Car makers have done their bit. Now it's our turn

The British International Motor Show, taking place at Excel in London's Docklands, is an appropriate moment to offer a word of thanks to the car companies.

Yes, indeed. The Society for Motor Manufacturers and Traders, the industry's lobby group, has long been producing figures showing how much more fuel- efficient cars are now, with consequent benefits for carbon dioxide emissions and other pollution. This evidence has been unfairly ignored, perhaps because so many people dismiss all road transport as evil (even if they happen to run a car themselves).
Yet the numbers are impressive. Only a decade ago the average CO2 emissions of new cars sold in the UK was a whopping 190g/km. Today, the figures are heading towards the 160g/km mark. If all goes well and the EU's latest targets are met, that will be closer to 140g/km by 2012, with a further 10g/km shaved off emissions through the use of improved tyres and sustainable biofuels, for instance. Another example: it would take 50 new 2008 model Ford Fiestas to produce the same toxic emissions as a single Mk I Fiesta from 1976.
Now, it is true that innovations such as the catalytic converter, green labelling and ever tighter rules on engine design have been driven by the authorities, especially the EU. But it is the engineers at Ford, General Motors, VW, Toyota, Fiat and all the rest who are the real heroes in the fight against global warming and climate change.
The problem is us, as the graphic shows (and I'm grateful to the Energy Saving Trust for the insight). The improvement in the general level of emissions seen in the past 10 years has been largely manufacturer driven, because we are broadly buying the same "mix" of cars as we were then; the lower emissions have come from the fact that a 2007 Clio/Mondeo/Mercedes-Benz is cleaner than its 1998 ancestor. But if we were to pick the greenest models in each category (SUV, family hatch, exec saloon etc) or even downsize, we too could do our bit. And where better to pick your next green car than at the Motor Show?