Erth-Folk News: America's Dirtiest Vehicles
The EPA rates air pollution on a scale of 0 to 10; the score reflects the amount of tailpipe emissions a vehicle releases. Vehicles that score 10 are the cleanest--they don't emit pollutants like hydrocarbon, nitrous oxides, particulate matter, carbon monoxide and formaldehyde. Greenhouse gas levels (carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane) are based on the vehicle's fuel economy and are evaluated on the same 0-10 scale. That score represents the "relative global warming potential of each car," the EPA says. For our list, we combined air pollution and emissions scores and then chose the vehicles with the smallest results (the greater the score, the more environmentally friendly the car). We broke ties by evaluating the combined fuel efficiency of each vehicle. (Driving a car that gets 25 miles per gallon rather than 20 mpg will prevent 10 tons of carbon dioxide from hitting the air over a vehicle's lifetime, according to EPA data.) We did not evaluate models that will end production after this year, like the Bentley Arnage and Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Roadster, or vehicles classified as "heavy duty," like the 3500 series of the Dodge Ram, which are exempt from federal fuel economy requirements. We also deliberately omitted some vehicles that rated higher on the particulate-emissions scale, including exotics like the Ferrari F430, uber-luxury cars like the Bentley Continental Flying Spur, and high-performance variants from Mercedes-Benz's AMG line. Those cars have marginally worse emissions ratings than some of the entries on our list but are produced in such small quantities and driven so infrequently--on weekends or on racetracks--that they often don't contribute much to air-pollution problems. Even had we included those supercars, though, the Jeep Grand Cherokee still would have topped the chart. It scored a paltry three out of 10 for air-pollution ratings and two out of 10 for greenhouse gas emissions. The flex-fuel engine--prized because it uses a renewable resource...
Thus, a custom Nitrous Express direct-port system was fabricated to help spool the turbo, and the venerable Getrag six-speed transmission was ditched in
Don't forget the Nitrous Kit! Aggressive or Defensive driver, it's your choice. The Need For Speed franchise uses a new innovative approach towards each