UK to end hydrocarbon-fuelled cars in 2040

[roon]

I thought you were against deriding differing opinions. You wrote:

...it does rankle me that they deride anyone who has an opinion other that theirs.

...

Ok Roon; You want to keep grasping.

I've responded to false claims you made about me. You claimed I said you directed rude comments at me. I didn't. That's not grasping, its simply reminding you about when you make things up.

You confuse debate with personal attacks. All this time you think I am attacking you. I am attacking the flaws in your logic. Curtail your hystrionics.

[Andres125sx]

Probably because wind is what it is but generated is variable. They can reduce the output of Nuke with little waste while dropping wind powered would not be

Would not be as easy as activating the brake as they do when wind is too strong? Problem comes when you need more power than provided, wich is the reason we still need nuclear, and will need it for many years ahead yet

I kinda like Musk's idea of re-using old car batteries as stand by storage. It would not really matter much how the storage had degraded as long as they are still usable. Then they go off for re building (apparently)

Exactly. I´m using Lipo batteries for rc planes and drones for decades. When a battery is old, the only parameter wich degrades is the max C it can discharge, what does affect the max capacity as a degraded battery with same load suffer much higher voltage sag, reaching the LVC sooner, so you can´t use the full capacity.

But if you use it for a different task where it´s not demanded that much, it will continue working for years, literally, and my experience is with Lipos wich are a lot more fragile than LiIon used in cars

I use one old battery wich is useless for planes for my goggles, I had to retire it for planes with around 1 and a half year of use. Now it´s around 10 years old and still working perfectly. Similar with other batteries for my 6.5kg drone, retires after one a a half year of use, now used to charge batteries in the field (to feed the charger), they´re around 4-5 years old and working perfectly

I still have to investigate how to buy a used battery of an EV to get a good price (still looking for a piece of land), but that´s my plan exactly, using a discarded EV battery for my home installation. Batteries, as always, are the limiting factor, if you get a cheap one wich can work for some years then instantly the solar/wind instalation becomes profitable in very little time

[strad]

@roon

strad wrote: ↑
Mon Aug 12, 2019 3:03 pm

I thought you were against deriding differing opinions. You wrote:

I wasn't deriding anything. I was laughing at Andres idea that it would upset me if he or anybody said something bad about muscle cars.

[RZS10]

no point in leaving this up when you can't even have a discussion here

[strad]

I've used EBC for years. Not only is there less dust on rims and such they also work better. Especially when cool which is when most street machines need good braking.

[hollus]

