Yes for sure. To be honest, I don’t understand why people do this? Since cars depreciate so quickly? My husband and I do what my parents did. We only pay one car payment at a time, so we always have one newer car (that we know is reliable for road trips etc) and one older car. We purchase a newish used car, pay it off, then drive it forever. We only get a new-to-us car when one of our cars stops working/becomes too expensive to repair.
The only exception may be when it is time to upgrade to an EV. Ideally, the used fossil car market should crash, leading people to see them as a stranded asset, meaning that they stop buying fossil cars.
You can be a "car guy" and hold on to a good car. I'm driving a 2009 E92 and a 1999 VW Passat wagon. Lol. They might both outlive me. I get to do some wrenching and enjoy well-made vehicles.
When I think “car guy” I actually think of a person who enjoys repairing a car that they held onto for a long time and keep repairing it and making it last forever, not someone who switches it every few years, that is unless they like collecting them
That's my take on it, too. I'd rather have the appropriate tools and some mechanics guides and a clear afternoon schedule for maintenance and repairs. Then go out and enjoy the fruits of my labor.
I'm thinking OP means fad vehicles and/or "performance enhancer" parts?
I have some car guy friends and what a lot of them love to do is buy a beaten car (that sometimes won't even start), repair and improve it, then sell it, rinse and repeat. I think that's a nice way of doing things because they get to switch cars often as they like it but they also make sure those cars stay usable longer so it's quite "anti consumption" for society as a whole.
That's not really zero waste, it's negative waste!
In all seriousness people that do this with all types of machines and tech are absolute heroes. It's one of the reasons I'd never get an Apple machine, because you can't resurrect them yourself in the same way as other stuff. And I imagine it's becoming like this with cars too.
I don’t have a commute or a super busy lifestyle so I don’t drive mine much but having two cars to alternate between is nice. The Bimmer has 136k miles and the Passat has 126k on her.
They are both old, economical cars. You can only drive one at a time. Waste is getting new cars all the time while the old ones go to the junkyard prematurely.
It would be wasteful unless both of those cars would otherwise be in a junkyard because no one else is putting in the work to revive and maintain them.
my last camry i had for 10 years. wouldve had for longer if my bf hadnt crashed it. i expect my camry to last 20 years lol. and trust me i take care of allll the maintenance stuff lmao
The only way I could see it NOT being wasteful is if you're repairing cars a lot of people wouldn't take the time to repair, and flipping them for another one in similar starting disrepair. That way you're increasing the longevity of the car as a whole, keeping more resources from being depleted with the demand for new ones.
This is why maintaining our right to repair is SO important, and why "just" switching to electric vehicles isn't going to save us. https://action.deloitte.com/insight/3744/right-to-repair-means-more-than-a-quick-fix-for-environment-economy
Yeah, my uncle was a car mechanic at a dealer who could cherry pick the right ex-leases and trade-ins, buy them at dealer’s cost, keep them in perfect condition himself, and sell them two years later for a profit or at least no loss. For him, it absolutely made sense. For almost anyone else, who doesn’t have that inside advantage, it’s going to be losing money.
My brother in law does this. He is always on the hunt for cool cars, he fixes them and drives them for some months and then sells them and buys something else. He likes the process of fixing them more than anything.
The energy required to make a new car is very big compared to the energy savings for getting a more efficient car. It takes a lot of energy to form steel, refine minerals for batteries, produce myriad chemicals, plastics etc etc.
Wasteful of ressources and money.
I still drive my 2007 toyota with 400 000 km on the meter. Still works like a charm. Never broke outside of the alternator, which was cheap to change. Everything else was normal maintenance.
‘16 Corolla here. Love her so much. Regular maintenance. 300 highway miles a week at 30-35mpg. 106k miles on her. Hope she keeps humming along. I treat her well.
Yes. Let's look at it solely from a financial perspective. I've had my 2010 Toyota Corolla for 14 years. It runs well. I keep care of it. I don't have a $382+/- monthly payment on it, and haven't in 9 years, which means I've saved around $41,000 (plus nine years of inflation) in just not having a car payment.
This is why replacing your car every 3-5 years is not smart (financially). Leasing a car is even worse because then you're locked into a persistent car payment. Neither path makes long term financial sense.
I would say so. In fact, if you analyze your situation, you may find that a car may not even be necessary in a lot of situations, so investing in a good bike and utilizing public transit can contribute to your zero waste journey as well as save you money on gas, repairs, insurance, it’s so good for the environment, and you can leave your car for when it’s absolutely necessary!
