California is first in world to ban new diesel trucks

[helix]

Hydrogen will be distributed at the existing petrol stations and the benzene merchants will produce it.

[Corylax18]

  On 5/4/2023 at 12:02 PM, clint said:

The climate change narrative is just another in a long line of money laundering (and control through fear) schemes.    Until enough people wake up it's just going to be more of the same.   I'm against unnecessary pollution just like the next guy but making carbon the enemy is just ridiculous (and genius at the same time).

 

Not everyone agrees that evs are the way of the future.   I mean how "sustainable" is the mining of rare earth minerals used to build these batteries?  Are they an infinite resource?   What is that mining doing to the actual environment?   Are they mining with evs or diesel equipment?   Where do the used up batteries end up when they are exhausted?

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So, you're just ignoring the fact that Exxon knew climate change was going to be an issue as early as the late 70's? Not only did they tell their scientists to keep their mouths shut, they spent billions of dollars over the last 40 years seeding the "conspiracy theory" crowd to think exactly what you're saying. This isn't crazy, tin foil hat B.S. This was scientists with huge budgets conducting extensive research. Their predictions turned out to be astoundingly accurate. Meanwhile, the people that paid them to conduct the research intentionally lied to anybody who asked, for decades. 

We can debate all day about the best ways to solve the problem, but if your stance is still that there isn't a problem at all, You are wrong. Exxon proved you wrong almost 50 years ago. Not some far left, commie tree huggers, one of the largest fossil fuel companies in the world. 

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2023/01/harvard-led-analysis-finds-exxonmobil-internal-research-accurately-predicted-climate-change/#:~:text=The researchers report that Exxon,would lead to dangerous warming.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abk0063

[BrightonCorgi]

  On 5/5/2023 at 6:05 PM, Corylax18 said:

So, you're just ignoring the fact that Exxon knew climate change was going to be an issue as early as the late 70's?

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My dad is a retired US Govt geologist with presidential awards and 50+ publications.  A world renowned expert on mineral resources.   A staunch Democratic/Socialist at that. 

His contention is that although there is climate change (the climate has always been changing since the earth was formed), it's impossible to say what, if any percent is solely due to the way we live.  Keep in mind geologic time vs. our time in this planet. 

[Corylax18]

  On 5/5/2023 at 6:41 PM, BrightonCorgi said:

My dad is a retired US Govt geologist with presidential awards and 50+ publications.  A world renowned expert on mineral resources.   A staunch Democratic/Socialist at that. 

His contention is that although there is climate change (the climate has always been changing since the earth was formed), it's impossible to say what, if any percent is solely due to the way we live.  Keep in mind geologic time vs. our time in this planet. 

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So, Exxon's scientist's (and countless others) just guessed right? Despite the people paying them wanting them find the exact opposite result? 

In the US we actually saw a downward trend in temperatures over the last 3 years, because of 3 straight "La Nina" years, so I completely understand its not just human factors. But nothing that I've ever seen in geological samples, Ice cores, anything going back 10s and 100s of thousands of years has shown such a drastic spike or decline in temperatures in such a short period of time. 

Sure, Ice ages that took a thousand years to develop and lasted 10,000 years, periods of heating with similar timeframes. But we're talking measurable changes in 10s or hundreds of years now, take away the thousands. That's the difference between geological time and our time, we're seeing changes now, in one lifetime, that used to take thousands of years. 

[BrightonCorgi]

  On 5/5/2023 at 7:50 PM, Corylax18 said:

So, Exxon's scientist's (and countless others) just guessed right? Despite the people paying them wanting them find the exact opposite result?

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Associating cause is a whole a different animal.  Data collection is just data collection.

My concern for the planet is preservation of drinking water. 

[El Presidente]

I thought we got rid of all of the dickheads?

Apologies. I missed one. 

 

[Bijan]

For what it's worth all this climate change issue depends on time horizons. We're going to get another ice age sooner or later, or something of that order.

