Motorcycles come in three types. There are the off road bikes, the street bikes and the dual purpose bikes. The off road bikes are racing bikes and not meant to be ridden on the roads. The street bikes are what people ride on the roads. They are further categorized into mopeds, cruisers and scooters amongst others. The dual purpose bikes are designed for both racing and normal street riding.
The high automobile pollution and traffic congestion are reasons that make motorcycles make headway amongst vehicles on the road. Its carbon emissions are lower. It has better fuel efficiency as compared to other vehicles on the road. The fuel economy is primarily due to its smaller mass. Though motorcycles rate better in terms of greenhouse gas emission, the total pollution per mile is ten to as much as twenty times when compared to a car. Motorcycles produce more nitrogen oxide which is a byproduct of combustion and a major component of smog. The lower efficiency of its catalytic converters is the main cause of emission of nitrogen oxide.
In recent times, the motorcycle market has shown an upward swing. The global market grew by 6.5 percent despite the global economic downturn. Or perhaps the growth has been fuelled by the economic downturn and the increase in fuel cost. The market for electric scooter is also on the rise. Electric scooters run on battery instead of gasoline. These silent scooters, though with lower speed, have better fuel economy. With gasoline price steadily increasing, electric scooter becomes an option. It is very less polluting in terms of air and noise pollution. Better battery technologies are expected to make it more popular. There are many electric scooters on the road such as Eped Sport/City, Vectrix VX-1, ZAP Zapino, E-Solex, Yo Speed, Razor E200S Scooter , EVT-4000e, Peugeot Scoot’Elec and Io-scooter, Ezip Electric Scooters.
Motorcycles are a popular means of transport in the Asian countries such as India, China, Vietnam and Indonesia. More people own motorcycles than other vehicles. For instance, in Taiwan motorcycle is owned by twice the number of automobile owners. There has been a 50 percent rise in the registration of motorcycles in the United States. It is also popular in Latin America’s frontier towns.