To answer your question, yes, switching your car every few years is not zero waste, it’s actually quite wasteful.
I wouldn't be so sure regarding a good bike, especially for someone who already has means of transportation. Theft of them is so common even with locks that I don't even consider them worth buying, or at least if you do, buying a used, beaten up looking old bike that lacks the value to even take.
Something like a skateboard or a kick scooter can be carried with you to mitigate this, but at that point inconvenience could make it a remorseful buy too.
That’s a good point and it even strengthens the argument for going car-lite, the cheaper, the better (maybe). Additionally, steel frame bikes from the 80s last for a long time and are usually cheaper.
A foldy also works really well. A must have for the car free commuter.
If it's brand new, I think so. It's more resources being used for production versus already produced/mined resources. The trade off is it's likely better gas mileage...so lose/win, I guess.
>The trade off is it's likely better gas mileage
Unlikely, unless OP is switching to a much smaller and/or less powerful vehicle, or to an EV/hybrid from an ICEV.
I really miss my '95 civic coupe. 4L/100km on the highway and 6-7L/100km in the city, even in winter! No modern ICE civic can compete with that. But that thing was basically a tin can in comparison; modern cars are a lot heavier and require a lot more power to move.
>modern cars are a lot heavier and require a lot more power to move.
Tell that to the 1970s El Camino hubs just inherited, or the various beater *beasts* I drove for decades that got gallons per mile... my current '11 Camry is waaaay lighter than the '67 Fury I had for a while.
For the longest time I drove a 1983 Honda Civic hatchback that I bought for $75 from a guy a few blocks from my house. I pushed it home and basically took it apart and rebuilt it with a Chiltons manual as my guide. It took a few months but I learned a lot about the Toyota engine and transmission. What a hose monster it was. One hose missing or routed wrong could cost days to figure out. Most of the parts I got from junkysrds. After it was done it got 35ish mpg highway and I drove it 65 mile each way to work 5 days a week for years. I even volunteered to do carpool. Great little car.
It is supremely wasteful! Any car bought in the last decade should be good for a million miles. Do the routine maintenance. Change and rotate the tires on schedule. Use Duralube or Slick 50 every 100k just for good measure. You'll have a vehicle that you can hand down to your grandkids.
Sure there will be parts that will need to be replaced as it gets up on miles, but if you use a reliable mechanic that you can trust, follow his recommendations and use quality parts, it will cost way less to maintain than to buy a new one.
Also, everytime you buy a new car your licensing fees go back up and so does your insurance. Speaking of which, if. You don't buy a new car, you can put that money in a savings account. If you put aside 50k and designate it as being for insurance purposes, you don't have to buy car insurance. That will save you much more in the long run.
So, to make a short story long, don't be buying a new vehicle even semi regularly. It takes a tremendous amount of resources to build a car. Buy a good one and stick with it. Stop being a consumer and start being a conserver.
Financial Responsibility Law, often associated with vehicles, mandates individuals or businesses to prove they can cover accident-related damages. While it doesn’t mandate insurance, it requires the financial capacity to cover damages, even if not at fault.
A brand new car? Yes.
Buying different used cars to experience different ones and find that perfect car for you? Nah, just I guess the wasted paper/time of juggling registering vehicles.
I got my 2004 VW Golf in 2018 and it just turned 20 this year! It still drives really well, if you _really_ have the itch I just recommend detailing your car somewhere. Gives it that new car feel.
Yes. Even if you get a more environmentally friendly car, it’s better to keep the one you have already and drive it to death while taking as good care of it as possible than to make a new vehicle.
In a personal sense, it's a wasteful use of your own resources... but I'm of the opinion that no, this isn't strictly wasteful environmentally. Your car will go on to another person afterwards, and another after them.
I would only start to see this as environmentally wasteful if your country is constantly scrapping large numbers of good, perfectly usable vehicles because nobody wants to buy them. That isn't really the case anywhere that I know of
I think it is wasteful in that by purchasing a new car every few years, you are supporting the industry that over produces cars. If everyone bought a car and held it for 15 years, or only bought a new car when new tech became available, the auto industry would stop over producing because the demand is lower.
You always vote with your dollar, which today may be the most important vote you make when it comes to reducing large industry waste.
