Putting the Brakes on Idling

With gas prices soaring people are looking for ways to improve their fuel efficiency now more than ever.  One easy way is to avoid idling.

Why steer clear of idling?  On the environmental front, idling produces emissions that contribute to air pollution and climate change.  For every litre of fuel used, the average vehicle produces 2.4 kilograms of CO_2.  If every motorist in Canada reduced their idling by five minutes a day, more than 1.6 million tonnes of CO₂ could be spared each year.  On the fuel front, idling gives you zero miles per gallon.  At today's fuel prices, a standard half-tonne pickup truck, which consumes around 2½ litres of fuel per hour while idling, ends up wasting over $3.00 an hour.

The towns of Jasper, St. Albert, and Hinton have all passed anti-idling bylaws, and with several other communities in Alberta also exploring the idea, there's no better time than the present to kick the idling habit.  But in case statistics and bylaws don't motivate you, maybe the smiling face of a child knocking on your window and asking you to stop would.  As the weather turns cool and kids head back to school, school parking lots can become an anti-idling nightmare.  But students across the province are doing something to change this. 

At Briar Hill Elementary School in Calgary, grade 4 and 5 students from the school's Save our Earth Environmental Club set out on their "idling gets you NOWHERE" campaign in November 2007 to educate parents and prompt a change in behaviour. 

With the help of their teacher, Nancy Johnsen, students took an audit of the number of vehicles that were idling in front of their school.  Throughout the school year parents were reminded to turn their engines off via parking signs, the school newsletter, an open house, brochures and students who diligently went window to window.  The campaign has been such a great success that the school now has an anti-idling compliance rate of over 80 per cent and has received a Destination Conservation award.

"It's exciting to see the impact this group of students has made," said Nancy Boa, a parent who helped with the campaign.  "Now all it takes is for the students to walk beside the driver's in their parked cars with their auditing clipboards and idling engines seem to magically turn off, even on days when most would prefer to be sitting in an air-conditioned car."

If you would like to promote anti-idling in your school or community, the City of Calgary, City of Edmonton and NRCAN all have free resources on their websites to support anti-idling outreach campaigns.

Of course there are moments (when in traffic for example) when idling is necessary, but more often than not it's something that can be avoided.  So, put these four idle-free ideas into practice and reduce what you are paying out at the pump.

1. If you are stopped for more than 10 seconds, turn off the engine.  Idling for more than 10 seconds actually uses more fuel than it does if you turn the vehicle off and back on.
2. Avoid idling as a method of warming up your car.  Idling does nothing to warm up your vehicle's transmission, tires, suspension or steering, and doesn't allow the engine to operate at its peak temperature which results in poor fuel efficiency.  The Ontario Ministry of Transportation found that it took 30 minutes of idling to warm up an engine to the same level as driving for 12 minutes did. 
3. Give up the remote car starter.  While nice on those cold mornings, it's too easy to turn your vehicle on with one of these and then let five or ten minutes slip by.  Instead use a block heater to warm up the engine when temperatures are freezing.
4. Park your car and put those legs to use rather than sitting in drive-thrus.  Students at the University of Alberta monitored a Tim Horton's drive-thru in Edmonton last year for 54 hours, during which time they found that 3,756 cars idled in line for at least five minutes each.  At this rate, if you pick up your coffee at a drive-thru five mornings a week, you're spending almost two hours idling a month and unnecessarily increasing your fuel costs.  Think of the extra coffee you could be purchasing instead.