arthwollipot
Limerick Purist Pronouns: He/Him
With 28-year old fuel economy, no doubt.
Cont: Global warming discussion V
- Thread starter lobosrul5
- Start date
Government vehicles aren't subject to emissions testing testing and standards in many places.
Construction equipment isn't always reliable as the older versions before computers were on every damn vehicle.
Costs of repairs are definitely greater on late model electronic equiped units.
I was in that line of work and just diagnostic equipment from authorized sources is tens of thousands of dollars. Updated every new model year that tends to drive smaller shops out of the business.
The best bet is to keep older non computer units in service until they are worn to utter junk.
The burden of reducing emissions worldwide falls on the populace and not on the government agencies like police and fleet vehicles. Government going to EV is about the first real step into them going low emissions.
Construction equipment isn't always reliable as the older versions before computers were on every damn vehicle.
Costs of repairs are definitely greater on late model electronic equiped units.
I was in that line of work and just diagnostic equipment from authorized sources is tens of thousands of dollars. Updated every new model year that tends to drive smaller shops out of the business.
The best bet is to keep older non computer units in service until they are worn to utter junk.
The burden of reducing emissions worldwide falls on the populace and not on the government agencies like police and fleet vehicles. Government going to EV is about the first real step into them going low emissions.
Cosmic Yak
Philosopher
Construction equipment is going electric, and the verdict seems to be that it is a viable option- cheaper, quieter and no charging or performance issues.
https://www.idtechex.com/en/researc...ectric-beats-diesel-for-mini-excavators/29363
https://www.constructconnect.com/blog/electric-dreams-will-heavy-construction-equipment-go-electric
https://www.idtechex.com/en/researc...ectric-beats-diesel-for-mini-excavators/29363
https://www.constructconnect.com/blog/electric-dreams-will-heavy-construction-equipment-go-electric
The Atheist
The Grammar Tyrant
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2006
- Messages
- 36,408
This is interesting: https://phys.org/news/2024-05-north...anographers and,emitted by factories in China.
Maybe a good excuse for China to allow more pollution, but also raises the question of whether geo-engineering is the way out of the climate problem.
Obviously, increasing pollution as a short-term measure is a dangerous one, but is it more dangerous than allowing the planet to overheat?
Maybe a good excuse for China to allow more pollution, but also raises the question of whether geo-engineering is the way out of the climate problem.
Obviously, increasing pollution as a short-term measure is a dangerous one, but is it more dangerous than allowing the planet to overheat?
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
Definitely. This model doesn't explain the heatwaves in Australia, South America and South Africa.
Reducing air pollution does exacerbate local warming, but only because the greenhouse gasses are there to trap the sunlight. China had to clean up their air. If only they - and we - had reduced CO2 emissions enough to compensate it would have been fine. But instead we burn 'clean' gas and the CO2 level continues to rise.
Global warming won't go away if we increase aerosols, it will just be temporarily masked - giving a false sense of relief and encouragement to burn even more fossil fuels.
The silly thing is that in a few thousand years we are going to need some warming to prevent the next ice age. 1960's level CO2 with clean air would be just about right. But we are blowing our wad now, so when we really need those fossil fuels they will be all gone. Of course nobody cares about that because we will all be dead in a few years anyway, so let's just party on and let future generations curse us.
The World is already dangerously overheated, and polluting more will only make it worse. So some northern countries are getting heatwaves because of it? Serves them right. But geoengineering to 'fix' it won't happen because that would cost money.
The reason coal plants are shutting down in western countries isn't that they pollute more, but that they are uneconomic compared to gas and renewables. We would have more nuclear too if it didn't cost so much. It's all about the cost. Soon EVs will be cheaper than gas cars, and then people will buy them because they are nicer to drive and cost less to run.
People want cleaner air too. You're not going to convince China to stink up their cities again just so the US can have milder heatwaves!
BTW yesterday I got a booklet from the city council explaining why they will be raising the rates by 25% next month, 15% next year and 10% the year after, for a 58% increase in 3 years. Have to pay for the damage caused by Cyclone Gabrielle and measures to deal with the next one. And this was not caused by China reducing aerosols in the north Pacific!
Pixel42
Schrödinger's cat
There was a fascinating paper a few years ago by a team at Copenhagen university IIRC who had calculated how long we could have kept global temperatures within the range it has been for the last ten thousand years, i.e. during the current interglacial period, if we'd kept the fossil fuel reserves for that purpose and burned just enough of it as each glaciation approached to stop it dropping below that. It worked out to be about half a million years. That's the next 10 or so glaciations we could have prevented. Instead we started burning through it when we were only just past the peak of the current interglacial, and by most estimates we've already used up nearly half of it. Which is why we're buggered.
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
No, the answer is to make new equipment more reliable and cheaper to maintain.