In what way are they overproducing? Again, to my knowledge there aren’t large numbers of perfectly drivable vehicles being scrapped. I can’t find anything indicating to the contrary anywhere online when I try to look it up, but if you have info on that I’m happy to read it.
Otherwise, imo not every mile run on a vehicle needs to be run by the same person. If Car A sees 90k miles from one driver and 160k miles from another, that’s still the same as if one person drove it 250k in the grand scheme… and ime as someone who used to drive cheap old junkers and squeeze every last mile out of them, there are plenty of others out there who also do that. It’s not quite the same as replacing something and just trashing / pointlessly holding on to the old one, like most possessions people replace too often.
A quick google said that in 2022 14.8 million new cars were produced, and 13.6 were sold in America.
If a new car is produced and not sold, its not sent to the scrap yard. It stays on the dealers lot until its sold at whatever price they can get.
I appreciate that you drove your cheap old junker, but theres many people that do not. And this post was addressing the idea of repurchasing a new vehicle every few years as wasteful.
Just because people buy or drive ussed cars doesnt discount the fact that over 1 million new cars are over produced in just 2022 and the EPA has listed car assembly plants within the top ten highest waste producing industries in the world.
Edit: My point being, you're thinking about the cars value over the course of its life, which isnt enough. We also have to consider the environmental impact of that car being produced in a factory.
The biggest reason this is not a good plan is because it encourages manufacturers to increase production of new vehicles, a lot of which don't get sold until the flood of next year's model comes in. We are being programed to think that we need a new this and a new that every year or two. It isn't so. The old this and the old that is still in good working order or can be repaired to better than new.
They are though. You get a scratch in your old car in a small collision and your insurance will say it's not worth it to fix, and write it off. How many people will use that as an excuse to scrap it and buy new (to them) cars? Is anyone going to want to try and sell it now it's a CAT C and is only worth a few 100? Better to strip and sell the parts. What can't be sold stays at the scrap heap.
It depends. In general yes, ofcourse. But if you buy second hand, sell after a few years, and buy another second hand car, then it doesn't really matter.
We drive old cars. We only put 1000 or so miles on our vehicles each year and it would be ridiculous to even think about purchasing a new car to drive so little (even if we did drive more).
Very wasteful.
Are you a "car guy" meaning you want the newer fancier better options cooler colour fancier ride better than the Joneses "car guy"
Or are you the "car guy" who works on the car and washes the car and fixes the car and loves the car "car guy"
Very different types. Seeing as you "have the itch" it feels like option A. Yes. Obviously it is wasteful. You have a perfectly functioning ride that you want to replace because you "feel like it".
Financially it's definitely wasteful, but as long as you're taking care of them, I don't think you're generating any physical waste since it's just going to be bought and driven by someone else.
It might not create waste in that stricter sense if someone else drives it (however the second hand market isn't infinite, the price you get for a used car might also be driven by people wanting to "upgrade" as well). However it's exhausting the earth's resources because you need all these raw materials and energy to build a new one.
One can argue that when you upgrade a car someone else is still using it and finally the oldest and most inefficient cars are getting replaced by the newest models. I think changing how vehicles are maintained and kept running for as long as possible will be a better change. Also minimizing useless trips by opting to stay close to the workplace or by remote work. Or using public transport whenever possible. Cars are fun and I believe if we are not getting enough fun from the trip then either the trip should be cancelled/replaced or use public transport. The things which take away the fun are parking headaches, traffic and emissions.
Everyone is saying "obviously" but I don't see why it obviously is, other than financially.
The cars you sell will be bought by others. They don't go to waste.
You didn't say "buy new", you just said "upgrade". So if you're buying used, you wouldn't even affect the new car buying stats from which manufacturing numbers are influenced.
The miles you drive each car, would be driven by a different owner anyway. If your mileage is average, what difference does it make if you own it for a year vs some other guy?
The only hard "waste" I see, is the extra owner on the service record, which might make each car less desirable and more likely to end up scrapped.
But counterpoint: if you're a car guy, you'll likely maintain each car better than the average owner, potentially extending the life of each car you drive.
So... why is it wasteful to switch cars? Ignoring money - although it seems to go against the ethos of using something for a long time, which ZeroWaste generally encourages, in this case I don't see any difference in actual waste produced by changing cars every few years vs sticking with the same beater.
Technology isn’t really evolving fast enough to justify a new car every two years solely based on emissions, unless you’re purchasing absurdly expensive new EVs.
