Oil company buys up old cars to clear smog

Adapted extract from an item by Martin Walker in the Guardian.

In what is being hailed as an imaginative and cost-effective anti-pollution measure, the California-based Unocal oil corporation is spending $5 million to buy up 7,000 old cars for recycling.

'Offering the owners of old bangers $700 in cash, and a one-month free bus pass'

Advertisements are being posted across Los Angeles offering the owners of old bangers $700 in cash, and a one-month free bus pass in return for their polluting old heaps.

'Thirty per cent of smog is coming from pre-1975 automobiles,' says Unocal chairman Richard Stegemeier. 'If you want to make a big impact in a hurry, this is by far the quickest and most cost-effective way.'

Unocal has opened a central junkyard employing 30 people, equipped to process 12 cars each hour, 40 hours a week.

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