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Forbes’ Least Green Machines

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North America’s most harmful vehicle: 2006 Ford E-Series van

Forbes magazine has produced its first Least Green Machines list: a who’s who of environmentally-awful vehicles thatr roam our roads. From their website (or read the whole article):

Bill Ford, chairman and chief executive of Ford, frequently touts the company’s environmental friendliness. Ford was the first American car company to offer a gas/electric hybrid vehicle that could run on electricity alone (the Escape Hybrid SUV), and 10.4 acres of plants grow on the roof of the automaker’s Dearborn Truck Plant.

But our first-ever ranking of the least environmentally friendly new cars isn’t just dominated by pickups and SUVs; five of the seven cars on our list are made by Ford . And though domestic manufacturers are rolling out low-emission gas/electric hybrids, such as General Motors’ Saturn Vue Green Line SUV, all seven of the market’s least green cars, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s most current data, are American–strong evidence that U.S. automakers are not as serious about clean vehicles as their foreign counterparts are.

In fact, the market’s least environmentally friendly car is Ford’s $26,000, full-size E-Series van, which gets the EPA’s lowest-possible scores for air pollution and greenhouse-gas emissions: 0 out of 10 on both.

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4 comments

  2. …and those full-size vans are typically hauling around 8 or 10 people…who would be polluting more and using more fuel if they were all in seperate cars!

    Instead of tractor trailers hauling merchandise from one city to another, I propose a caravan of 20-30 loaded up Toyota Priuses. Cause they run on farts and love.

  3. I think you are viewing the world through rose coloured glasses if you are assuming that all of those vans are being used at full capacity to shuttle people around town…

    I think you will find them being driven by one lone guy with the back full of supplies for whatever business the vehicle is being used for.

    While these can be used for moving people, I think it’s a stretch to believe that this is the main usage they are being employed for, there are thousands of these work trucks on the road (my friends company has a whole fleet of the E-series vans – all lone drivers with gear in the back).

    Now, if they had a farts & love conversion kit for the E-series, all would be good, perhaps we should recommend that to Ford…

  4. Steve is right. I rarely see those E series vans with a lot of people. They are used to move stuff to stores, etc.