The opinion divide on this subject and the entrenching from both sides is well documented, so I won’t try to turn anyone to my side, but I think there is a couple of unfair things going around in this thread.
One is with “scientists say” and “scientists said”. Boy, how I hate those expressions. “Scientists” is a brutally heterogeneous group of people, with more or less knowledge, more or les communication skills, broader or narrower but deeper expertise, and most are not shy to pontificate on subjects where they are not experts. And they certainly find it hard to agree on most things, they love to argue even more than us here Thus, there will be some (but not most!) scientists saying virtually anything, and the world being what it is, there will be journalists willing to ask for quotes, take them out of context, exaggerate them and then slap the “scientists say” moniker in there.
Now, with that out of my chest, no, it is not “the same scientists” that said something in the 70s and are now saying the opposite. Any scientist with the prestige and power to pass his or her stories to the press back then was likely 40+ and won’t be influential today. Plus the state of planetary weather modeling back then was, well, not only rudimentary, but completely out of reach, actually; computing capacity has increased by orders of magnitude of orders of magnitude since then. Models were, out of necessity, one-dimensional, with the planet represented by a single column of air representing an average point in the surface of the earth. Why someone felt, in the 70s, that they could make predictions based on that, is beyond me, but I’ll venture a guess: Egos. Scientists have egos (shocking!). By the way, I’d love a copy of some of those articles in the newspapers, it is good to be reminded to be humble regularly.
The current models, well, they are somewhat else. Much better, obviously, but when it comes to simulating a planet over centuries, they are still too coarse. Things like 100km*100km cells representing a spot in the earth surface are common, but in reality, they are large enough to contain ocean, and island, rivers and mountains, al mixed together. Still too coarse. Most parameters are in, but probably a few are still missing, and who knows if those will turn out to be more important than expected. But an imperfect model is not a zero-value model.
Regarding “zero-value”, my second picking bone: “They can’t even predict the weather”. That is simply wrong. They can’t predict the weather all the time, but they can most of the time. Proof that the models are not useless, even if we only have imprecise and sparse data to feed them (measure the humidity content of that parcel or air coming to you over the ocean at 5000m altitude, please, and then feed it into the model). They get it right most of the time, but weather is probabilistic. If one expects a simple answer, like will it rain here tomorrow or not, one is already set for failure. Did it rain yesterday in my city? No, then yes, then no again, then yes again, then no. It is probabilistic, and many forecasts are switching from rain and temperature to POP (probability of precipitation), and temp ranges. This might be semantics, but it is difficult to be wrong after predicting a POP 50! Anyways, next time rain is predicted and fails to show up at the expected time, check the local weather radar map, more often than not, you were in the edge of the rain area and it is indeed raining 20 km away (sometimes they fail big, that is also true, sometimes).
In any case, this irrelevant to predicting the long term climate averaged over regions and years. For an F1 analogy: One could have predicted that Hamilton would win in Germany, or that he would not, and both would have been good predictions, even if one would be wrong. Same applies to Hungary. One correct prediction does not a good model make, and one failure does not a bad model make. I cannot predict if Hamilton will win in Spa, but I can confidently predict that Hamilton will win the championship (might be wrong!) and even, probably, collect the most points until the end of the season. I might be right or wrong in that, but probably all here agree that it is a reasonable forecast with decent predicting value? Similarly, Manchester City might or might not win the next game, but they will be #1, #2 or #3 come the season end. Predicting the climate is the same, large averages, not individual events. That is of course, if, a large if, the models have captured all the right and important parameters, and that is indeed questionable.
Anyways, sorry for the wall of text. I’ll now go back to judging everyone’s F1 knowledge based on whether you can or cannot predict the winner in Spa.

[Andres125sx]

Even if they exagerated, for example here in Madrid we go over the limits of NOx not slightly, but some times even x2 or x3 the limit, so even if the exaggerated and the limit is too low, you can be sure at any big city the real limits are exceed.

Any doctor, when he´s talking to someone with some respiratory problem, first advice he provide is going out of cities to breath clean air, and there are statistics showing how not only respiratory problems but even alergies (alergen and pollution molecules get mixed and increase allergen strenght) are a lot more frequent into the cities. No idea if that limit you´re criticizing is real or not, but experience is proving air into cities is causing several health problems. Ask someone with asma about his feelings when into a city or out of it,

I sincerely think we can´t question if air into cities is harmful or not, it´s obvious it is

That's the thing though, even if you go 2x or 3x over the completely arbitrary limit periodically, it's still not really a 'high' level - California (probably the 'greenest' state in the US) currently has a limit of 57µg/m³ averaged over the year and 339 µg/m³ averaged over an hour - both way more reasonable limits than our EU one ... i know that there's studies claiming that high NOx levels can cause harm, especially to people with pre-existing medical conditions, but those don't have to go on a walk near a main road at rush hour, do they?

I won't disagree that the air in rural areas will be better than in the city, however the air in the cities has vastly improved over the years, for example we have 10 measuring stations in the city, 5 of those stay under the limit all the time, three exceed the limit slightly and only two (next to the main highway ... duh ...) exceed the limits "a lot" (they still stay under 50 µg/m³ though) - they still want to ban diesels as a retarded kneejerk reaction to the emission manipulations based on the silly EU laws.

Those laws are in place so that they can sue countries if they can't adhere to the arbitrary limits resulting in fines which will further finance the EU - it's the same thing as the emission standards for cars which will cause big issues for the european car industry soon since the EU will demand billions in fines because they did not manage to reach the unrealistic emission goals.

