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-   -   Cars idling at crossings burn Rs 1,000cr a year in Delhi (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian-car-scene/43684-cars-idling-crossings-burn-rs-1-000cr-year-delhi.html)

Cars idling at crossings burn Rs 1,000cr a year in Delhi-Pollution-Earth-The Times of India

Interesting article. Though I am not entirely convinced by the findings of Central Road Research Institute (CRRI). If a wait at a signal is more than a minute, I switch off the engine else I do not. This study says if cars switch off their engines at traffic signals that are more than 14 seconds, it would save a good 1000 cr. I'd assume it is not healthy for a car to be switched off and then crank it to life again in less than 15 seconds again. I do not have a technical explanation to this, though.

What is the opinion of other T-BHPians? Gurus?

I always think the money getting wasted with idling can be used to construct fly overs and road widening. The is even the case with bad roads. I do not know when Govt learns this. :Frustrati

One more important point is that the pollution that is caused by these jams.

Edit: You can not switch of your car as you will not aware how much the signal stays RED. Govt is lethargic in putting up the timers (LEDs and Solar Panels) at all signals and educate public to save fuel. I used to switch off my car initial days. After all this confusion I changed my habit. Other points that has to be considered are:

1. You have to bear all the horn noise if car fails to start at one crank. How about putting electric starts to the cars as 2 wheelers.
2. If you switch off the engine, You need to sit in the car with with windows rolled down or run your AC on Battery. Would be difficult in sunny days leave alone Indian summers.

-BSR

Agree. Cars use an extra bit of fuel to start up, so I don't think switching off at 15-20 seconds would make an big saving. For a minute or so, it's a different matter. But again, the figures are suppposed to be arrived at by experts, so they might know a thing or two!:)

Other things that could be done are: gentle but steady throttle at the green light, and avoiding stalling the vehicle.

I don't think starting the engine again will do any harm but I also thought that wait has to be atleast a min to save any fuel by turning off the engine. Maybe they meant that if there was no traffic signal, just flyovers then we might save Rs1000crore a year? What would be the cost of constructing flyovers at each traffic signal + traffic problem (jams = reduced fuel economy) for that amount of time?

Exactly my thoughts on restarting the engine at a traffic signal. I always thought bringing to engine life consumes more fuel than otherwise, so if I encounter 4-5 signals on my way to work I'd use more fuel contrary to what the report says. But again, the research is conducted by experts in the auto industry!

Can we get some technical guys on the forum to clarify this?

I guess a 15 second stop and re-crank would not hamper the modern engines. Yes the incessant honking from behind can be irritating, but this can just change with time ( or you would get used to it ;-) ).

There was an article in a malayalam news paper 'Mathrubhumi' that Bosch has developed an system by which engines will switch off automatically when idled for a fixed time. Pressing the clutch subsequently will reactivate the engine. As claimed, the dual advantage of this is - fuel saving and 8% reducion in CO2 emission.
I can post an image of the e-paper article if required.

On my morning commute, my skoda reads 10 km/l till HAL airport. The stop start traffic till Marathahalli brings it to 7 km/l. By switching off ignition, i manage it to 8.5 - 9 km/l

Again, the same road at night, with thin traffic and 40km/h as opposed to 22 k/h average speed sees me getting 12 km/l!

It would be a nice read. Please post it.

-BSR

1000 crores? Thats a small amount compared to how much fuel is wasted due to bad roads. I expect that figure to be atleast 100x. Let the government first finish whats on its plate before it attempts to dig into others.

Its just this kind of wastage that prompted Honda to develop their Civic hybrid to shut its engine off when you come to a stop and restart as you accelerate away on electric power.

We can't save the fuel wasted and neither the 1000 crs that it's worth, even if we have a lot of flyovers built even then the sum won't come down drastically, as cars on our roads are rising by the day and the roads we have just can't support them. I don't want to sound pessimistic , but I believe it's reality.

The best bet would be to make cities expand and have proper infrastructure in place so that people can move out of Cities and have a good or better life style, where every facility is available.

Today metro rail is really the answer in all big cities. You need to use the Delhi Metro once to realise how fantastic it is. Later common pool electric vehicles could ferry you to your destination from the nearest station.

Here it is. Its in malayalam. Transalation provided below.


<Transalation>
Title: Mechanism to stop vehicles at signals

Bangalore: Bosch company has informed that it has developed a mechanism by which vehicle engines automatically switch off at signals and at traffic jams. Vehicles fitted with this mechanism from Bosch will switch off engines if idle for a fixed time. Subsequently, if the clutch is pressed, the engine will be functional again. The company clarified that by using this mechanism, apart from fuel savings, CO2 emission can be reduced by 8%.
</Translation>

agree:
That's the only way forward. Metro is in that direction but needs a lot more coverage and better supporting public transport it maximise usage. People like me (or us) who are used to AC offices, cars & homes are not going to use it if I need to hang out from a crowded bus to reach the Metro station.