1. No Unleaded Petrol Please, We are Italian»:
The Italian resistance to the “greening” of the car
Federico Paolini (University of Siena, Italy)
My paper examines an aspect little studied by the Italian
historiography on transport: the resolute opposition to the sale of cars
with engines fitted with catalytic converters and fuelled with unleaded
petrol.
The time span covered by this paper goes from 1981 (the year in
which British consumer groups denounced the high toxicity of leaded
petrol) to 2000, when gasoline with lead additives was withdrawn
from the market in twelve European Union member states with the exception of Italy, Greece
and Spain, which won a one-year exemption.
In Italy, the reasons for the opposition to engines fuelled with unleaded petrol were basically
three. The first is of a socio-cultural nature: the Italian drivers, in fact, were (and still are)
very attached to some very popular cars (like, for example, the Fiat 500 and Fiat 127) and
did not accept limitations on the their movement. The second is of an economic nature: a
characteristic of the expansion of private vehicles in Italy, in fact, is represented by the slow
renewal of the fleet of cars, which over the years has remained a constant feature of Italian
car ownership. Italian drivers, therefore, opposed the new engines fitted with catalytic
converter because they feared being forced to pay a very high cost for
replacing their vehicles.
Finally, the third, is of a productive nature: the largest producer of Italian
cars – Fiat – was opposed to low-octane unleaded petrol because its cars
used motors with high compression ratios requiring gasoline with high
octane. My paper will frame these issues in historical perspective.