Scooters and The Environment

Scooters and The Environment

So Taggart and Liz own a moped scooter, a 2003 Yamaha Vino, and they very graciously allow Todd and I to make use of it.

Most scooters have two-stroke engines, as opposed to the 4-stroke engines powering motorcycles and automobiles.

I decided to poke around the internet and learn about two stroke engines. I ended up at howstuffworks.com where I found an excellent explanation of how two stroke engines work.

From this explanation I learned the various disadvantages of two stroke engines, namely that they produce a lot of pollution and do not use fuel efficiently.

This got me thinking about something I read in one of Sara's posts. She was writing that her boyfriend drives a scooter because he wants to "leave a smaller ecological footprint than most humans do."

If he is riding around on a scooter with two-stroke engine (I don't know what kind of scooter he rides...), is this really helping to leave a smaller ecological footprint? I wonder how it works out with Taggart's Vino, for example. The Vino gets around 80 miles-per-gallon. But in doing so it dumps a disproportionate amount of pollutants into the air...

It seems like the best idea, if the environment is a concern, is to get a four stroke scooter like the Honda Metropolitan...