Here's a neat website, i'll look at it after i get home tomorrow which will be around rush hour ... will be interesting
http://aqicn.org/map/europe/

And as much as i searched with a variety of keywords i could not find anything about docs telling people to leave the city when they have resp problems - i did hear already that people are being told to leave the country into different climates, especially when they have really heavy seasonal allergies

Regarding allergies ... according to some (not all) scientists it's fine particles that irritate the mucous membranes thus making people more perceptive for allergens - the allergen concentration in rural areas is way higher though - with most cars (now even some petrol) having particulate filters the fine particles are now mainly coming off brakes and tyres though, so electric cars don't solve that issue at all.

There's many ways to combat those particles, better traffic management, cleaning the streets periodically (when there's no rain) so that the old dust doesn't get airborne again,

One could of course force all car makers to use low dust brake pads (and they do make a difference, i switched to EBC greenstuff and there was a lot less brake dust on the rims compared to the stock ones) and ban any that produce a lot upon usage, but then you'd just slap some of those bad boys onto your old car and they couldn't make you buy a new one ... to save the planet of course

So you´re assuming scientifics limits about pollution are arbitrary because of the opinion of one or two who disagree with the general consensus, to then criticize scientifics because they´re wrong

And no, no need to walk next to a road, but that does not mean you will stay on zones where pollution is lower, but the opposite, next to a road pollution is even higher than those data recorded in measuring stations

Yesterday I heard someone was going to launch a rocket to take a picture and prove Earth flatness... Do we assume scientifics are wrong because of this discordant opinion? When some data is not supporting your point of view you will always find some other opinion disagreeing and supporting your point of view, but that does not mean the general consensus is wrong

Allergens get mixed with pollution and increase their effects drastically, this is well documented

And you´re wrong with EVs not reducing particles, electric cars waste less than a half the brake pads compared to any ICE car, as regen makes the vast majority of the job, at least while you´re not racing in the street regen can actually do 100% of the job, so brake pads particles reduction may be big, massive or even complete

[RZS10]

no point in leaving this up when you can't even have a discussion here

[Tommy Cookers]

I thank you, RZS10
particularly for most useful account of the emergence of the 40 microgram NOx limit

when the UK Channel 4 TV 'exposed' the dieselgate NOx scandal they had purported evidence from car tests they funded
but the tests (when I studied them) neither showed or claimed high NOx in city driving
high NOx was obtainable only with hard driving ie on the motorway (freeway/autobahn etc)
vehicular NOx in cities comes from heavy diesel vehicles not from diesel cars

40 micrograms seems absurdly low
that's 30 parts per TRILLION
including the NOx that's natural
some of the annual 500 billion tons of natural NOx is generated at ground level eg by bacteria
some places will have natural NOx well over the WHO advised level

I wonder what our school chemistry laboratory reached ......
(8 bottles of 1:1 nitric acid open to atmosphere 24/7 and 8 of red fuming nitric acid opened as needed or for fun)

[Andres125sx]

There's obviously a general consesus that toxins are harmful, there's no consensus regarding the limits though, this is evident in different countries having different limits, only the EU just blindly followed the recommendation of a 40µg/m³ limit from the WHO which is literally a 'guesstimated' number ... when they had to decide on it the WHO did not have a sufficient data basis about the health impacts of toxins from exhaust gasses so they looked at studies about the health impact of gas stoves in private homes (which is funny but more about that later) even though this had little to do with traffic and they ended up literally just estimating that a 40µg/m³ limit should do.

It's a guessed number from 1997 of which they thought it would be a good limit to keep people healthy and any time anyone questions it politicians just say "yea but it's a suggestion of the WHO and they're not just anyone, they're the WHO"....

In 2005 the german Helmholtz institute got tasked by the Federal Environment Agency with confirming that number so they compared health data of rural and urban citizens and straight up blamed the slightly lower life expectancy (a few days less on average) of urbanites on the worse air quality -they then put that into a model and that gave them 50000 lost years of life or 6000 dead people a year thanks to NOx.

