Making sense of motor vehicles

From responsible driving to recycling a car, the show highlights many motoring issues, writes Peter O’Donnell.

As the agenda for next week’s (23 January) European Automotive Forum recognises, making sense of motors requires a comprehensive approach, embracing many distinct technologies - as well as the key variable: the man or woman in the driving seat.

This year’s European Motor Show casts light into many of the more obscure corners of the world of wheels, spanning the motoring experience from end to end. Right at the beginning of the journey, the Belgian Responsible Young Drivers association is trying to catch them young, to alert newcomers to the risks and imbue them with a sense of responsibility. With some support from the motor industry, it campaigns in schools, discotheques and sports clubs to reach out to novices before they kill themselves or others on the road. And it is making use of technology to make its point. A full-scale simulator on its stand allows everyone to check their skills and anticipation.

Similarly, the Ecoscore stand invites the public to practise eco-friendly driving on its bank of simulators. FEBIAC, the Belgian motor industry federation, has just released figures showing that what it terms "e-positive" driving can cut fuel consumption by 18% - and carbon dioxide emissions by 8%.

"Environmentally aware driving is a primary concern," says FEBIAC, listing ten tips that every driver can follow to help save fuel - and the planet. They are such simple and obvious tactics as changing promptly to a higher gear to save unnecessary engine revs, keeping your distance from the vehicle in front so you do not have continuously to brake and accelerate, regularly checking tyre pressures, planning your route and switching off the engine when you stop briefly, such as at a level crossing or to pick up passengers.

Ecoscore also provides methods to calculate just how clean your car is, incorporating the overall impact of pollutants, carbon dioxide emissions and noise - as well as the environmental cost of the production and distribution of the fuel it uses. Out of a maximum of 100, it has rated all the new cars on the market - with the best scoring 75, notably hybrids and some sophisticated diesels with filters to trap particles - and the worst coming in as low as 24.

At the end of a car’s life, too, technology is playing an increasing role. Febelauto, representing what used to be called scrapyards, is demonstrating what happens nowadays to your cherished runaround after you’ve stopped cherishing it. Now it is a question of "management of unused vehicles for recycling" - and the results are impressive. From every car, an average of 94 kilograms of components are recuperated for re-use. Components containing valuable or dangerous substances are removed, plastic in the bumper bars and elsewhere is reduced and reconstituted as re-usable granules, and once the naked carcass goes into the shredder, it is reduced in 12 seconds to 750 kg of twisted lumps of scrap metal to be recycled as raw material in the steel industry. As Febelauto likes to boast, 131,000 end-of-life vehicles found a new life last year - and the metal recovered was sufficient to build 40 Atomiums. So looking after your car a little longer could also cut down landscape blight in Belgium.

From responsible driving to recycling a car, the show highlights many motoring issues, writes Peter O’Donnell.