Easy on those Brakes Buddy

Shahwar encourages you to drive with a light foot, but it’s not what you think!

Global warming is a reality, and we all contribute towards it. Scientists have been telling us for years on end that the glaciers are melting, sea levels are rising alarmingly, and that nations will be wiped out like Atlantis – not to mention that the depletion of the Ozone layer will give us all skin cancer.

These reports scare the daylights out of us for momentarily. But after the initial frenzy, the newspapers and journals tone down their reports and eventually stop publishing them altogether – until there’s a severe case of drought, or a flood, or a freak storm somewhere. We sweep the issue under the carpet, and go back to our old wasteful ways. But global warming is here – now – and these frightful reports might just be the exception that proves the rule.

Like I said, we must all take responsibility for contributing towards this harsh reality. Smoke from our factories, our air conditioners, the perfumes we use, deforestation, cutting up hills and filling up precious wetlands, building concrete jungles, and, unfortunately, our automobiles.

Environmentalists tell us to plant more trees, but trees take years to grow and reach a stage where they can contribute towards the retardation of the Green House effect. But, if we motorists want to do something about global warming, and fast at that, we can do so right now. Just go out and stay off the brakes! Use the brakes by all means to prevent from rear-ending the car in front of you, but do so gently.

Braking produces heat, and serious heat at that. Some years ago, a study was conducted in the US about the heat generated by automotive brakes. The study showed that when a large car like a Mercedes 560SEL travelling at a speed of 100km/h brakes to a standstill within a very short distance, the brake pads and tyres generate 730 BTU’s (British Thermal Units). 1 BTU is the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of 225 liters of water by 1 degree Fahrenheit. It was calculated that if the big Merc brakes like this five or six times a day, enough heat would be generated to cook a decent meal.

Delhi has a minimum of 2.5 million cars on the road on any given day, and that means 2.5 million stoves being kept burning all day – every day. Even if the stoves are turned to low, that many stoves means serious heat.

The silver lining, though, is the fact that the heat generated is directly proportional to the mass of the car. So a small 800cc car will generate much less heat than an SUV. And India has an overwhelming number of small cars. But speed has a far more telling effect. Double the speed, and you generate four times the heat. Just imagine the amount of heat a DTC bus generates. Most of them are driven at breakneck speed, which means they brake equally hard.

I was being driven to the airport the other day in an Innova, and I felt that the driver must have been watching a little too much of the World Rally Championship. He invariably had the throttle fully open as he approached traffic signals, even if he could see the red light from a long way off. He braked hard right at the last moment, when he could very well have coasted down and braked softly. That would not only cause less heat to be generated from the brakes, but also release less CO2 from the exhaust and use less fuel.

We don’t have to wait for the government to come up with some set of rules (with many loopholes) to force us to drive sensibly – we call all do so ourselves starting today.

We can all help address global warming, even if it’s to a small extent, if we just go out and keep those burners at ‘low.’ It’s criminal, and selfish, for of us to continue contaminating and pre-heating our children’s air.
Unless some jaywalker with a death wish comes waltzing in your path, use a light foot on that brake pedal.