The Federal Environment Agency even admits that they can't prove those numbers.

The Helmholtz study is what a bunch of pneumologists disagree with, saying they've turned a random correlation into causation, that it's a numbers game with statistics that is unsubtantiated - you know, they're the ones dealing with patients and their illnesses.
Btw one of them was the director of a clinic which was specialised in treating people who worked coal and the president of the German Respiratory Society.

And if you're perfectly honest, those numbers are nothing less than fearmongering, some EU agency even claims that NOx kills 12000 people a year in germany alone.
The US agencies specifically do not publish any such statistics because they say there's no scientific foundation for it.

But yea ... that study is what reaffirmed the 40µg/m³ limit.

What is even funnier is the fact that the NOx limit at the workplace is ........ 950µg/m³.... a place people spend 40h a week at can exceed the limit for the air outside by almost 24x ... funny eh?

So all in all i believe me using the term 'arbitrary' isn't wrong.

Yes it is! In science estimations are normal, not everything is measurable, but that´s far from meaning it´s arbitrary, very far actually

The exact limit is impossible to know with any certainty, you can´t put a group of different humans into a controlled atmosphere to force him to breath a controlled concentration of NOx for 50 years and see the consequences, so they´re forced to make an estimation. And if someone have to make an estimation, I can´t rely on anyone better than WHO, that´s exactly their job mate!

We´re talking about the health of millions people, it´s perfectly normal any estimation will be conservative, that´s also their job, ensuring their recomendations are not risking anyones health.

Also, NOx is taken as a reference, but there´re a lot more toxic substances in ICE fumes

Anycase it´s same debate than CC naysayers.... "if they can´t predict how CC will change the planet accurately, with dates and exact numbers, then I won´t rely on any of their statements", assuming we humans are so smart we should know everthing in any field, and if we can´t prove it it´s because it´s false. This is arrogance, an asthonishing arrogance way too frequent in we humans sincerely

We can´t know everything, and we don´t know everything, so some estimations are mandatory. Maybe you´d rely on some US agency estimation (yes, his is also an estimation, or where´s the data supporting that limit is too low?) better than on WHO estimations. IMHO that´s a HUGE mistake, US has always been extremelly pasive about regulations to put some limit to companies trying to make profit at the cost of someones health. Their alimentary regulations are a joke compared to EU regulations, they´re one of the few first world countries who systematically reject to join any environmental regulation, etc.

If any US agency disagree with WHO estimations, I will always rely on WHO

The stations usually measure right next to roads.

Then what´s the reason you were surprised about this same subject here?

three exceed the limit slightly and only two (next to the main highway ... duh ...) exceed the limits "a lot"

There's some wiggle room regarding the proper placement of those stations, but they're generally really close to points of heavy traffic, some countries/cities place their stations in reasonable more open places away from main intersections, which is a good interpretation of the regulations since it gives a good indicator of the air quality in the city, the germans are, well, german enough to take it to the extreme by putting them right next to large roads at big intersections where cars stand still for half of the time which then obviously gives you high measurements.

I watched an interesting report some time ago, in it a group of scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation and Infrastructure Systems did their own measurements at one of the worst stations in Stuttgart because they believe the stations are placed in a way to give the highest possible results, not to give a meaningful measurement (as per regulations).

For particles they got 8µg/m³, they estimated that 25% of that was from diesels, the remainder from tyres and brakes.

The NOx values were reaching 60µg/m³ right next to the official station but were already 10% lower just by measuring on a pedestrian bridge above the intersection, which is just a few meters above the road surface and the acceleration of the cars at the traffic lights did not give huge spikes anymore, the moment they went to a park across the road just 50m (!) away from that measuring station, you know, the place where people spend most of their time and the NOx levels were at 10-20 µg/m³, so 25-50% of the limit and Stuttgart is supposedly the city with the worst air here.

The people responsible for the placement (green party, duh) claimed the professor and his team were incompetent and that the measurements are being done there because people live in apartments right above it - so that team did some measurements in one of those apartments right above the station ...

