Green Taxes

Cork

I started a thread last week on the "Green Boards" on environment taxes. But the response was small.

Should the government introduce green taxes on heating oil, petrol etc?

Should we aboloish motor tax and just add a levy to the cost of petrol.

This would be ceaper to collect and there ould be a zero % default rate.

These taxes would also raise money for the government to invest in Green Projects.

dathi1

Instead of trusting the government to spend more taxes or different taxes to tackle green issues they should revolutionise our approach to transport by introducing a zero tax on hybrid vehicles and biodiesel (Dublin bus etc). That would be a brilliant start. Then get Mitsui corporation or whoever to build an underground for Dublin and lease it to the state.

Villain

With the cost of a oil set to rise very high ($100 a barrel!) I don't think higher taxes would be very welcome. Instead of increases taxes on petrol etc, they should make public transport more accessible.

gandalf

A comprehensive, efficent, integrated public transport system is the key. Fast track (if you forgive the pun) building LUAS lines/Urban rail lines from all the major population centres feeding into Dublin (and Cork and Limerick) and get the underground built in Dublin. Zero taxes on Hybrid Cars and Bio-Diesel (forgot about that) as suggested above is a good idea as well.

If their was a decent public transport system a hell of alot of people (me included) would leave there car at home most of the time and only take it out for trips outside the city.

Cork

irish1 wrote:

With the cost of a oil set to rise very high ($100 a barrel!) I don't think higher taxes would be very welcome. Instead of increases taxes on petrol etc, they should make public transport more accessible.

But should motor tax be devised as a levy to be added to the cost of fuel?

Public transport is a disaster. I was talking to somebody who lives in the suburbs of Cork who works at the other side of the city. She has to get up very early to get 2 buses to work.

The alternative is to get taxis which are expensive - 5 days a week.

Intergrated transport is really needed.

The 15c plastic bag levy has zero cost in collection. I believe that a levy could be a good alternative to motor tax.

Villain

Cork wrote:

But should motor tax be devised as a levy to be added to the cost of fuel?

Public transport is a disaster. I was talking to somebody who lives in the suburbs of Cork who works at the other side of the city. She has to get up very early to get 2 buses to work.

The alternative is to get taxis which are expensive - 5 days a week.

Intergrated transport is really needed.

The 15c plastic bag levy has zero cost in collection. I believe that a levy could be a good alternative to motor tax.

Well I would be in favour of a levy if both motor tax and VRT were abolished, then basically you have a pay as you use system, i.e. the person who only drives a few thousand miles a year would pay a lot less than those who drive over 20,000 miles a year, whether they have a 1 litre or 2 litre car. That may be some incentive to people to carpool more or use public transport, but that alternative of public has to hugely increased.

Zombrex

Cork wrote:

The 15c plastic bag levy has zero cost in collection. I believe that a levy could be a good alternative to motor tax.

The problem is the government have to prove an alternative, and at the moment the public transport in Dublin brings people to tears. The Luas and bus lanes are a good start, but the buses still run late everyday, and the Luas only serves a small area.

We need at least another 5 Luas lines running into the city from the suburbs. We need a proper plan for inner city transport (underground, linked Luas lines, what ever), the idea that you hop off the Luas walk 15 minutes through the city centre and then get on a bus, Luas or Dart to finish your journy is beyond stupid.

But most importantly we need a government that stops f**king up our transport plans. And unfortunatly that is a very hard thing to come by in this country

is_that_so

Not 100% sure on the VRT removal but they should certainly find some way to take it off environmentally efficient cars like hybrids. That tax could be transferred to other types of vehicles.

AngelofFire

Carbon taxes should be introduced, people on lower incomes should compensated with special increases(ie seperate from normal increases) in the minimum wage, pensions, welfare etc.

madmorphy

If the government really gave a toss about the enviroment,gas gussling 4x4's and them L300 things would be taxed to the hilt,humvees would be banned.hybrid cars would be subject to no VRT thereby sending their sales through the roof and removing huge amounts of emmissions for the enviroment.
Any alleged "green tax" in this country is just that a tax,more revenue generation by the powers that be.

