Texas Calls Renewable Fuel Standard Misquided

The Governor of Texas, Rick Perry, has asked for a 50% waiver from the US Federal Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), calling it a misguided mandate that is significantly impacting food costs.

The mandate requires a percentage of ethanol be added to petroleum and Gov. Perry's request is in response to the rapidly rising food costs that are a direct result of the US involvement in food-based fuel.

Corn prices rose 138% globally over the past three years and global food prices increased 83% in that same time period. With the new RFS mandate, corn prices are expected to rise another $8 per bushel, resulting in a $3.6 billion negative impact to Texas alone.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that 25% of the corn crop was diverted to produced ethanol in 2007 and 30-35% will be diverted in 2008. How stupid is that? 25% of a basic food crop removed from the food chain to provide fuel?

Ethanol is still the wrong choice and I commend Governor Perry for speaking out against it.

Tax Freedom Day

April 23, 2008 is Tax Freedom Day in the United States. That's the day that the nation, as a whole, has theoretically earned enough income to cover its annual tax burden. In other words, every penny that you earned until that day has gone to cover what you would normally shell out for taxes over the course of the year. Everything earned after that is yours to spend however you would like.

In Canada, Tax Freedom Day won't hit until around June 20th.

Oh Canada,
Our home and over-taxed land .....

Manitoba Considering A Ban On Pre-1995 Vehicles

Bill 15, which is currently before the Legislature of the government of Manitoba, would, among other items, ban pre-1995 vehicles from being brought in to the province. It may also restrict your classic from the highways.

The act reads as follows on importation: (click on the title of this post to see the Province of Manitoba's website version of the Bill)

The Drivers and Vehicles Act is amended by adding the following after section 108:

Importing older motor vehicles prohibited
108.1(1) Subject to the regulations, no person shall bring a motor vehicle into Manitoba for the purpose of resale if its model year is older than 1995, or another model year that is prescribed by regulation.

Regulations re older motor vehicles
108.1(2) For the purpose of subsection (1), the Lieutenant Governor in Council may make regulations
(a) prescribing a model year that is more recent than 1995 but which is at least 10 years older than the current model year;
(b) defining "model year", and prescribing the date in a year on which a model year begins;
(c) establishing the following classes of motor vehicles, and authorizing vehicles within such a class to be brought into Manitoba for resale, despite the vehicle's model year being older than 1995, or the model year prescribed under clause (a):
(i) antique motor vehicles,
(ii) classic motor vehicles,
(iii) vehicles with low emissions;
(d) authorizing a person to bring a motor vehicle into Manitoba for resale to a person who holds a collector number plate, despite the vehicle's model year being older than 1995, or the model year prescribed under clause (a).

And on highway restrictions:

Regulations re low-speed vehicles
319(1.2) The Lieutenant Governor in Council may make regulations
(a) permitting zero-emission and other low-speed vehicles to be driven on highways;
(b) establishing rules of the road for low-speed vehicles;
(c) restricting low-speed vehicles to certain types of highways, including highways with a specified maximum speed.
_____________

Forget about that beautiful 40th Anniversary Corvette that you had your eyes on. The Manitoba government won't let you have it. Thinking about a Buick Grand National, Mazda Miata, a Ford Mustang, a Nissan 300 ZX, a Chevy Impala SS, Dodge Viper, Subaru SVX, or any other car built between 1984 and 1994? You won't be able to bring them in to the province!

Do you have a pre-war vehicle? The low-speed regulations (designed for the electric ZEN car built in Canada) does not exempt antique vehicles. Your classic may no longer be allowed on roads where it cannot maintain the speed limit.

I urge all car enthusiasts in Manitoba to call on your clubs to immediately contact your government with your concerns on the impact of this legislation.

Contact:
Minister Ron Lemieux, Department of Infrastructure And Transportation
Minister Stan Struthers, Department of Conservation
Premier Gary Doer

Do it today! Tomorrow may be too late!

Reader's Rides - Steve's '66 Galaxie 500

Our first Reader's Rides entry is my car. This is my 1966 Ford Galaxie 500, 2 door hardtop. I purchased this car in 2005 from its third owner.

The car is pretty much all-original; paint chrome, trim, interior, hubcaps, etc. The only non-original part on the car is the radio (due to change shortly since I have found a factory-correct replacement).

The car spent the first 20 years or so of its life in Hollywood, Florida and was used as a winter car by its first and second owners. It features a 289 with a 3 speed auto tranny and the warm weather package that included factory-installed air conditioning (still functioning), a 5 blade fan, and a three core rad.

