Environmental News

Nice Blog the battery does not charge the electrical system! @Grimy Very sorry for this misinformation, ordinarily these articles are fact checked very thoroughly prior to release. In this case however we slipped up. Thanks very much to Grimy for pointing this out. We have removed the offending line "the battery charges the electrical system".

I live in country WA and have collected several kangaroos. I was taught brake and go straight. The car will bend, the animal will give and you will have the highest chance of survival. No matter how big an animal is it will give but a big gum tree wont and if you start out of control skidding you will most likely flip. If damage must be done make sure it is not to you or your passengers.

My last 3 cars. 3.5 litre V6 Rodeo with tradsman style canopy, ladder rackes, etc. 17.5 litres / 100 average. 3 litre 4 cylinder diesel rodeo same as above 10.5 litres / 100 average. BT50 styleside ute, mainly used for commuting. 9.2 litres / 100 averaged over 80,000K Hello there, I am so excited I found your site, I really found you by error, while I was researching on google for Wrecked Car , Anyhow I am here now and would just like to say kudos for a fantastic post and a all round thrilling blog (I also love the theme/design), I don’t have time to go through it all at the moment but I have saved it and also included your RSS feeds. Damaged Car

I use E85 on my car , but unfortunately there isn't enough petro Stations that have it or different petrol companies that sell it Eg : I use the UNITED brand E 85 Note the government encourages us the people to use it but don't encourage other petroleum companies to sell it , therefore limiting competition and availability.

No this was not a good budget for the car industry or the owners, which is no usual for a Labor Government. Personally most of the changes made in recent years only result in taking more out of any disposable income i have, such as extra tax. Only hope the next government takes more positive action.

The main reason that people con't buy these fuel efficient cars is cost. If you work out the price to own / run the car for 3 years (a common time period these days) then you still have not even broken even on overall cost compared to a similar "non-green" car. I'd love to be proven wrong and things may have changed since I worked it all out late last year but extra cost has to be worth while. I am looking forward to it looking better next time we buy a car. Dnx Hi, Toyota about to release another prius, called prius c which will start from $23,990. The electric cars should be compared with Oz electricity prices in mind, but if owner has solar cells, this will be cheaper. Some of these cars in list are manual versions, not prefered by some drivers. Oz petrol buyer behaviour is such that we will cross the road/do a u turn to save a few cents at another bowser. The BIG cars in Oz are now $30-40K. I can see why diesel SUVs are popular. My daily commute is shared with mostly single occupant cars. The market is there for an organised car pooling scheme, and buyers wanting new $15-25K cars with low fuel use. I'm seeing more i20s, Mazda2s, Yaris, Fiestas, Polos, etc . Melbourne prices over $1.50/litre this week. Perhaps couples/famillies will adopt the one big & one little car 'policy' or we hire big cars when we need one.......but nothing new in that. I would like to see a complete list of cars less than 7litres/100kms. cheers Duncan is on the money. This is little more than a novelty comment. Any fleet manager worth his money would be talking about whole of life cost. If these vehicles have a higher premium cost, higher maintenance cost, excessive downtime because of maintenance issues, and consequently a lower resale cost because of the excessive maintenance and downtime much of the fuel savings are lost and they may in fact be a financial trap. As an example I can recall a particular truck model which used less fuel than its competitors and cost about $5000 less, but required a $15,000 engine build at 80,000 km; the manufacturer had to pull it off the market. What about the Golf Bluemotion? This one is priced pretty low, and is rated for low fuel consumption. If you tested the fuel consumption to be higher, and excluded it on that basis, maybe that's worth another article. If the Gov't would overhaul the registration CTP system so it's fair, then these cars would be a popular choice. I can afford two cars, one for working/holidays etc.- so a mid-large size with towing power. I'd also like a small car for commuting, general running around. What I can't afford is two greenslips, rego and insurance - and, I can only drive one at a time. This is the real problem.

I was a die-hard Holden fan and still own one but my preference is Toyota. Toyota are more expensive but I would choose one over the Captiva just on (Toyota) reliability Although, Toyota Customer Service is very poor and way behind Holden when it comes to the care factor. Captiva 7 diesel is a great package and the best value for money.I am really impressed by its off road capabilities,humiliating more powerful 4WD's.Drive it to experience it.Captiva is equipped with a great suspension and a remarkable price line.The service networks are spread across and reliability is outstanding.I never expected this much on a captiva.Perfectly content with my decision to buy one. Great news - The Ultratune have a quality identical oil filter for the new 2.2L diesel Captiva for about 1/5 the price that Holden charges. Thats right $23 each compared to $105. Go Ultratune. They just serviced my Captiva at 30K kms for $269. Good filter, good oil, good full logbook service.