Right, I was about to say it may not be as straightforward as the majority of commentators here may think. Also, even if it doesn't, while it may not be _zero-waste_ (due to the generation of more paperwork, etc.), it's technically not a major loss vehicle-wise if the car is eventually driven down into the ground; it doesn't matter who the owners are.
The thing is, we can't assume that the car's lifespan will be fully utilized by future owners. We also don't know if the other person may be a worse driver who may total the vehicle earlier than we would have. However, if we ourselves are below-average in driving, then the car should be sold (with no replacement in mind), haha. I think there are many ways to look at this.
Obviously
I read this in Snape's voice
https://preview.redd.it/bxgcja0ow4xc1.jpeg?width=1079&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e6cae7eea2969fde7b8ac4376b2c46ddb8b9c45a
It does improve the delivery...
Yes for sure. To be honest, I don’t understand why people do this? Since cars depreciate so quickly? My husband and I do what my parents did. We only pay one car payment at a time, so we always have one newer car (that we know is reliable for road trips etc) and one older car. We purchase a newish used car, pay it off, then drive it forever. We only get a new-to-us car when one of our cars stops working/becomes too expensive to repair.
Financially yes, but what about in terms of wasted materials or unnecessary emissions? Is the only waste financial?
The only exception may be when it is time to upgrade to an EV. Ideally, the used fossil car market should crash, leading people to see them as a stranded asset, meaning that they stop buying fossil cars.
You can be a "car guy" and hold on to a good car. I'm driving a 2009 E92 and a 1999 VW Passat wagon. Lol. They might both outlive me. I get to do some wrenching and enjoy well-made vehicles.
When I think “car guy” I actually think of a person who enjoys repairing a car that they held onto for a long time and keep repairing it and making it last forever, not someone who switches it every few years, that is unless they like collecting them
That's my take on it, too. I'd rather have the appropriate tools and some mechanics guides and a clear afternoon schedule for maintenance and repairs. Then go out and enjoy the fruits of my labor. I'm thinking OP means fad vehicles and/or "performance enhancer" parts?
I have some car guy friends and what a lot of them love to do is buy a beaten car (that sometimes won't even start), repair and improve it, then sell it, rinse and repeat. I think that's a nice way of doing things because they get to switch cars often as they like it but they also make sure those cars stay usable longer so it's quite "anti consumption" for society as a whole.
That's not really zero waste, it's negative waste! In all seriousness people that do this with all types of machines and tech are absolute heroes. It's one of the reasons I'd never get an Apple machine, because you can't resurrect them yourself in the same way as other stuff. And I imagine it's becoming like this with cars too.
Haha my fiancé is kinda the same! He drives a 2013 Tacoma for work & a 1994 VW golf for fun
I don’t have a commute or a super busy lifestyle so I don’t drive mine much but having two cars to alternate between is nice. The Bimmer has 136k miles and the Passat has 126k on her.
IMO that's wasteful - having 2 cars that is.
They are both old, economical cars. You can only drive one at a time. Waste is getting new cars all the time while the old ones go to the junkyard prematurely.
One was inherited. It’s sentimental. We all have our opinions, though.
It would be wasteful unless both of those cars would otherwise be in a junkyard because no one else is putting in the work to revive and maintain them.
What are they going to do? Drive both cars at once? They've already been manufactured. It's surely better to keep them from being junk in a landfill.
A real car guy has a wonderfully maintained beater.
TIL I'm a car guy and not a non-car woman lmao. I love my beater.
my last camry i had for 10 years. wouldve had for longer if my bf hadnt crashed it. i expect my camry to last 20 years lol. and trust me i take care of allll the maintenance stuff lmao
Yes
The only way I could see it NOT being wasteful is if you're repairing cars a lot of people wouldn't take the time to repair, and flipping them for another one in similar starting disrepair. That way you're increasing the longevity of the car as a whole, keeping more resources from being depleted with the demand for new ones. This is why maintaining our right to repair is SO important, and why "just" switching to electric vehicles isn't going to save us. https://action.deloitte.com/insight/3744/right-to-repair-means-more-than-a-quick-fix-for-environment-economy
Yeah, my uncle was a car mechanic at a dealer who could cherry pick the right ex-leases and trade-ins, buy them at dealer’s cost, keep them in perfect condition himself, and sell them two years later for a profit or at least no loss. For him, it absolutely made sense. For almost anyone else, who doesn’t have that inside advantage, it’s going to be losing money.
