SUVs were the second largest cause of the global rise in carbon dioxide emissions over the past decade, eclipsing all shipping, aviation, heavy industry and even trucks, usually the only vehicles to loom larger than them on the road. Each year, SUVs belch out 700 megatonnes of CO2, about the entire output of the UK and Netherlands combined. If all SUV drivers banded together to form their own country, it would rank as the seventh largest emitter in the world…]
[…The whole debate falls apart when you just target one type of vehicle which in itself is not really one type of vehicle. An SUV can be many different shapes, sizes, weights, ages and engines.
Conjoining two quotes – define an SUV, because as the latter quote says, SUV’s can be all sorts of sizes, a Panda 4×4 is an SUV, so is an Audi Q7, a Suzuki Jimny is an SUV, so is a Mercedes G-Wagen with an engine putting out 500bhp.
It’s term that was originally used to describe certain types of 4×4, like the HiLux, and is now a catch-all term to describe any vehicle that’s a bit taller than an average saloon, and is, quite frankly, completely meaningless.
Except as a way of demeaning certain car owners, probably by people who own far more polluting* vehicles that aren’t ’SUV’s’.
Like T4’s…
*By which I mean the overall CO2 expended in their manufacturing, as well as amount of materials used.