New Reg New Yer. Our friend in Laois

He's still causing a new car to be manufactured each year, just so he can get a little buzz from having a particular number on the reg plate. It is pure consumerism, obviously car prices or taxes aren't high enough if people are playing games like this with the future of the planet.

Nah, I used to go through 5 demos a year when I sold cars - and they would all go on to be sold to people who would have bought a new car instead. Same principle.

In fact, now that I think about it, that was a very responsible setup really because it saved me needing to buy a car at all.

In fairness that's such a simplistic perspective. So because a guy, whose circumstances are unknown, has the capacity to buy a new car you consider the rest of the population should pay higher taxes in order to save the planet. A lot worse issues to be addressed

I grew up in rural Waterford in the 70s/80s, you got to know every car locally as there was so few compared to today and people kept them for a long time.

Except a local man who won a load of money and went bananas; he had about 25-30 new cars in 18 months.

Ownership period varied between 1-4 weeks. Biggest talking point every Sunday was what did Vickel buy this week.

Sometimes he changed to exact same car in a different colour. They were all run of the mill cars.

He ended up broke of course, never even had a proper job.

His 1.0 was 125bhp, sure more thirsty than the boring, underpowered 1.5tdci.

Saying that 1300 km per year isn't enough to calculate mpg. We are talking 3-4 km a day trips.

Crazy, but not my money, not my problem.

To be fair, Dacia do generally fare very well in terms of residual values vs other brands, certainly compared to the flood the market Koreans.

18 months old is a terrible time to trade in if you are looking for a good deal.

I do believe that because for one Dacia never sold cars here before 2015 and two the Logan was never sold here. So what country was this in that it happened because it was not Ireland or the UK?

Yes you are right there. Forgot about that one. Never seen many of them. What was it MCV stood for again?

😆

Now now. You made a bit of a fool out of yourself with that one 🤣

Anyone got a link to that interview?

Fair point, changing the law because of one person wouldn’t be a sensible reaction. I suppose I was just frustrated at the lack of consideration of environmental impact of such conspicuous consumption.

The guy can afford it, the cars get resold, he's happy, the dealer is happy, the used car customer is happy.

There's far too much of this begrudgery and prostrating "everyone should live like peasants" stuff being shoved in to every aspect of society here so the Green types can tell themselves they're saving the bunnies while China, the US, Russia and other nations do whatever they like and will emit vastly more damaging emissions than Ireland ever will.

So keeping a car for maybe five years or maybe ten years is "living like a peasant" now? Awful lot of peasants around so.

My own car is 10 years old so no sale I'm afraid! It is a "big dirty (3 litre) diesel" though that'll be going nowhere soon - unless the right A8 came up!

But if this man wants to trade his car in every year then fair play to him. The buyer of his old one may well keep it until it dies, or they may have bought it instead of a brand new one themselves, and a functioning second hand market is essential if the goal is to reduce consumerism.

Either way, what this man or any of us do will have very little effect on the environment vs those bigger countries I mentioned who don't give a toss about how much we give up, and I see no reason to artificially reduce my standard of living (as if the costs and taxation generally aren't high enough as it is if you're a middle earner) just so Eamon Ryan and his supporters can get the warm and fuzzies.

How do they manage to do that?

It wasn’t his first ecosport though.

Ah stop. The significance of what he's doing or what his actions are meant to be symbolising is being way overplayed.

I'd say it's actually good for the environment. Someone will buy that Eco-Sport now and trade in some Euro 3 or 4 shitbox off of it, the car already existed so the second owner wont need to feel bad for the environmental impact of production, they in turn dont need to commission another new unit and it's taken another heavier polluting vehicle off the road.

That and it's imortant to keep the national fleet fresh anyway for road safety and stuff like that. I dont know what sort of spec that Eco-Sport has but if someone traded in a 2012 car againt it, there'd be a world of difference in terms of road safety.

And the trade in will live on through recycling.

Stuff has to be replaced too. Not buying a new car really really has a very tiny impact on a persons carbon footprint vs any other lifestyle choice they could make.

What are you doing on a motoring forum spouting environmental stuff. The guy buys a car. Someone else uses the old one. He spends a few quid. Dealer makes a few quid. Government takes a heap of tax off it. They are free to put that tax to good environmental use.

If anything this war shows the stupidity of penalizing ordinary hard working people with carbon taxes for heating their homes or driving to work when no other options are available, all the while Putin, is doing more environmental damage every minute than all the cars in Ireland put together would do in years and years.

All these environmental doom predictions totally and utterly ignore our ability to Engineer solutions. An example of this was the maps that were doing the rounds showing half of Dublin under water by a certain year. Did anyone consider that people might actually Engineer stuff to reduce such issues.

The poor man probably living a very frugal life and just keeps a new car and you coming on here basically calling him an environmental terrorist.

It's sickening and the poor man only following the advice of the green party to keep a low CO2 car.

Start at your own door and see how perfect an existence you lead.

He's preaching the "new" word of course.

Is there some rule on this forum about ignoring what is happening in the world? A 'don't look up' rule?

It's strange that you mention 'no other options' when he has many, many other options - like not buying a new car every year, or every three years.

We don't need more cars on the road. He's not doing society a favour by buying a new car every year. The environmental cost of this action is largely hidden. He's not paying it, but we're all going to be paying.

What is the environmental cost anyway? Can we quantify it vs other things to help people understand how negligible it is?

Where is it at vs things like a sun holiday or running a 15 year old oil boiler or buying all your clothes in Penneys?

When I said no other option, I was referring to taxing ordinary everyday people via carbon tax and every other tax on fuel that is needed to travel to work or heat their home.

You will say there are other options like Ev and heat pump but for someone who needs to travel long distance daily and can only afford a 1500 car, there is no ev option. Similarly, someone like myself that doesn't live in a new house, there is no other option bar gas or oil to heat the house unless I spend 200k on upgrades.

Personally I don't agree with being heavily penalized via taxation for this green agenda unless for example the government bring in real retrofit schemes for home heating as the current ones really are not the answer.

Everyone is different. I have not been on an airplane for a few years, work from home since 2005 so that's good but I like to piss away petrol by needlessly driving a car around a race track a couple of times a year so lock me up now.

Can we learn something of your life, how you live and what we should aspire to then?

We had an end to the ice age, a massive change for the planet and much as you believe our friend who buys the new car every year is the devil, you cannot blame the ice age ending on him or anyone like him. Surely instead a natural cycle of the planet. By all accounts, we are now entering a period of many years where a sun spot is going to result in some cooling of our planet and this will have more effect that all any action man could take. Again a natural cycle.

How do we know that there hasn't been multiple traw freeze periods in the past.

I've seen data referred to where cores are taken deep into ice and CO2 levels read and results produced showing that our current CO2 levels have never been seen before.

That method in my opinion has one serious flaw that may well be producing bullshit results yet results that very much suit the global.warming agenda.

He has a point though and i wouldn't agree with Mick very often.

If you are a middle income earner, live in a house built in the 90's with an oil boiler and drive a 10 year old petrol car, what can you do to help the UN Secretary General in his plight?

- spend €250,000 doing a deep energy retrofit on your house and buying an EV.

- cease your existence

- continue as normal

Are the only options i can see and really only one of the 3 is viable.

Nothing wrong with running a 15 year old boiler as long as it is well serviced.

My boiler is 12 years old and would be 15 years old except for the first one blew up like a lot of boilers in my estate did. They were plumbed wrong.