The last one supposedly lasted from 115,000 BC to 11,000 BC.

And yet scientists think most of the large land mammals that went extinct (Mammoths, etc.) were hunted to death by humans, even during that period.

The places they lasted longer, were places humans got to later.

At least that's what I got from the book Sapiens.

All that to say if we mess up the climate, billions of people may starve to death in the next century, but the planet will probably be fine.

 

[NSXCIGAR]

  On 5/5/2023 at 7:50 PM, Corylax18 said:

But nothing that I've ever seen in geological samples, Ice cores, anything going back 10s and 100s of thousands of years has shown such a drastic spike or decline in temperatures in such a short period of time. 

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There are quite a few very, very accomplished scientists in this field and other related fields that argue that with our current technology we are not even capable of accurately measuring the average temperature of the planet. 

But my opinion is that if humanity can't adapt to a degree or two of warning over a century or more then we've got bigger problems. And I think it's also reasonable to assume 50 or 100 years will give us technologies like fusion that will solve the problem. Impoverishing first world countries and killing people in third world countries just doesn't seem like a sensible approach to me. 

 

  On 5/6/2023 at 1:39 AM, Bijan said:

All that to say if we mess up the climate, billions of people may starve to death in the next century, but the planet will probably be fine.

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Save the snails! 

[Bijan]

  On 5/6/2023 at 6:06 AM, NSXCIGAR said:

But my opinion is that if humanity can't adapt to a degree or two of warning over a century or more then we've got bigger problems. And I think it's also reasonable to assume 50 or 100 years will give us technologies like fusion that will solve the problem. Impoverishing first world countries and killing people in third world countries just doesn't seem like a sensible approach to me. 

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Whether we can survive it or not or even what could be the terrible consequences even if we could, aside. The narrative does not pass the sniff test.

Let's take a huge environmental issue: the clothing industry. It's one of the biggest wastes of water and one of the biggest sources of plastic pollution and general waste.

Digging deeper when we look at the social and environmental costs in say just Bangladesh, which is one of the most negatively affected places, we find that paying maybe $0.08 more per garment would be enough to fix the issue and insure a decent living wage and stop the most egregious environmental violations.

Where's the outcry?

Again climate change is likely going to devastate the third world and mainly inconvenience the first world.

What are the chances that the people unwilling to pay $0.08 more per t-shirt to help textile workers in the third world are willing to pay to fix climate change in order to mainly benefit people in the third world?

I am not a jaded cynic, but what basically amounts to foreign policy, is never so altruistic.

My take is that if green technology is worth pursuing, from our perspective, it is worth pursuing for economic and political reasons and not primarily for climate reasons.

Even with fracking, and whatever new technologies are coming along, fossil fuel extraction is a growing capital sink. Whatever green tech is going to cost us, is nothing compared to what the fossil fuel industry will suck up in the next century if we don't make the transition.

Combine that with the political consequences of pouring ever increasing amounts of money into fossil fuel extraction, which is monopolist/oligopolistic vs the potential benefits of green tech in terms of innovation and competitive free enterprise (look at Elon Musk and Tesla who have built self driving cars and thr same guy is sending rockets into space and providing global satellite internet service) and I think that's a compelling argument.

Too bad we seem to live in a world where you can't make rational arguments for political decisions.

[MrBirdman]

  On 5/5/2023 at 7:16 AM, NSXCIGAR said:

This is probably true, although I've never seen the particulate issue decoupled from the climate argument. After all, CO2 is officially considered a pollutant by the EPA.

I will say that just perusing the literature on PM2.5 and other automobile-generating particulates it seems that there's a lack of solid foundation for the harm of low-level, short-term exposure of these particulates--the kind most of us receive. 

There seems to be a lot of research about worse health outcomes in areas with higher PM2.5 levels but I would think it would be extremely difficult to prove a causal link. High PM2.5 areas have a lot going on that could impact health. 