Cork

AngelofFire wrote:

Carbon taxes should be introduced, people on lower incomes should compensated with special increases(ie seperate from normal increases) in the minimum wage, pensions, welfare etc.

I agree. Like is is not crazy that an OAP(who does little driving) taxing their car. A levy on to the cost of petrol would be more equitable.

, then basically you have a pay as you use system,

Costs of collection would also be low.

But is it that local authorities are afraid - they'd loose a source of finance?

Sand

Actually, most of the cost of petrol at the pumps is tax already. It can be justified by the cost of enviromental pollution but it will not encourage alternative use unless there are alternatives.

The dormitory towns strung out as far as fricking Meath mean that Ireland is car-centric. Taxing people to the hilt wont change that. Public transport - in Dublin anyway - is inefficient, slow, dirty, often unpleasant due to tolerated loutish passengers and based on a hub system, that again encourages use of a car. If I want to travel from another town in North Kildare, 5 minutes away by car, I have to wait for a bus in to at least Lucan, then wait for another bus thats coming out from Dublin and take that back out again. What takes 5 minutes in car, a comftable, safe, warm trip with plenty of space for shopping etc takes the best part of an hour waiting in the cold for buses, surrounded by screaming kids and getting dropped off a good 15-20 minute walk from where you actually want to go. A friend of mine has it even worse, he has to travel to Tallaght every day - that requires a trip into the city center and out on buses each way every day on top of a nice long walk, instead of a 20-30 minute drive. Green taxes wont change that.

LUAS has been a mixed success. It has taken passengers from Dublin bus, not cars. AFAIK Dublin Bus are actually reviewing the sevice they will offer along the LUAS route in light of the fall in passengers. The arrival of the LUAS isnt much fricking good to anyone who doesnt already find the bus service adequate, seeing as its merely following already covered bus routes.

Dublin does need a good public transport system, but it needs to be more than merely an upgrade of existing routes. It needs to link the dormitory towns where everyone is moving to where everyone is working, where cars seem to be the only acceptable transport link. The level of commitment, planning and sheer money required means that hydrogen cell powered cars will already be prevalent by the time its up and running in any meaningful sense.

aodh_rua

Environmental taxes are only effective if they encourage people to take up alternatives. Since the availability of alternative energy sources and public transport is so woefully inadequate, levying green taxes will just serve to increase the exchequer tax take and persecute consumers who have no option but to pay up.

xonencentral

The EU has instructed all members states that;; as it is proposing carbon taxes and implimenting reduction strategy's and penalty's for fossil fuels for environmental reasons that members states can no longer justify non-standard rate VAT on fossil fuels, this means;
that Petrol, heating oil, ESB, etc, etc, etc will move from 13.5% to 21% standard rate VAT and the government will probably announce it on a Friday evening before a bank holiday just at the start of a 3 month dail holiday so we can't tell them what a bunch of *&)$£%ers they are.

And its worse in the UK, their fossil fuel VAT rate will go from 5% to 17.5%.

And EU VAT treaty was agreed years ago so no getting out of it.

On the green front, try www.surfacepower.com to stuff the ESB and at least a significant part of their bill, my friend won't shut up about this Irish company's DIY Wind Turbine since he bought 2 of them in Jan.

bonkey

Sand wrote:

The dormitory towns strung out as far as fricking Meath mean that Ireland is car-centric.

There's no shortage of reasons as to why Ireland is currently car-centric.

Ultimately, we have to just accept that this is how it currently is, and figure out how best to move on.

Taxing people to the hilt wont change that.

No disagreement from me there - unless the increase in taxation occurs simultaneously with the provision of a viable alternative. I've no objection to using further taxation as encouragement, but there's no point in using it as a stick to beat people with when there's nothing to drive them to (all puns intended).