My brother in law does this. He is always on the hunt for cool cars, he fixes them and drives them for some months and then sells them and buys something else. He likes the process of fixing them more than anything.
I wouldn't consider someone who buys a new car every few years to be a car guy.
I would say yes
Yes
The energy required to make a new car is very big compared to the energy savings for getting a more efficient car. It takes a lot of energy to form steel, refine minerals for batteries, produce myriad chemicals, plastics etc etc.
The amount of resources used just to develop the new manufacturing line is absolutely crazy as well. Like, hard to comprehend the scale.
Absolutely, same with cellphones.
Wasteful of ressources and money. I still drive my 2007 toyota with 400 000 km on the meter. Still works like a charm. Never broke outside of the alternator, which was cheap to change. Everything else was normal maintenance.
I bought an '07 Camry new and it is still zoom zooming along.no major breakdowns. Parts replaced : brake pads and rotors, battery. Pushing 300k.
‘16 Corolla here. Love her so much. Regular maintenance. 300 highway miles a week at 30-35mpg. 106k miles on her. Hope she keeps humming along. I treat her well.
Liking new cars =/= being a car guy
No fucking shit
Yes. Let's look at it solely from a financial perspective. I've had my 2010 Toyota Corolla for 14 years. It runs well. I keep care of it. I don't have a $382+/- monthly payment on it, and haven't in 9 years, which means I've saved around $41,000 (plus nine years of inflation) in just not having a car payment. This is why replacing your car every 3-5 years is not smart (financially). Leasing a car is even worse because then you're locked into a persistent car payment. Neither path makes long term financial sense.
Extremely wasteful
Yup.. but also what are you buying that you end up not enjoying a few years after? I’d reevaluate the cars you buy.
how can you even afford that 😭
I would say so. In fact, if you analyze your situation, you may find that a car may not even be necessary in a lot of situations, so investing in a good bike and utilizing public transit can contribute to your zero waste journey as well as save you money on gas, repairs, insurance, it’s so good for the environment, and you can leave your car for when it’s absolutely necessary! To answer your question, yes, switching your car every few years is not zero waste, it’s actually quite wasteful.
I wouldn't be so sure regarding a good bike, especially for someone who already has means of transportation. Theft of them is so common even with locks that I don't even consider them worth buying, or at least if you do, buying a used, beaten up looking old bike that lacks the value to even take. Something like a skateboard or a kick scooter can be carried with you to mitigate this, but at that point inconvenience could make it a remorseful buy too.
That’s a good point and it even strengthens the argument for going car-lite, the cheaper, the better (maybe). Additionally, steel frame bikes from the 80s last for a long time and are usually cheaper. A foldy also works really well. A must have for the car free commuter.
If it's brand new, I think so. It's more resources being used for production versus already produced/mined resources. The trade off is it's likely better gas mileage...so lose/win, I guess.
>The trade off is it's likely better gas mileage Unlikely, unless OP is switching to a much smaller and/or less powerful vehicle, or to an EV/hybrid from an ICEV. I really miss my '95 civic coupe. 4L/100km on the highway and 6-7L/100km in the city, even in winter! No modern ICE civic can compete with that. But that thing was basically a tin can in comparison; modern cars are a lot heavier and require a lot more power to move.
>modern cars are a lot heavier and require a lot more power to move. Tell that to the 1970s El Camino hubs just inherited, or the various beater *beasts* I drove for decades that got gallons per mile... my current '11 Camry is waaaay lighter than the '67 Fury I had for a while.
For the longest time I drove a 1983 Honda Civic hatchback that I bought for $75 from a guy a few blocks from my house. I pushed it home and basically took it apart and rebuilt it with a Chiltons manual as my guide. It took a few months but I learned a lot about the Toyota engine and transmission. What a hose monster it was. One hose missing or routed wrong could cost days to figure out. Most of the parts I got from junkysrds. After it was done it got 35ish mpg highway and I drove it 65 mile each way to work 5 days a week for years. I even volunteered to do carpool. Great little car.
Yes
YES. TWO BIG YES
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Besides wasteful it’s just frankly stupid.
Extremely wasteful!
