuesday by an environmental group over diesel pollution which violates European Union limits.

European Union health laws say cities cannot have more than 50 micrograms of fine particle dust per square metre of air for more than 35 days a year. The Bavarian capital Munich has already logged its 36th day over this level in 2005.

Other German cities close to breaching the EU limit are Berlin, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Dortmund.

The lobby group German Environment Aid (DUH) announced it was taking legal action in Munich aimed at forcing the city to take measures to reduce levels of particle dust.

...
http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=52&story_id=18496&name=Driving+ban+sought+for+polluted+German+cities

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

1. If only we could get a bit of that here

[Kellanved]

2. Oh, I am all for car-free Sundays

Especially in cities like Berlin, which do have a reliable and cheap public transportation system with 100% coverage. Cities like Frankfurt and Munich would be ill-equipped for such a regulation.

It basically boils down to this: a few years ago, the German car industry had a fierce battle with the Federal Government about new pollution guidelines. The Federal Government got a lot of bad press for placing the domestic car industry off-sides by setting a dead line at 2008(at the time the only cars to fulfill the discussed limits were French).

Now, the whole thing has flipped: the EU has superseded the German Government, the limits are effective; in a complete flip-flop, the press is today blaming the Government for not forcing the car industry earlier.

Anyway: the driving ban is the cheap way out; a conservative idea. The right way to go would be mandatory pollution levels for all cars with no BS exceptions to protect the domestic industry - if the managers weren't dickheads relying on their influence, they would have switched the production to filtered diesels years ago anyway.

[One_Life_To_Give]

3. Outside of a Black Hole,

50 micrograms of matter in a volume of ZERO. Shouldn't be a problem.

[phantom power]

4. ???

can you run that by me again?

[One_Life_To_Give]

5. From the original article/post

From the original article
50 micrograms of fine particle dust per square metre of air

A square meter is 1 meter by 1 meter by zero thickness. Which gives a volume of 1 x 1 x 0 or zero volume. Now "Normal" matter takes up physical space.

Or more simply put the author of the article didn't know enough to recognize it or didn't care, that it should read 50 micrograms per Cubic Meter(Metre) of Air.

[phantom power]

7. Aha, I read right past that one!

It would make sense if we lived in flat-land.... :crazy:

[rfkrfk]

6. perhaps Honda could uncrush some of their EVs,

and sell them in Germany.
No tailpipe.
The high cost of gasoline in Germany, makes dealing with
battery wearout issues, more economically possible.