LUAS has been a mixed success. It has taken passengers from Dublin bus, not cars.

It would be fair to say, perhaps, that it has taken more from Dublin Bus then from cars, as there are undoubtedly some car-drivers who have switched.

AFAIK Dublin Bus are actually reviewing the sevice they will offer along the LUAS route in light of the fall in passengers. The arrival of the LUAS isnt much fricking good to anyone who doesnt already find the bus service adequate, seeing as its merely following already covered bus routes.

Ah, but there could well be method to that madness.

I recall on the days when Dublin Bus didn't run for whatever reason, that there was often less congestion on the roads, because bus travellers didn't generally flock to their cars, but got lifts from those driving anyway, or walked/cycles etc. in large numbers. Sure...some drove, but the lack of buses and (IIRC) allowing the use of bus-lanes for traffic more than made up for it.

It is possible that replacing large numbers of buses with the LUAS (and, one would hope, local feeder imp-sized buses to drop you to the local LUAS to replace the fleets of double-deckers running along the primary routes of traffic could actually benefit the situation overall, by making the LUAS even more accessible, and reducing congestion. It may even be possible to provide good enough feeder services that more people would be convinced to move away from driving.

Lets not forget...LUAS was ultimately about transportation, not about environmental issues. Its not a bad start, IMHO, but it needs to be worked on, and re-structuring at least parts of the bus network around it could work. Or then again...maybe not. I've no idea whether or not the LUAS is already at capacity constantly throughout rush-hour anyway.

As for the hybrid cars...I'm all for 'em, but I did see an interesting article in SciAm a while back about a new engine GM were building where the car would fire on less cylinders when the energy wasn't needed. Now, granted, this was for the American Car [tm] which generally has massive engines, but they reckoned the overall environmental savings over 10 years or something from just replacing the conventional engine with the whatever-silly-name-they-gave-it new "smart" one in all new cars would equal the savings they'd make in the same time period from the replacement of conventional with hybrids or any new technology.

<edit>
I should have said in that last sentence "the savings they'd make in the same time period from the takeup in the new technology.

But this then begs the question...why do the hybrids get a tax break? OK - I understand that on a car-by-car basis against a big American Car running a big-but-smart engine, there's no denying its far superior, but shouldn't the incentive be set at an environmental rather than technological level? If Smart (say) were to produce a new ultra-tiny car, using an even cleaner and more efficient engine then at the moment, and this had comparable emissions to a larger hybrid....should it not too receive any "clean incentive", or avoid any "pollution tax" that the hybrid is?

And ultimately...isn't the whole point of these cars that they use so much less fuel? Doesn't that mean they have a lower running cost, and by purchasing one the owner is automatically avoiding large amounts of recurring government taxation on their fuel bill?

So don't these cars already have the necessary incentive? Is it not surely more a question of education and information, rather than of intervention?

jc

Sand

It is possible that replacing large numbers of buses with the LUAS (and, one would hope, local feeder imp-sized buses to drop you to the local LUAS to replace the fleets of double-deckers running along the primary routes of traffic could actually benefit the situation overall, by making the LUAS even more accessible, and reducing congestion. It may even be possible to provide good enough feeder services that more people would be convinced to move away from driving.

The LUAS is far too expensive to replace buses on a large scale. To be honest, whilst the LUAS is nice "flagship" project I think a similar level of transport could have been provided by simply reserving entire lanes of existing road for bus use, giving them right of way at all junctions and buying enough buses to ensure one arrives at any particular stop at least every 10-15 minutes.

And probably at a fraction of the cost, time required to set up, and with the ability to adjust easily to new routes if or when required.

I still struggle to comprehend the logic behind the decision to pave over Dublins previous tramlines rather than expanding them, or at the very, very least preserving them for future use.