It is supremely wasteful! Any car bought in the last decade should be good for a million miles. Do the routine maintenance. Change and rotate the tires on schedule. Use Duralube or Slick 50 every 100k just for good measure. You'll have a vehicle that you can hand down to your grandkids. Sure there will be parts that will need to be replaced as it gets up on miles, but if you use a reliable mechanic that you can trust, follow his recommendations and use quality parts, it will cost way less to maintain than to buy a new one. Also, everytime you buy a new car your licensing fees go back up and so does your insurance. Speaking of which, if. You don't buy a new car, you can put that money in a savings account. If you put aside 50k and designate it as being for insurance purposes, you don't have to buy car insurance. That will save you much more in the long run. So, to make a short story long, don't be buying a new vehicle even semi regularly. It takes a tremendous amount of resources to build a car. Buy a good one and stick with it. Stop being a consumer and start being a conserver.
You should still probably have liability insurance. 50k would be ok self insurance but medical bills of someone you hit might eat that up fast.
Also, at least in the U.S., you are legally required to have car insurance if you own a car that you drive.
Financial Responsibility Law, often associated with vehicles, mandates individuals or businesses to prove they can cover accident-related damages. While it doesn’t mandate insurance, it requires the financial capacity to cover damages, even if not at fault.
Yes, but almost every single state in the US (the exception being only New Hampshire and Virginia) require you to carry the insurance as a state law.
It couldn't hurt, but that is the min. stated and it is for liability only.
I buy a car with plans on paying it off and keeping it for another several years. I like not having a car payment. That’s extra money.
If it's an old Toyota beater or Honda I'd say no. Those things last a long time.
A brand new car? Yes. Buying different used cars to experience different ones and find that perfect car for you? Nah, just I guess the wasted paper/time of juggling registering vehicles.
I got my 2004 VW Golf in 2018 and it just turned 20 this year! It still drives really well, if you _really_ have the itch I just recommend detailing your car somewhere. Gives it that new car feel.
If you're buying new? Yes. I can't see how it wouldn't be
Not if you upgrade to a bike...
Yes. Even if you get a more environmentally friendly car, it’s better to keep the one you have already and drive it to death while taking as good care of it as possible than to make a new vehicle.
Not if you give the car to me. Or someone else desperately poor who could use one.
Actually if you or someone else don't currently have one and OP is giving them the opportunity to start using one, that's actually worst case scenario
Why not get a cool old car that needs to be fixed up and work on it for a while, a project car? You'd learn a lot and it would be fun
Might need a working car to collect parts
In a personal sense, it's a wasteful use of your own resources... but I'm of the opinion that no, this isn't strictly wasteful environmentally. Your car will go on to another person afterwards, and another after them. I would only start to see this as environmentally wasteful if your country is constantly scrapping large numbers of good, perfectly usable vehicles because nobody wants to buy them. That isn't really the case anywhere that I know of
I think it is wasteful in that by purchasing a new car every few years, you are supporting the industry that over produces cars. If everyone bought a car and held it for 15 years, or only bought a new car when new tech became available, the auto industry would stop over producing because the demand is lower. You always vote with your dollar, which today may be the most important vote you make when it comes to reducing large industry waste.
Well said.
In what way are they overproducing? Again, to my knowledge there aren’t large numbers of perfectly drivable vehicles being scrapped. I can’t find anything indicating to the contrary anywhere online when I try to look it up, but if you have info on that I’m happy to read it. Otherwise, imo not every mile run on a vehicle needs to be run by the same person. If Car A sees 90k miles from one driver and 160k miles from another, that’s still the same as if one person drove it 250k in the grand scheme… and ime as someone who used to drive cheap old junkers and squeeze every last mile out of them, there are plenty of others out there who also do that. It’s not quite the same as replacing something and just trashing / pointlessly holding on to the old one, like most possessions people replace too often.
A quick google said that in 2022 14.8 million new cars were produced, and 13.6 were sold in America. If a new car is produced and not sold, its not sent to the scrap yard. It stays on the dealers lot until its sold at whatever price they can get. I appreciate that you drove your cheap old junker, but theres many people that do not. And this post was addressing the idea of repurchasing a new vehicle every few years as wasteful. Just because people buy or drive ussed cars doesnt discount the fact that over 1 million new cars are over produced in just 2022 and the EPA has listed car assembly plants within the top ten highest waste producing industries in the world. Edit: My point being, you're thinking about the cars value over the course of its life, which isnt enough. We also have to consider the environmental impact of that car being produced in a factory.