Having lived in Florida for most of its life and then spending the Canadian winters in a heated garage, this car is completely rust-free and in amazing condition.

We've had fun going to different outings with this car and have participated in the Atlantic Nationals with it, and have gone on several tours including a tour of Cape Breton in 2007.

Reader's Rides

I've started a new feature call Reader's Rides. In it, I will feature a picture of your car and a write-up on it.

Here's what I need from you:
- A photo (the higher quality, the better) of your vehicle
- A write-up on your vehicle
- Your name, city, and province

On the sidebar is an "About Me" section. Click that to find an email link.

Here's what I'll do:
- I'll post your picture and your write-up on this site. I'll also add your photo to the slideshow on this site.

Here are the rules:
- Canadian entries only. There are thousands of sites featuring U.S. and European owners and their vehicles. This one is Canadian only.
- Send in anything from your project cars to your show cars, but don't send your daily drivers. I'm looking for your classic, antique, collectible, hot rod, muscle car, street rod, cruiser, or ... you get the picture.
- Don't send info on cars that you have for sale. This is not a classifieds section. If I post your car/write-up and find a link to it from a classified ad or website, I'll delete it, plain and simple.

To view all of the Reader's Rides entries, click on "Reader's Rides" located on the sidebar under the heading "Keywords".

Fact: Older Vehicles Pollute Less

I've always said that common sense isn't as common as it use to be. Under the category of common sense, I would put the following statements:

People who use older vehicles (12-15+ years) tend to have less disposable income to spend on transportation.

If that statement makes sense to you, perhaps the following might as well:

People who own older vehicles have less disposable income available for transportation and because older vehicles are more likely to suffer a serious breakdown, these vehicles tend to be driven significantly less than new, or newer, vehicles.

As John Baird gets ready to announce a spending spree on retiring "older vehicles", Environment Canada actually realized that the 2005 Canadian Vehicle Survey said just what I did; older vehicles are driven less than newer ones. They also came to the following realization:

"While older vehicles produce more than their fair share of air pollutants, they produce fewer than average GHG emissions because Canadians tend to drive them less."

There's an important snippet to pay attention to in that previous statement: "they produce fewer than average GHG emissions".

Environment Canada goes on to say that "older vehicles emit fewer greenhouse gases - an average of 2.4 tonnes of carbon dioxide compared to 3.8 tonnes for a newer vehicle, annually."

So why is our Federal Government getting ready to announce a $90 million program to get older vehicles off the road? Well, being a cynic, I would say that rather than tackling the heavy polluters like coal-fired generating plants and industry, low-income earners are an easy target. It also allows our government to strut like peacocks without really doing anything other than wasting more of our money. Another reason is because auto industry analyst, Dennis Desrosiers gets plenty of media time by using derogatory terms like "old smokers" and "beater" that he claims are belching pollutants at alarming rates and destroying our environment. Personally, I blame political posturing and the spewing of hot air, but that's beside the point. By announcing a system to get older vehicles off the road, Baird gets to appease industry analysts like Desrosier and the industry itself. The old "Big 3" weren't too happy with our government over their ill-conceived ecoAUTO program that promoted companies like Toyota while punishing companies that continue to roll out inefficient vehicles at ever-increasing rates, so it almost looks like Baird has been sent in to make the government look industry-friendly. As a sidenote, I called the ecoAUTO plan ill-conceived because one (in my mind, stupid) rebate was for poor mileage flex fuel cars that are capable of burning ethanol; a product that is only available at 2 or 3 stations in all of Canada. Please refer to my previous entry on ethanol and my first statement above on common sense.

Getting back to Desrosier; he even goes so far as to recommend "a large bounty on older vehicles" (DesRosiers Automotive Reports - Vol. 15, Issue 7) and that "keeping these old 'war horses' around is also at the root of the quality perception issue that continues to plaque GM, Ford, and Daimler Chrysler." (DesRosiers Observations - Vol. 21, Issue 7). Again, refer to my first statement. Personally, I would blame actual quality issues for GM, Ford, and Chrysler's quality perception problems, not older vehicles, but hey - that's just me.

So: older vehicles pollute less and they are driven less (and therefore use less fossil fuels). Yet, John Baird and Dennis Desrosier want these vehicles off the road and use derogatory terms in an effort to make their statements more grandiose. Meanwhile, Transport Canada is still giving rebates to flex-fuel vehicles that would normally be punished with a guzzler levy - and the rebate is because they use a fuel (E85) that you can't buy in 99.9999% of the country.

Makes sense to me.