Whilst the official station outside measured 70µg/m³ they had 80µg/m³ inside thanks to the gas heater in the apartment (and they have that level consistenly).

They then lit a few candles and got 140µg/m³ (it would be easy to ban candles, no?)

Then they cooked some quick food on the gas cooker and it got to 1300µg/m³ (why is no one banning gas stoves?) ... and if gas stoves cause such 'highly toxic' air at such high levels, where did the WHO get the (in relation) very low number of 40 from?

The report also mentioned another city that doesn't even allow traffic in the city center, yet their station says the air exceeded the emission limits, ironically the air exceeded the limits when there was a marathon and barely any traffic, the city also installed their own passive NOx collectors and came to the conclusion that the air pollution is far from the limits, yet there might be a diesel ban coming because the one official station measures absolute bs.

Maybe that´s the reason they always recommend to open some window when ANY burning device is used, cooks, stoves, anything, or the reason it´s mandatory to install vent holes on kitchens. At least here in Spain it is, if it´s not mandatory in Germany you should ask for them inmediatly instead of worrying about CC, agree with that

I watched an interesting report some time ago, in it a group of scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation and Infrastructure Systems did their own measurements at one of the worst stations in Stuttgart because they believe the stations are placed in a way to give the highest possible results, not to give a meaningful measurement (as per regulations).

For particles they got 8µg/m³, they estimated that 25% of that was from diesels, the remainder from tyres and brakes.

The NOx values were reaching 60µg/m³ right next to the official station but were already 10% lower just by measuring on a pedestrian bridge above the intersection, which is just a few meters above the road surface and the acceleration of the cars at the traffic lights did not give huge spikes anymore, the moment they went to a park across the road just 50m (!) away from that measuring station, you know, the place where people spend most of their time and the NOx levels were at 10-20 µg/m³, so 25-50% of the limit and Stuttgart is supposedly the city with the worst air here.

The people responsible for the placement (green party, duh) claimed the professor and his team were incompetent and that the measurements are being done there because people live in apartments right above it - so that team did some measurements in one of those apartments right above the station ...

Whilst the official station outside measured 70µg/m³ they had 80µg/m³ inside thanks to the gas heater in the apartment (and they have that level consistenly).

They then lit a few candles and got 140µg/m³ (it would be easy to ban candles, no?)

Then they cooked some quick food on the gas cooker and it got to 1300µg/m³ (why is no one banning gas stoves?) ... and if gas stoves cause such 'highly toxic' air at such high levels, where did the WHO get the (in relation) very low number of 40 from?

The report also mentioned another city that doesn't even allow traffic in the city center, yet their station says the air exceeded the emission limits, ironically the air exceeded the limits when there was a marathon and barely any traffic, the city also installed their own passive NOx collectors and came to the conclusion that the air pollution is far from the limits, yet there might be a diesel ban coming because the one official station measures absolute bs.

Interesting, but reading your interpretation of their report looks like that institute don´t agree traffic fumes are a problem...

Then I wonder about the reason they´ve developed the longest bus in the world, with electrical/hybrid power

https://www.ivi.fraunhofer.de/en/resear ... grand.html

Looks contradictory, doesn´t it? Or maybe your interpretation of their report is not too accurate

Given how bad the average driver is and how late everyone is braking it's will probably be more towards 50% and then you still have tyres.

Agree, but then you´re agreeing your previous statement about EV doing nothing to reduce particles was wrong, as they´re reducing around 50% of brake pads dust, right?

Oh and hey... look ... the air isn't bad, actually?
https://i.imgur.com/R0anP0n.png

With current weather, with lot of wind, no, obviously it´s not. Problem comes when there´s no rain and wind for some consecutive days. Then NOx concentration raises dramatically. Basically the air quality we breath into cities depend on the weather, wich should not be the case I think

To me it seems like the discussion about climate change and all the surrounding aspects is in large parts fearmongering and in some parts just paranoia ... i've witnessed some pathetic individual having a complete mental brakedown over those latest "we only have 18 months in order to save the planet" nonsense ... that autistic kid being paraded around like she knows jack --- about climate is a nice touch though ... it's "but think of the kids!" turned up to 11.

