Downsizing could be bad for business

Date: Tuesday, June 2, 2009

While screwing down CO₂ emissions from vans ever more tightly may on the face of it be laudable, it could have some worrying unforeseen consequences warns Mercedes-Benz van technology head of development, Dr Sascha Paasche.

It could prompt operators penalised for running big commercial vehicles said to emit excessive CO ₂ to switch to lots of smaller vans instead. While individually their CO ₂

emissions may be acceptable, collectively they’re likely to pump out more than the handful of large vehicles they replace. “In a situation like that you could end up more than doubling CO₂ output,” Paasche warns.

Nor is making such a switch likely to do much for distribution efficiency, he adds. In fact it’s likely to drive up costs.

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