But this then begs the question...why do the hybrids get a tax break? OK - I understand that on a car-by-car basis against a big American Car running a big-but-smart engine, there's no denying its far superior, but shouldn't the incentive be set at an environmental rather than technological level? If Smart (say) were to produce a new ultra-tiny car, using an even cleaner and more efficient engine then at the moment, and this had comparable emissions to a larger hybrid....should it not too receive any "clean incentive", or avoid any "pollution tax" that the hybrid is?

A possibility might to be do away with carbon taxes on petrol and tax break given to selected models of cars, and even the rather pointless road tax and simply impose tax on the amount of pollution the car produces - I.E. try to reward or punish the bottom line, enviroment damage, and encourage all forms of innovation in the reduction of pollution rather than simple fuel efficiency and certain approved technologies.

The drawback might be that it would be hard to implement - youd need to fit cars with some sort of "black box" that could accurately measure units of pollution being produced, and some fair means of collecting the tax. And seeing as the black box would be on the car its almost inevitable that some enterprising scallywags would find a way to subvert it.

Either way, I think if those concerns could be addressed it would be the way to go in taxing car pollution, rather than leaving tax incentives for new technologies in the hands of a bureacratic proccess that relies on almost godlike intelligence and information - and one that can easily be corrupted through bribery.

dathi1

So don't these cars already have the necessary incentive? Is it not surely more a question of education and information, rather than of intervention?

Yes the incentive on fuel savings are attractive. The Toyota prius does 55-60 mpg but costs 29,000 euro to buy. The biggest incentive would be lower the cost of Hybrids (Including 4X4 hybrids ) with tax breaks. In time the motor industry would respond (as its doing already) much faster as demand rises. The ultimate goal would be of course zero emission hydrogen fuel cell cars/ 4x4s etc.....not possible at the moment due to tech costs and producing Hydrogen from the sea...but some dissenters in the green movement seem to be moving towards 3 generation nuclear energy to solve that problem. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.02/nuclear.html
now all we need is the return of maglev

bonkey

dathi1 wrote:

The Toyota prius does 55-60 mpg

<aside>

Isn't it funny....

We buy our petrol in Litres.
We measure/post our distances and speed limits primarily in KM.
We still talk of mpg (as opposed to what I believe is the norm in Europe, which is litres-per-100-km)

jc

Blub2k4

Cork wrote:

I started a thread last week on the "Green Boards" on environment taxes. But the response was small.

Should the government introduce green taxes on heating oil, petrol etc?

Should we aboloish motor tax and just add a levy to the cost of petrol.

This would be ceaper to collect and there ould be a zero % default rate.

These taxes would also raise money for the government to invest in Green Projects.

I personally fail to see how imposing a tax on fuel will lead to any green benefits, in fact it is a very american thing to do and I dont see the benefit. You cannot pay for everything in this world, the only thing that will help is a reduction in fuel usage. On this island I envisage people saying well I'm paying for it so I'm going to get more value which is the opposite of what is intended. Surely all initiatives should be aimed at reducing usage of hydrocarbons and not paying for your usage?
THERE IS NO DIRECT LINK BETWEEN PAYING MORE FOR A FUEL AND ECO FRIENDLINESS.
It's a bit like the whole repak scheme, I'd rather hand my cardboard into a retailer and not take it home, but the retailer has a sign up that he has effectively already done his part by paying for a repak scheme, this makes money for someone but I still walk away from his shop with the recyclable materials, he has effectively payed for the privilege not to handle this green material with some scheme that I am never going to see directly in action.
Taxes dont = green, or can someone convince me otherwise?

bonkey

Blub2k4 wrote:

the only thing that will help is a reduction in fuel usage.

Y'huh. And if petrol was (say) twice the cost it is today, people would think twice about "luxury" use of their car (i.e. driving to teh shops that are 5 mins away, or buying the fuel-hungry sporty/big car over the more economical model).

On this island I envisage people saying well I'm paying for it so I'm going to get more value which is the opposite of what is intended.

That depends on the cost. The more expensive soemthing is, the more likely people are to think about their usage of it.

