back to article This city's smog is so TERRIBLE, people are told to stay indoors. Beijing? No – PARIS

Residents in romantic Paris are advised to take public transit and avoid cars as the city was today shrouded with a heavy cloud of pollution. City officials have made public transportation free in the French capital through the weekend as the European Environment Agency (EEA) warned of "unusually high" pollution levels across …

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  1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Trollface

    Free public transit in Paris?

    You don't get a place even if you PAY!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Free public transport

      How bad would things in Blighty have to get before that was offered???

  2. Herby
    Coat

    Cure for "global warming"??

    Smog. Look, they mentioned that it might cause "nuclear winter".

    Maybe, we need to see the air we are breathing. You might get ill on air that is too clear!

    I'll leave it to others to debate this further. I'm outta here!

    1. Charles Manning

      Well it does raise some interesting issues...

      How many of the temperature sensors used in climate change models are within these smog islands?

      Even when the smog levels are not this bad, the smog is going to be distorting the data used in any models. Garbage in, garbage out.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Well it does raise some interesting issues...

        Garbage in, garbage out. It has been that way for years and when they can't find the data they just make it up.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Cure for "global warming"??

      The "cure" may not be the one you wish for. Oh, it could reduce temperatures, but probably not via solar dithering about, but through poisoning off the population producing CO2.

      However, as often said, if/how/when there is any human attributed global warming, things like local smog are certain immediate events we can observe and usually wish to avoid. If the knock on effect of keeping our local and immediate environment clean and safe helps the long term to, then it's win win.

  3. Lars Silver badge
    Coat

    Nice

    Perhaps the Chinese should do the same for some years.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Of course, pollution that says, "Cower indoors!" to Parisians probably says, "Let's go out and play!" to someone accustomed to Beijing-scale particle counts.

  5. Hit Snooze
    Joke

    That wasn't smog

    ...it was smug!

    1. TheRealRoland

      Re: That wasn't smog

      smaug?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    That'll be all those crappy French cars with engines burning oil.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      That'll be all those crappy French cars with engines burning oil.

      Not very polite, but your comment is pretty accurate.

      It has proven much more difficult than expected to get the particulates out of Diesel exhaust - because the smaller particles are the worst and hardest to remove. The problem with particulate filters getting blocked is quite serious, and the additional costs of complicated turbocharging, catalytic converters and the rest have made Diesels more expensive to make and to repair. So people keep old ones longer.

      In France, the large disparity between the price of Diesel and petrol is a Diesel subsidy and has had the usual unwanted side effect - an installed park of too many older Diesel vehicles which don't comply with current emission limits.

      Meanwhile in this country the haulage industry comes up with many reasons, some even real, why Diesel should continue to be cheaper per kilogram (it is denser than petrol) than petrol. If fuel was taxed entirely according to either the energy per kilo or the carbon dioxide per kilo, the price of Diesel would go up, the incentive to buy Diesel cars would go down, and eventually air quality would benefit (note - I am making no assumptions either way about global warming, which is nothing to do with air quality in towns.)

      1. JeffyPoooh
        Pint

        Re: That'll be all those crappy French cars with engines burning oil.

        They've made a mistake. They've reportedly instituted usage limits on cars.

        They should have instituted limits on just the diesel smoldering cars and trucks. And then invited modern petrol powered cars to SVP leave their engines running day and night to clean the air.

    2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

      You are mostly spot on

      I have had to deal with multiple french car from both major french manufacturers over the last 25 years.

      First of all, it is only PSV which suffers from the oil burn problem. Renaults generally burn clean even when they are 20 years old. We have given away a 1989 Clio we used to have as a present to relatives and it is still running at this age somewhere in the "Wild East" and still having a very nice clean burn. No smoke, no smell of oil at all. Passing MOT emissions with flying colors every time.

      Second, PSV has gotten better now. Their worst years were during the cooperation with Ford on engines ~ 10-15 years ago when every PSV (and every Ford for that matter) started to stink of burned oil between 5-7 years of service. These are now are behind them (newer ones are nowhere near as bad). That is not surprising as the reliability after 5-7 years was also complete crap. Funnily enough their own engines (ones they did not cooperate with anyone on) from the same period f.e. the 1.9 basic non-turbo diesel which went into vans and the lower spec Citroen Xara estate do not stink, do not burn oil and still run like a clockwork till this day (16+ years after they have left the factory line). So it may not necessarily be PSV's fault anyway - it may be the "partner" from that period.

  7. Esskay

    Proof

    That there really are too many french people in France.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Trollface

      Re: Proof

      TIme to move to Hollande.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Proof

      Londres is the fifth or sixth largest French city (cite: Heard on R4)

      Anyway, how on earth can there be a proof of "There are too many ..." ?