'Right to repair' is becoming a big thing now. Governments want it to encourage repairing stuff rather than throwing it away, and because 'smaller shops' are complaining about being locked out of doing repair work (which often results in customers throwing stuff away because the repair costs are too high). Diagnostic equipment these days often consists of standard devices with special software. The actual cost is peanuts, but the manufacturer charges megabucks for it because they can.
It used to be practically impossible to replace the traction battery on a Nissan Leaf without having it done at huge expense by an authorized service center. Then an outfit here in New Zealand developed some programming tools which you could hire at reasonable prices. Just recently someone open-sourced it. Now you just need a CAN bus bridge that costs about $5 on Ali Express. There are also several videos on YouTube showing how to replace the battery - and even how to repack it with new cells you can buy from China to greatly increase capacity. Any 'smaller shop' can now do this job.
Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
Good info..
That article is pretty much boilerplate by now. What, with all of these good things going on like cheap renewables, bike lanes, solar powered mines, EVs etc. These guys are still crying the blues and complaining that "the corporations" are making us do energy intensive things like flying to Singapore and remodeling out kitchens.
Glad to see they're finally catching up to me and saying that 1.5C is a fantasy. I knew it was just a matter of time.
So what now, climate scientists? You're telling us the unattainably overpopulated global south is going to suffer the most, again. What do you want out politicians to do? Come on, don't be pussies, spit it out.
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
“It’s just the fact that we’re not taking the action that we need to.”
“The world’s response to date is reprehensible – we live in an age of fools.”
“what the **** do we have to do to get through to people how bad this really is?”
“I wonder how deep the crisis needs to become before we all start rowing in the same direction.”
“I feel resigned to disaster as we cannot separate our love of bigger, better, faster, more, from what will help the greatest number of people survive and thrive”
The problem with climate scientists is that they are climate scientists, not behavioral scientists. They know what what we need to do, but they don't know how to motivate us to do it. We could easily keep the global temperature below 1.5 °C if we set our minds to it, but we won't because we are too focused on short-term selfish desires. We're not going to get serious about tackling global warming until we see a personal benefit from it - never mind that we will all suffer from not doing so. As one of those scientists said, "We live in an age of fools" (as if we ever didn't).
A fantasy only because we won't listen to what climate scientists are telling us needs to be done.
“There is an argument that if we say that it is too late for 1.5C, that we are setting ourselves up for defeat and saying there’s nothing we can do, but I don’t agree.”
Being all negative about the situation is counterproductive. Telling people that it's hopeless just gives them an excuse to do nothing.
You talk about 'these guys' complaining about corporations 'making us' do energy intensive things, but nobody in that article said that. The main complaint is that we are not taking them seriously. The article cites 'lack of political will' as the main reason we aren't responding fast enough, but this is just another way of saying that politicians aren't getting enough support from the people (ie. us). This is highlighted in another recent Guardian article:-
What are the most powerful climate actions you can take?
And not just voting, also making politicians aware of what you want from them - both before and after election day.
They have given politicians all the information they need. In New Zealand for example, a reduction in gross emissions of 44% is required by 2030 to be '1.5˚C compatible'. The previous government's plan to achieve that was insufficient, but could have been built on. Unfortunately even that weak response was too much for voters, who decided they wanted a more 'conservative' government which is now rolling back emission reductions and promoting fossil fuels.
The real problem isn't global warming. With the technology we have today that's easily fixable and even profitable. But in our socioeconomic system that can't happen without the will of the people. This Guardian article is helping to make people aware of how serious the situation is, but I'm afraid that won't be enough. The only way to really drive home why we need to urgently stop global warming is for people to experience it - then they will be more receptive to the actions scientists say are needed. The only question is how high must the temperature go before we get the message?
The IPCC has always said the temperature would peak over whatever goal was set, simply as a result of averaging (when we reach '1.5˚C' half the years will be above it). However if we rapidly decrease GHG emissions at the same time this peak shouldn't last long. We are just beginning that process. Provided that we continue accelerating it we should be fine. The problem is right now there's a lot of push back against that.
Some people want to throw in the towel when we are only just getting started. This is typical of human behavior - if people don't see instant results they assume the plan isn't working. That's where scientists need to step in and show us that it is working, and how much better off we will be if we stick to it. Instead of doom and gloom we should be charting our progress and eager to improve it - not making defeatist statements like "1.5C is a fantasy". It's only a fantasy if we let it be one.
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Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
You can't throw in the towel if you never pick it up..
Respectfully snipped for length.
This is what I've been saying all along. The people are interested in talking about climate change but aren't really interested in doing anything about it if it's going to impact their lifestyles. Ye, people are going to experience the effects most of them by reading about them from their comfy chairs in their comfy suburban living rooms. Maybe they're seeing wildfire smoke in their neighborhoods for the first time but is that going to convince them that they shouldn't fly to the Bahamas next winter? Hell no! Not when "raising awareness" and complaining is seen as actually doing something.