Its the reverse of (say) new technology. Why do you think things become more widespread in usage as the price reduces?

Surely all initiatives should be aimed at reducing usage of hydrocarbons and not paying for your usage?

The more you pay, the more inclined you are to consider voluntary reduction, and (for many people) the less you can afford to use. If you can't afford to double your fuel bill, but the cost has doubled, the only alternative is to reduce your usage.

THERE IS NO DIRECT LINK BETWEEN PAYING MORE FOR A FUEL AND ECO FRIENDLINESS.

I beg to differ.

When charges were introduced on plastic bags, did the Irish continue to use them to the same extent, choosing to pay more rather than choose a cheaper and more eco-friendly option? Did they hell.

Same applies in many areas if you look where "polluter pays" laws have been implemented. While people may not make the change in order to be more eco-friendly, they will make a change to a more eco-friendly option if there is a clear financial benefit in doing so (or clear cost in not diong so).

All that is needed is a viable alternative.

Taxes dont = green, or can someone convince me otherwise?

The wrong taxes are not green. The right taxes / incentives can be.

They're not a panacea, nor are they infallible...but then again, nothing else is either. Choosing failed examples doesn't make them useless in all situations. Consider the plastic bag scenario, and explain why that has not resulted in increased eco-friendliness. If you can't, then surely you must accept that taxation can work.

Meh

Blub2k4 wrote:

I personally fail to see how imposing a tax on fuel will lead to any green benefits, in fact it is a very american thing to do

Huh? Doesn't the US have the lowest petrol taxes in the developed world?

Blub2k4

Meh wrote:

Huh? Doesn't the US have the lowest petrol taxes in the developed world?

What I mean is covering up a lack of real action on the environment by levying extra taxes.

Sand

What I mean is covering up a lack of real action on the environment by levying extra taxes.

Taxation can be extremely effective where there are alternatives, as the plastic bags demonstrated. What other real action can the government take?

Regulations are grand, but youre relying on a civil service to have perfect knowledge of the industry, technology and the next 5-10 years. And once companies meet those regulations - no matter how stringent - they have 0 incentive to go any further.

You might reject taxation as pricing the right to pollute and thus being morally reprehensible or whatever. Thats fair enough but all economic activity pollutes. The clothers youre wearing, the PC youre using, the house your living in all of this was produced through polluting economic activity. 0 pollution means 0 economic activity, which is clearly undesirable unless youre a hippy.

So, even in your government regulations scenario a trade off is faced - how much pollution are we willing to accept for some given level of economic activity. I.E. what price are we willing to pay for economic activity. the civil service sets a level it thinks suits and thats the price - a flat, one off lump sum. Any pollution below that level is free, any pollution above it is infinitly expensive - fines, jail, company shut down, what have you.

If you set a tax on polluting economic activity/inputs - like petrol - you can ensure that every single unit of pollution costs the company and thus they have an incentive to erradicate every last unit they can do so easily - down to zero theoretically, which they have no incentive to do under regulations. And if theyre still producing too much pollution, then the price is clearly too low and you bump it up until you reach an acceptable level.

monument

The only form of tax on motorist should be at the pumps, it makes sense far beyond any green issue – it makes the people who really use the roads pay for them.

But the people who really use the roads - the haulage companies - would have major problems with ideas like that.

Side stepping human transport again for a second, nationwide cargo transport relies far too much on the roads and too little on the rail network (no matter how messed up it is).

On metropolitan transport...

Sand wrote:

The LUAS is far too expensive to replace buses on a large scale. To be honest, whilst the LUAS is nice "flagship" project I think a similar level of transport could have been provided by simply reserving entire lanes of existing road for bus use, giving them right of way at all junctions and buying enough buses to ensure one arrives at any particular stop at least every 10-15 minutes.

That sounds too much like logic to be used by government.

I don’t think many people realise that less people are transported in London vie the Tube then by bus.