A debate around phasing out SUVs on Irish roads needs to define exactly what they are.

Trinity College Dublin Professor Brian Caulfield told The Pat Kenny Show sport utility vehicles (SUVs) create a “less safe environment” for road users and our climate. 

“These cars have a 20% higher emissions profile than a saloon car or hatchback car,” he said. "They're producing more emissions – and we're selling more and more of them year on year.” 

Prof Caulfield said 22,000 SUVs were sold in Ireland last year, 14,000 of which were petrol or diesel.

He said while many SUVs are electric, they still need more energy “to push these bigger vehicles through the roads”.  

“They use a much higher amount of the rare minerals that we need to put into our electric vehicles.” 

Prof Caulfield acknowledged SUVs are more accessible for bigger equipment and large families – but “we need to just be a little bit more careful about the types and sizes of vehicles that we were using”. 

“Those vehicles are going to be knocking around in our fleet for decades causing emissions,” he said. 

He suggested that SUVs should be phased out through increased taxes on cars based on their size.  

Snobbery 

Transportation consultant Conor Faughnan said we need to agree on a definition of an SUV because of the varying sizes.  

He also said the debate is “conflating” SUVs with climate change and pushing “snobbery” around the vehicles.  

“We don't like SUVs because they're big, they take up too much space in our cities,” he said. "I think they're fair points, but they're nothing to do with the climate debate.” 

“It's a mistake to borrow the legitimacy and the importance of the climate argument.” 

Mr Faughnan also said we already had a “very good tax structure” whereby you paid more tax when your car produces more pollution.  

“It was so successful, that there's now no such thing as a band, C, D or E car,” he said.  

Mr Faughnan said we don’t know why any single person buys an SUV, so we cannot judge their choices.  

Road safety 

Prof Caulfield said once again that SUVs should be “phased out” because of their high emissions profile – but there are more problems.  

“I come at it from a climate perspective, but also from a road safety perspective,” he said.  

Prof Caulfield said SUVs take up more road space, which is “pushing people away from using cycling and walking on our streets”. 

“It encroaches on cyclists and makes it a less safe environment to exist in,” he said.  

“Up until recently, these SUVs had a big bull bar in front of them,” Prof Caulfield said. “If you walk past one of these SUVs in the schoolyard, you'd struggle to see a toddler in front of it.”