SIR, — If, as one of this country s 30 million driving licence holders, you stopped driving altogether, you could save less than 0.0000000004 per cent of the 0.039 per cent atmospheric carbon dioxide (of which, 96.5 per cent is created by nature). If this

SIR, - If, as one of this country's 30 million driving licence holders, you stopped driving altogether, you could save less than 0.0000000004 per cent of the 0.039 per cent atmospheric carbon dioxide (of which, 96.5 per cent is created by nature).

If this is a sensible notion then can we expect another policy initiative shortly that will further lower the temperature of the world by having every child dip an ice lollipop into the tide when they next paddle on a beach - though this approach may prove as unpopular as the extortionate taxes faced by drivers watching the Government regularly dipping into their pocket, and with little mention of emissions produced on the domestic front, nor of the major driver of Earth climate - solar and cosmic radiation. To boot, the "carbon-free home" is a misnomer. It cannot exist. Breathe, cut the grass, dig the soil - and one produces CO2.

The Stern Report, commissioned by the Government, suggested that £44 per tonne is an appropriate level of taxation for CO2 emissions.

Motorists already pay for their carbon - at five times the level of the Stern recommendations - in fuel duty. Moreover, calculations on Congestion Charging proposals shows that London's Band-G residents would be paying £161,000 per tonne for their extra emissions in Central London.

There are no justifiable reasons for further penalties and restrictions on cars and motorcycles. A significant cut in fuel duty would be in order, based on the Stern Report alone.

Carbon dioxide is a life gas; every living thing relies on its presence to exist. Ask a horticulturist the optimum levels of CO2 for plant growth and it will be in the region of 1,000 parts per million by volume - that is the amount achieved within commercial greenhouses and plants thrive on it.

Our continued fiddling at the edges with such "green" taxation in a misleading belief it will change our climate, will lead to financial and economic disaster, locally, nationally, and globally.

D. REYNOLDS,

Woodland Drive, St Albans.