No doubt. Most people don't have the skill or desire to keep 27 year old vehicles running at good efficiency. It's also common to start adding performance parts or disabling the emissions tech, which is even worse.

I'm on my fourth vehicle lifetime, including the one I lost in a flood. Been drving for over three decades. Figure that I'm actually pretty far down on emissions as so much pollution is tied to the original manufacturing.

There's that whole reduce and reuse thing everyone forgets about and jumps right to recycle.

The proper comparison here is replacing used ICE with used EV. As battery tech and manufacturers get better, new ICE should have a heavy tax that disincentivises private purchase and ultimately bans them except for edge cases. Keep a collector class with a small maximum mileage and other restrictions.