That's in addition to most of the best studies on the health effects of PM2.5 focusing on people with unusually high exposure like Chilean townspeople who are subjected to much higher levels than we ever would be due to burning wood inside their houses all day and night.

Most harmful substances are dose-dependent. Like cyanide in apples it's deadly but in small doses is harmless. No one's going to get cancer smoking one cigarette a week or get diabetes from one doughnut a week. 

So while I haven't (and probably won't) do a deep dive into all the research on the surface it looks like it may not be as cut and dried as it appears. Causal relationships are notoriously difficult to establish no matter the subject. But that's never stopped bureaucrats...

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I can assure you that PM2.5 has been studied for decades, mostly in short-term exposure, and the research supporting its negative health effects is quite robust. Fortunately, most people in the U.S. now live in areas with healthy average levels (<12 μg/cubic meter). However, that's measured on a county-wide basis, and areas near highways are often much worse. So while you may not personally be harmed by these pollutants, other people somewhere are.

 

  On 5/6/2023 at 1:39 AM, Bijan said:

All that to say if we mess up the climate, billions of people may starve to death in the next century, but the planet will probably be fine.

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That bit is one of his greatest, and I think it deserves some context.

Carlin was speaking to a cultural trend at the time coming out of the 70's environmental movement. This was before climate change was really on the table, and "saving the planet" was the term du jour. His point, as you identify, is that what we do to the environment is a threat to the people, not the planet. And that's as true for climate change as anything - the earth has been through periods of climate change like we're beginning to see and "survived." What didn't? Most of the animals; it led to a mass extinction. 

Carlin was, I think, frustrated that many environmentalists of the time were motivated by selfish concern about a "clean place to live", cloaking it in grandiose global terms, rather than being motivated out of concern for other people. Worth noting though that the motivation for addressing climate change is less material because its effects can't be outsourced - they're global, even if not evenly distributed.

[Bijan]

  On 5/6/2023 at 1:54 PM, MrBirdman said:

the earth has been through periods of climate change like we're beginning to see and "survived." What didn't? Most of the animals; it led to a mass extinction. 

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The mass extinction I remember was that of the dinosaurs. Looking it up it seems that of the big 5 mass extinctions 3/5 were during  the dinosaur era (well one was during, one was before, and one ended it), and two were before then, occurring it seems about once every 100 million years. Interestingly enough the one right before the dinosaur era (the most severe one of all it seems) was caused by greenhouse gases which not only raised global temperatures but acidified the oceans)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian–Triassic_extinction_event

[Chas.Alpha]

 

I don't know much of anything about climate change, but during the 1st couple of weeks of the COVID lockdown, the people of Punjab were able to see the Himalayan peaks for the 1st time in a generation. 🤔

Humans certainly are adding greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere.

[DikkeSigaar]

  On 5/6/2023 at 3:07 PM, Bijan said:

The mass extinction I remember was that of the dinosaurs. Looking it up it seems that of the big 5 mass extinctions 3/5 were during  the dinosaur era (well one was during, one was before, and one ended it), and two were before then, occurring it seems about once every 100 million years. Interestingly enough the one right before the dinosaur era (the most severe one of all it seems) was caused by greenhouse gases which not only raised global temperatures but acidified the oceans)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian–Triassic_extinction_event

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And today oceans are acidifying at a quicker rate than ever before in earth's history. We might already be experiencing the start of the largest mass extinction event the planet has ever seen.

I still think we might be able to make the changes necessary to prevent the worst but it's going to be a bumpy ride. I worry about the world my children and grandchildren will have to live in.

[Bagman]

  On 5/6/2023 at 6:06 AM, NSXCIGAR said:

There are quite a few very, very accomplished scientists in this field and other related fields that argue that with our current technology we are not even capable of accurately measuring the average temperature of the planet. 

But my opinion is that if humanity can't adapt to a degree or two of warning over a century or more then we've got bigger problems. And I think it's also reasonable to assume 50 or 100 years will give us technologies like fusion that will solve the problem. Impoverishing first world countries and killing people in third world countries just doesn't seem like a sensible approach to me. 

