What can the following statement re. what cars use be misunderstood as?

One needs the beginning of the statement or even the whole article to understand that part.

Otherwise , if there is no way of getting the whole article, or asking the person who said that, then what is it mistaken as? That some cars burn wood, etc., right?
So, Is there a term for that kind of statement anyway?

Yes, it does sound like it could be saying that. I don’t know of a term other than unclear writing. You are right, the meaning is ambiguous.

I just found the staement:
“Carbon monoxide (CO) is a poison gas that is a by-product of appliances, heaters, and automobiles that burn gasoline, natural gas, wood, oil, kerosene, or propane. It has no color, no taste, and no odor.”

“There’s cows, that produce methane,.....”

To make it clearer, I would eliminate the “and” before automobiles and insert it before natural gas.

What can be misunderstood from the statement as it stands? A wood or coal burning car is feasible. You simply burn the fuels in boilers to generate steam which is then utilized to power the car. For my money, the flaw with the statement may be in the implication that carbon monoxide as a byproduct is limited to the devices listed, when in fact a more succinct and encompassing explanation would be that carbon monoxide is a byproduct of the combustion of gas, wood, etc. It doesn’t matter where the combustion occurs. You get CO from a campfire or a matchstick. It’s the process, not the device.

I agree with ^^ that.
I think a clearer statement actually calls for less distinction of devices.

Carbon monoxide is a poison gas by product, which often results from the operation of various devices which use common fuels such as wood, kerosene, natural gas, oil, propane, or gasoline.

EDIT: OOPS! I left out the important words, by product. It reads better now.

CO ”...is a poison gas that is a by-product of APPLIANCES, heaters, and automobiles that burn gasoline, natural gas, wood, oil, kerosene, or propane.” A fireplace or a campfire would be an appliance. So would a coal powered furnace. Homes used to be heated with coal.

This statement just means that cars burning gas are just ONE of the causes of CO emissions.

@janbb and @Patty_Melt Yes, perfect sense.

Perfect sense—like saying people are just ONE of the causes of pollution.

They forgot coal, butane, LPG, dimethyl ether, DME, and the alcohols: ethanol, methanol and, and butanol.

Only hydrogen fuel avoids the production of CO2 as a waste product of the appliance or vehicle. However, if the facility that makes the hydrogen is powered by coal, oil, natural gas, etc., it is producing CO2 in the process.

And cows.

And humans. A typical human exhaled breath is 5% CO2. (Our atmosphere is about 0.04% CO2 now)