I am sceptical that this tax will not target fuels as all politicians lie and live in their own fantasy land where the ideas they come up with only effect the rest of the population!!

Hi Rory, the last 3 rows of your table should probably not say "Contracts commenced from..." because this gives the impression that contracts entered into before that date will stay at the previous rate - this is not correct from my understanding, ie. existing (low) rate contracts will be subject to an increase in FBT rate each year till they reach 20%. Regards, Peter. Thanks for the comment Peter. According to the Chartered Accountants Review of the FBT change, lease holders liability will indeed depend upon the date lease holders commence their lease (correctly outlined in the table above). We do however understand that there is some confusion over the change and, with this in mind we look forward to more finite details which have been sought by the AFLA (Australian Fleet Lessors Association) who are currently liaising with the Treasury Department. These details primarily revolve around the definition of the term “contracts entered into”. We will update any details as we receive them. For others reading this; please rest assured that if you do have a novated lease which you entered into prior to the FBT changes you will not be impacted by these altered rates and thresholds. This clarifies the situation somewhat. No impact on existing contracts, and for those that have signed an order but not yet received delivery, they will also fall under the old FBT regime. http://www.charteredaccountants.com.au/Industry-Topics/Tax/Current-issues/Tax-news/Regulatory-and-government-updates/24-05-11-Fringe-benefits-tax-reform-of-the-car-fringe-benefits-rules Rory, do you know if it will be possible for existing lease holders to elect to move to the new strucuture if you're already doing low km's to avoid the paperwork burden? Taking into account the above article its fairly evident there will be a massive impetus on many more drivers to switch to the logbook method if maximisation of claims is to be achieved. If it is obvious that you can better the 20% flat rate more drivers will keep a logbook for a continuous 12 week period, after all its valid for five years on the same vehicle if its is indicative of the normal use of the cae. It is even easier now to keep logbooks - you can buy a fully tax deductible Australian made iphone app for less than the headache of keeping a written logbook (and then having to perform all the manual calculations to get your percentage business use). One such app is VehicleLog available on the Apple App Store. Rory, I am changing the company who manage my lease, but not the finance company. should I continue on the old rate? @Kurross we will need to look into your details for this one. I have mailed you my details. As I see it a sales person who has to take out a loan so their company can conduct business now is going to be penalised for visiting a lot of customers and would be better off staying in the office? e.g Someone doing 35,000km a year mainly for work will be slugged 20% instead of 11% - so effectively the EMPLOYEE is fined for buying an asset, taking the risk of that asset depreciating, reducing that employees ability to borrow funds for their personal benefit, and now is lured into travelling LESS at the expense of good customer service??? And the people who drive their cars less (typically the executive are rewarded because they get an FBT cut? This just another means by which the Gillard Government wants to punish the worker and tax payer. The only person with any environmental ideas in this coalition were Bob Brown who pressured the changes and then packed un and is resigning.

Very useful!

Wow! The Honda Insight take a step forward with upgrades to its interior design and performance. I like its sleeker look and the fact that some cool car accessories were added to it.

EVs are maturing, but expense (high capital cost, iffy residuals, charging infrastructure) + low demand $s = poor fleet choice Simplistically - No! (please only argue with me if you are going to clarify 'near future'). Until the range issues are sorted out then they will only find a niche market with fleets working in a small geographical area. Problem then is with cost of purchase. A government grant is to be welcomed but is not sustainable in the long term. Please also don't suggest that government (local or national) departments should buy them to set an example only to then criticise the same departments for wasting money! Soap box now put away :-) They will definitely have a place in fleet, but not in huge numbers. Public sector fleets will no doubt be under pressure to use them - Boris Johnson's statement about 100,000 EVs in London will no doubt include public sector. They will also be used where suitable based on range and charging infrastructure to help companies enhance their "green" credentials. As soon as the cost of electric vehicles and the Infrastructure can support wider distribution, they will be used by more fleets.