The world's cheapest car, Indian Tata Nano is estimated to sell only 30,000-50,000 pieces over its first year. The company is suffering from both production capacity, and the overall financial situation. For the environment, this is good news. For Indian people, it can be good or bad depending on point of view.

First, my selfish european view is that if cars cost 1500 euros there will just be too many cars on the planet. It's of course easy for me to say, we have two cars parked outside of our house at the very moment, and I don't have false imagination that because one of them is a hybid car that I would somehow be a good person. Thinking about the planet, though, it's self evident that 6-7 billion people living here, more cars is not what we need.

Second, Tata concern has realised the environmental impact, and they are trying to reduce this impact by introducing various technologies in the ICE models, as well as bring hybrid and electric car versions out. But this is - as my most favorite recent quote by Pavan Sukhdev says - it's like giving blood transplants to the canary in the mine. Allowing people to buy cars for 1500 euros will explode the local environmental problem totally into another dimension, even if you did brand it "eco-friendly". Many of the problems that cars bring will not be distributed evenly around the globe, but will remain in the very village its being used. Here's a shortlist:

• Batteries
• Oils
• Dust
• Carbon Monoxide
• Nitrogen dioxide
• Sulphur dioxide
• Suspended particles, PM-10 particles less than 10 microns in size.
• Benzene
• Formaldehyde
• Polycyclic hydrocarbonsmicro particles

Third, accidents. Traffic accidents are a huge cause of death in the 2nd and 3rd world countries. There are many reasons for this, but one thing is for sure: more Tata Nano's, more traffic accidents. 

It is irresistably cute though.