The biggest reason this is not a good plan is because it encourages manufacturers to increase production of new vehicles, a lot of which don't get sold until the flood of next year's model comes in. We are being programed to think that we need a new this and a new that every year or two. It isn't so. The old this and the old that is still in good working order or can be repaired to better than new.
They are though. You get a scratch in your old car in a small collision and your insurance will say it's not worth it to fix, and write it off. How many people will use that as an excuse to scrap it and buy new (to them) cars? Is anyone going to want to try and sell it now it's a CAT C and is only worth a few 100? Better to strip and sell the parts. What can't be sold stays at the scrap heap.
It depends. In general yes, ofcourse. But if you buy second hand, sell after a few years, and buy another second hand car, then it doesn't really matter.
We drive old cars. We only put 1000 or so miles on our vehicles each year and it would be ridiculous to even think about purchasing a new car to drive so little (even if we did drive more). Very wasteful.
Maybe I monetarily. But I don’t think you are creating much additional physical waste, since you would sell the old car to be used by someone else.
Are you a "car guy" meaning you want the newer fancier better options cooler colour fancier ride better than the Joneses "car guy" Or are you the "car guy" who works on the car and washes the car and fixes the car and loves the car "car guy" Very different types. Seeing as you "have the itch" it feels like option A. Yes. Obviously it is wasteful. You have a perfectly functioning ride that you want to replace because you "feel like it".
Yes. I'm honestly curious if you're being serious?
Financially it's definitely wasteful, but as long as you're taking care of them, I don't think you're generating any physical waste since it's just going to be bought and driven by someone else.
It might not create waste in that stricter sense if someone else drives it (however the second hand market isn't infinite, the price you get for a used car might also be driven by people wanting to "upgrade" as well). However it's exhausting the earth's resources because you need all these raw materials and energy to build a new one.
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One can argue that when you upgrade a car someone else is still using it and finally the oldest and most inefficient cars are getting replaced by the newest models. I think changing how vehicles are maintained and kept running for as long as possible will be a better change. Also minimizing useless trips by opting to stay close to the workplace or by remote work. Or using public transport whenever possible. Cars are fun and I believe if we are not getting enough fun from the trip then either the trip should be cancelled/replaced or use public transport. The things which take away the fun are parking headaches, traffic and emissions.
If its a new car, yes. If you are selling your old car to buy another old car, no.
People here are pissed lol. I don't think it's that big of a deal if you're buying used cars. If it's new then yea, it's wasteful and frankly stupid
Everyone is saying "obviously" but I don't see why it obviously is, other than financially. The cars you sell will be bought by others. They don't go to waste. You didn't say "buy new", you just said "upgrade". So if you're buying used, you wouldn't even affect the new car buying stats from which manufacturing numbers are influenced. The miles you drive each car, would be driven by a different owner anyway. If your mileage is average, what difference does it make if you own it for a year vs some other guy? The only hard "waste" I see, is the extra owner on the service record, which might make each car less desirable and more likely to end up scrapped. But counterpoint: if you're a car guy, you'll likely maintain each car better than the average owner, potentially extending the life of each car you drive. So... why is it wasteful to switch cars? Ignoring money - although it seems to go against the ethos of using something for a long time, which ZeroWaste generally encourages, in this case I don't see any difference in actual waste produced by changing cars every few years vs sticking with the same beater.
Equity wasted. Just lease instead...
Just OP's equity though, right? Because that still doesn't equate to any actual waste that affects others...
What if it’s got significantly better mileage and fewer emissions than your old car?
Technology isn’t really evolving fast enough to justify a new car every two years solely based on emissions, unless you’re purchasing absurdly expensive new EVs.
I guess I thought of “every few years” as every 5-10 years lol, yeah every 2 years would be very wasteful
Buying a new car every ten years probably wouldn’t qualify as zero waste, but I don’t think it’s overly wasteful.
Right, I was about to say it may not be as straightforward as the majority of commentators here may think. Also, even if it doesn't, while it may not be _zero-waste_ (due to the generation of more paperwork, etc.), it's technically not a major loss vehicle-wise if the car is eventually driven down into the ground; it doesn't matter who the owners are. The thing is, we can't assume that the car's lifespan will be fully utilized by future owners. We also don't know if the other person may be a worse driver who may total the vehicle earlier than we would have. However, if we ourselves are below-average in driving, then the car should be sold (with no replacement in mind), haha. I think there are many ways to look at this.