Well India has very large kerosene subsidies for the poor, which they are managing to cut because prices have fallen. Replacing these with solar subsidies would make a huge difference, and cut fossil fuel use. And e-rickshaws took off quite fast.

The UK had new car sales of almost 2.5 million last year, ridiculously high, the highest in Europe, thats almost 10% of households bought a new car/

10% of households bought a new car, and that means that the average lifespan of a car with its FIRST owner must be on average 10 years. Cars might last 20-30 years in the UK as the previous poster pointed out, and longer in the rest of Europe which is already "rich" relative to India. I think you're proving his point exactly.

> 10% of households bought a new car, and that means that the average lifespan of a car with its FIRST owner must be on average 10 years.

Maybe I need more coffee, but wouldn't that only be true if every household only bought new cars?

In any case, we don't have to guess these things. Simple search found that in 2011 the mean car age on UK roads was 7.44 years. Even accounting for the long tail, that's actually pretty good.

Ah, excellent point. Yup, I got that one wrong!

Yes. Dirt cheap (new) solar panels have been sprouting all over Africa, India and China in the last couple of years. It's quite a sight to behold, sometimes.

These panels became such a 'threat' that Obama slapped tariffs on them.

I think you're being a bit pessimistic. People in third world countries love status symbols and want to do their part too. In the eighties, when Datsuns were all the rage in Pakistan, my grandfather was one of the very few to track down an imported used Australian Ford Laser sedan, which was surprisingly cheap (probably smuggled through Dubai).

Until recently, Pakistan had one of the highest adoption rates in the world of CNG in cars as an alternative to petrol, you could just flip a switch when you were cruising on a flat. We modified our Laser (may it rest in peace) accordingly.