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Proof

      Many paysants don't regard Parisians as French, but rather a race from another planet.

    4. James O'Shea

      Re: Proof

      "That there really are too many french people in France."

      No there aren't. There are too _few_ French people in France, because there are too many French people outside of France. Throw them all back in, especially any Quebecois you might find, and then sink the place.

  8. Johnny Canuck

    Here in Canada

    We have our own problem with the French polluting our airwaves with more talk of separation. Which gives me a foot in the door for a French joke.

    Two cats, an English cat and a French cat decide to have a swimming race across the Ottawa river. The English cat is named One Two Three and the French cat is named Un Deux Trois. Who won the race?

    The English cat. Un Deux Trois cat sank,.

    Most French people don't get it.

    Coat, hat, gone.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Here in Canada

      Deux chats, un chat et un chat Anglais Français décident d'avoir une course de natation dans la rivière des Outaouais. Le chat Anglais est nommé One Two Three et le chat français est nommé Un Deux Trois. Qui a gagné la course?

      Le chat anglais. Un Deux Trois chat coulé.

      Nope

      Modified

      The English cat. Un Deux Trois cat five,.

      Deux chats, un chat et un chat Anglais Français décident d'avoir une course de natation dans la rivière des Outaouais. Le chat Anglais est nommé One Two Three et le chat français est nommé Un Deux Trois. Qui a gagné la course?

      Le chat anglais. Un Deux Trois chat cinq.

      Ah, oui, je comprends, vous l'anglais et votre sens de l'humour drôle.

    2. James O'Shea

      Re: Here in Canada

      Quebecois = Frenchman driving large American car

      French driver = self-propelled death machine

      Therefore, Quebecois = large, dangerous self-propelled death machine.

      Yes, I just had a close encounter with a Caddy with Quebec plates, driven by a 90-year-old nearsighted twit. At 90 MPH in a 45 MPH zone. 'Tis a pity that my car doesn't have James Bond rocket launchers. Or at least a machine gun or two.

      Could Canada please, please, PLEASE keep the damn Quebecois at home, or at least confiscate their lethal weapons at the border? Please?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Here in Canada

        I just drove through Quebec. It's a police state with coppers every mile or two along the entire length of Route 20. Everyone is carefully plodding along at 105 kmh max with the same-old same-old 100 kmh limit. Boring. Scenery is nothing but power pylons.

        As soon as you reach New Brunswick, land of the free, the roads are smooth, the police have other things to attend to (none anywhere), the limit is 110 kmh, the big trucks (lorries) are all carefully doing 140 kmh, and one can simply whistle along (Ahem...) enjoying the natural beauty.

        (And because the NB highway designers are not idiots, the oncoming traffic lanes are 200m on the other side of a forested median. So one's high beam headlights can remain on for 95% of the time without bothering anyone. Night becomes day, very safe.)

        The policing contrast is stark. It doesn't bode well for personal freedom under a PQ state.

  9. Busby

    Ah gay Paris, no one has realised it's nothing to do with industrial pollution. I'm convinced this is purely down to Gitans.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Gay Paris? Never mind the smog .. better beware of the floods!

  10. Sil

    The levels are only for so called micro particules. China's pollution is absolutely not limited to those. Just go spend a week in Shanghai, I guarantee you'll feel the difference with Paris, London or Berlin on your eyes and lungs, no official warning needed.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Beijing

      I was in Beijing a few months ago. The sky was sickly disgusting brown.

      I'd like to visit again, after they fix that.

  11. Joe Zeff
    Pint

    The people in Paris are suffering from smog, and here in Los Angeles, famous for its air pollution, the air is clean and fresh. Of course, that's because we have very strict emission controls and "boutique gasoline" formulas that make the price at the pump one of the highest in the US, but speaking as somebody who lived here before the controls went into effect, the price is well worth it.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

      It could also be because you are nearer the ocean,

      1. JeffyPoooh
        Pint

        It could also be because... ...ocean.

        Yes. But look up the Low Emission standards. ULEV TZEV etc.

        They're ridiculously tight. Fleets fail due to insufficiently impermeable fuel lines. Crazy.

        These modern cars simply do not pollute the air (aside from CO2).

  12. 080

    Smog - Hah

    If your man enough to smoke Gauloises, a little smog will not bother you

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Author not French

    Otherwise, "romantic" is the very last adjective he would use for P****s.

  14. Valerion

    The Devastation Of Smog

    Best of the Hobbit movies, I reckon.

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