It's the sheer scale of the changes that actually need to be made that most people don't want to address.
Maybe I spoke too soon when I called climate scientists pussies. Here's one guy that's broken from tradition (then quickly backtracked due to pushback) and raised the-conversation-that-shall-not-be-had.
https://www.theblaze.com/news/scien...virus-as-final-solution-for-curbing-emissions
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
Actually most people aren't interested in talking about it, except for the purpose of downplaying it.
No, but when their house burns down it will.
True, but most people don't even know what that scale is. Which is hardly surprising because nobody is telling them.
Thanks for that. Now that I know what you are reading it's starting to make sense.
Blaze Media
As a 'modest proposal', Bill McGuire's sarcastic suggestion that we cull the herd with a deadly virus is weak. We've had them before and the result was only temporary. What we really need to do is cut GHG emissions. However the Covid-18 pandemic showed that most people will change their lifestyle to avoid dying when the threat is made real to them. It also showed how easy it is to dramatically cut emissions. All those people suddenly deciding that they wouldn't fly to Singapore or remodel their kitchen actually did have a positive effect!
Roger Ramjets
Philosopher
True. Countries around the world have picked up the towel, but many of their citizens haven't.
We are in the ring with a brute who will kill us if we don't knock him out first. The question is what will we do when the first blows start hitting us? Will we pick up that towel and go on the attack, or just just get pummeled and die? He might be much bigger than any one of us, but if we all fight together we can easily bring him down.
They are actually but whenever you mention it the usual reply is along the lines of "that's for the government to worry about" When their houses, those houses in the rural woods with all the glorious trees right up to the exterior walls burn down and insurance builds them a new one, maybe they'll take construction materials and landscaping design a little more seriously. It certainly won't stop them from driving miles and miles into town to get a quart of milk.
It's willful ignorance. The information is out there it just takes a little digging. The media likes to report on all the fluff that's not going to make a whit of difference in the grand scheme of things.
Oh Jesus...get over it. That's a complete presentation and breakdown of what happened. Either "debunk" it as a falsehood (I tried and failed) or take it for what it is. This whinging about the right wing media reporting on things the left wing media refuses to doesn't do anything for anyone.
McGuire may have been attempting sarcasm, or he may have been letting us know how he really feels. My guess is he was operating the Internet while drunk.
Everybody was forced to change their lifestyles during Covid with devastating consequences. Those are the sort of GHG reductions that we need, the ones during the first year of the pandemic with an equal amount of further reductions needed the following year. Maybe nobody flew to Singapore. Actually, that's not true people flew everywhere and put up with the restrictions and quarantine on arrival. Thailand was actually marketing golf retreats. Four guys fly to Thailand, everybody stays in their own room when they're not out on the course, business was booming. Many, many kitchens got remodelled and consumer goods pretty much sold out. I went into a place looking to buy an outboard motor and they literally laughed then told me...six months minimum. Gym equipment? Worth it's weight in gold. Camping gear, forget it. Then came the "revenge flying".
macdoc
Philosopher
A 787 has better fuel economy per person than a Prius with 4 passengers.
Pick on the stuff that is truly unneeded and massive like fast fashion.
The airlines are moving forward with carbon reduction.
Other categories not so much.
or red meat..
Flying is not going away....fast fashion and burgers...maybe.
Red meat consumption is already falling.
Pick on the stuff that is truly unneeded and massive like fast fashion.
The airlines are moving forward with carbon reduction.
Other categories not so much.
or red meat..
https://www.dw.com/en/fact-check-is-eating-meat-bad-for-the-environment/a-63595148
Flying is not going away....fast fashion and burgers...maybe.
Red meat consumption is already falling.
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Hummm last time I was on a 787 I put 15 000 miles on it, then another 5600 miles on some other jet. Pretty much, just for the hell of it. I like your thinking though. Fast fashion? not involved in it at all. Sure I eat a few burgers, but I much prefer chicken.
It's all got to go. Climate protesters take note.
It's all got to go. Climate protesters take note.
Skeptical Greg
Agave Wine Connoisseur
What about total meat consumption?
Poultry and pork farming combined probably produce as much if not more greenhouse gasses than beef.
There is a claim that red meat is a health issue.. That could be a plus in the grand scheme of things if it's true.
macdoc
Philosopher
Poultry has no where near the footprint that red meat has and oigs are not ruminants
More than all the rest of the mammals in the world by weight combined....that includes wild animals.
The beef for a single burger is something ridiculous
then of course there is methane.....eat kangaroos.
More than all the rest of the mammals in the world by weight combined....that includes wild animals.
The beef for a single burger is something ridiculous
then of course there is methane.....eat kangaroos.
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