Germany’s conservative chancellor, Angela Merkel, has long been trying to persuade the United States and the rest of the world  to cut their greenhouse gas emissions .  

But when it comes to her own “backyard”, she rules out a measure that could instantly cut Germany’s CO2 — a speed limit on the country’s high-speed motorways, which the influential German carmakers have long opposed for fear it would hurt their image around the world. They argue a speed limit would lead to a loss of jobs in Germany. (In fact, Germany’s motorways do have temporary or permanent speed limits on about half their length. But where none is specified, you can drive as fast as you like).

When her coalition partners, the Social Democrats, unexpectedly pushed through a conference motion calling for a general speed limit of 130 km/h (81 mph) on the autobahns on Saturday to cut vehicle C02 emissions, Merkel slammed on the brakes. No way, she said on Sunday, not on her watch.  

“In my mind a modern traffic management system is the right way to go,” she told a television interviewer, “a system that allows you to drive faster at certain hours of the time and requires you to slow down at other times of the day. That kind of system is safer. Traffic jams are as damaging for the climate as driving fast.”  

I thought it was an amazing statement. This is the same “Klimakanzlerin” or “Climate Chancellor” (as some media reports have called her) who talks so often and forcefully about the need to cut greenhouse gases — even if she is usually talking about what other countries should be doing.  

This was her opening to stand up to the car lobby and do something in her own backyard, and just a few days after Nobel laureate Al Gore had chided Germany, the world’s sixth largest emitter of CO2, about not having a universal speed limit. But she rejected the proposal just 24 hours after it was made, stomping out a discussion before it could really get started.   

  Sixty percent of Germans tell pollsters they favour a general motorway  limit. Environmental groups in Germany estimate it would cut vehicle CO2 by at least five percent overnight, and by another 15 percent long-term as more efficient cars gradually replace the need for the heavy cars that now cruise the autobahns at up to 220 km/h (137 mph). Some drivers even brag about  hitting speeds above 300 km/h. And of course there is safety.

As pushing others to reduce emissions is evidently easier than taking steps at home, it’s no wonder there seems to be more talk than action in the fight against global warming.