This is just insane. Not only are cars themself mostly unnecessary, if the right infrastructure is provided, but SUVs also use more resources to run and be produced then small cars, without any advantage over them. So an obvious waste, which could easily be cut to reduce emissions.
Source IEA: https://www.iea.org/commentaries/suvs-are-setting-new-sales-records-each-year-and-so-are-their-emissions
If we’re naming modes of transportation that pollute, it would be remiss not to point out the worst one: ships.
On the contrary: ships are the third-best one when you consider greenhouse gas emissions per ton-kilometer of cargo moved, which is the metric that matters. They only pollute a lot as a category because there is so much fucking shipping going on. (Reducing that is also an issue, but one for a different thread.)
The only things better are bicycles and sailboats (because they use no fossil fuels at all). Even trains are less efficient, although in the long run they have the advantage of being possible to electrify and run on renewables.
Granted, the other pollution (not greenhouse gas) from ships is terrible because they use the cheapest, nastiest fuel. But as bad as that is, it’s still a much, much lower-priority concern than climate change.
(TBH, what we really need are nuclear cargo ships.)
That’s honestly a very fair point.