Imagine this hypothetic scenario. You´re a scientist working for WHO, and know CC is real as there are hundreds evidences, arctic perfmafrost getting thinner, coral reefs disapearing, weather becoming more extreme all around the world, CO2 in atmosphere raising to higher levels than in previous 400.000 years and also increasing at a much higher rate than ever before... but we can´t predict what will be the consequences in 10, 50 or 100 years because the matter is too complex to simulate...

What would you do? How would you warn people about this huge problem?

They´re forced to do bold claims to warn people. We humans are not too keen to accept huge changes, so if you know a huge change is needed, the only way to make people conscious is making bold estimations, or even exageratting to make people afraid of the consequences if we continue this path.

But then some people will take those exagerations as an evidence they know nothing about the subject


Obviously there will be people doing stupid claims, but that´s not an evidence their reasons to do those stupid claims are wrong

[strad]

They´re forced to do bold claims to warn people. We humans are not too keen to accept huge changes, so if you know a huge change is needed, the only way to make people conscious is making bold estimations, or even exageratting to make people afraid of the consequences if we continue this path.

I see.... Just like the I.P.C.C. when they got caught lying about their own findings.
They said
"Yes we lied, but it was for a good cause."
That's real reliable science for you.

[Tommy Cookers]

as Andres well knows as he's read the report that I linked a few weeks ago .....

EV has only a slight advantage over ICE in particulates as EV's higher weight produces more tyre particulates
presumably the ICE hybrid is the best as it has relatively light weight combined with regenerative braking

[Andres125sx]

They´re forced to do bold claims to warn people. We humans are not too keen to accept huge changes, so if you know a huge change is needed, the only way to make people conscious is making bold estimations, or even exageratting to make people afraid of the consequences if we continue this path.

I see.... Just like the I.P.C.C. when they got caught lying about their own findings.
They said
"Yes we lied, but it was for a good cause."
That's real reliable science for you.

They lied about their predictions, not about their findings, but I know your point of view, you´re one of those I was refering to in this reply

What would you do? How would you warn people about this huge problem?

They´re forced to do bold claims to warn people. We humans are not too keen to accept huge changes, so if you know a huge change is needed, the only way to make people conscious is making bold estimations, or even exageratting to make people afraid of the consequences if we continue this path.

But then some people will take those exagerations as an evidence they know nothing about the subject

That´s where your reasoning begins and ends, CO2 increase... permafrost dissapearing... extreme weather all around the world... those evidences means nothing to you, you do prefer to focus on a failed prediction about a hugely complex matter as an evidence of scientifics ignorance

[Andres125sx]

as Andres well knows as he's read the report that I linked a few weeks ago .....

EV has only a slight advantage over ICE in particulates as EV's higher weight produces more tyre particulates
presumably the ICE hybrid is the best as it has relatively light weight combined with regenerative braking

Agree Tommy. And yes, exactly, a slight advantage is still an advantage, contrary to some claims around here


But if we´re comparing EVs with ICEs, we´re comparing two vehicles where only difference is the power plant, so particles coming from tires and brakes obviously will always be similar, EVs do not exist to reduce particles from brakes and tires, even if they actually reduce it a bit that´s not their goal

[Tommy Cookers]

They lied about their predictions, not about their findings ....

well no ....
they are lying about their findings ie some of the measured temperatures
by moving their measurement sites away from those used for previous measurements
some of the measured temperatures are higher than they would have been
but we can't tell by how much as traceability has been removed
over half of the original sites have now been replaced

they've even retroactively changed some temperature change data previously issued
and changed to 'double-weight' the measurements in polar regions

if warming was non-existent movement of measurement sites would (or could) still make warming appear to exist

no I have never said that there's no AGW
though recent NGW from planet motion effects on the sun is proven every 900 years for the last 8000 years