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Just wow.  I tend to avoid sensitive topics like this, but sometimes I'm left nearly speechless.

 

[Bijan]

  On 5/6/2023 at 5:30 PM, Monterey said:

Just wow.  I tend to avoid sensitive topics like this, but sometimes I'm left nearly speechless.

 

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The first statement may be factually inaccurate.

But the second paragraph is a pretty reasonable argument.

I'll quote myself:

  On 5/6/2023 at 7:49 AM, Bijan said:

Too bad we seem to live in a world where you can't make rational arguments for political decisions.

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[Bagman]

  On 5/6/2023 at 6:11 PM, Bijan said:

The first statement may be factually inaccurate.

But the second paragraph is a pretty reasonable argument.

I'll quote myself:

 

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To do nothing but to depend on fusion in 50-100 years to fix our current problems is the answer?  Okay then.  That is all I will say on this subject.  One thing I've learned, you can't change people's opinion.  No matter how crazy.

[Bijan]

@NSXCIGAR is probably the one FOH member I disagree with the most, or at least the one I argue with the most. (To the point of annoying lot of people who may not appreciate all the back and forth, at times off topic)

He may be argumentative, but he has never to my recollection been anything other than civil.

Edit: Edited for tone (apologies for the tanty).

@Monterey let us be civil.

For each and everyone one of us there are plenty of people we may think crazy or even morally repellent.

But we can't argue civilly if we dismiss every opinion we don't like as simply crazy or unworthy of reply.

That is my two cents.

[Nevrknow]

Great civil discussions.

After a great Lusi and some/a lot of Willet Bourbon, here's my take.

We all gonna die!

 

😁

[SCgarman]

  On 5/7/2023 at 1:12 AM, Nevrknow said:

Great civil discussions.

After a great Lusi and some/a lot of Willet Bourbon, here's my take.

We all gonna die!

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No one escapeth the Reaper. Period.

[Kaptain Karl]

  On 5/2/2023 at 7:23 PM, MrBirdman said:

In fairness to California, this move is not only about climate change. California has by far the worst air quality in the country - most people in the state live in a county that exceeds the national air quality standards for 2 or more pollutants (there are only six, none of which are greenhouse gases). Most places in the US don't exceed any.  Completely leaving aside climate change, that air pollution has significant (and costly) impacts on public health, and diesel is actually a significant contributor (since whereas greenhouse gases have a global impact, other air pollutants are much more local). 

California's politicians do love to virtue signal, often to the point of being asses. But here there are at least good reasons for this move and it will in fact have an impact in their state if it ever comes to pass (again, even completely leaving climate change out of the equation). You can still think its a terrible idea, but it definitely isn't meaningless posturing. 

 

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This only works if as a state we can produce enough power, which we're not. We do live in a green energy paradise as the sun shines and we have the most consistent offshore wind in the US, maybe the world. But I have very little confidence that we'll be able to produce enough power without building nuclear or natural gas power plants to go 100% electric by this time. 

Also with the removal of Russia and the gradual retreat of China from the globalized system it could prove impossible to acquire the requisite materials to truly mass produce electric vehicles as its far harder in a material sense to build electric vehicles than combustion. 

I imagine this will be something that'll continually get pushed back further and further.

[Corylax18]

  On 5/7/2023 at 2:10 AM, Kaptain Karl said:

I imagine this will be something that'll continually get pushed back further and further.

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They've been passing these same stupid, hollow, poorly thought out laws for over 30 years now. Back in 1990, the requirement was going to be 10% by 2003, it took until 2020 for that % to actually be achieved. 25 years after they had to repeal it, because it was a pipe dream. Just like this new mandate and the ICE engine ban from last year where. It's just buffoons' blowing hot air, like its always been. The article below is from December of 1995, it could have been written yesterday.

https://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/26/us/california-is-backing-off-mandate-for-electric-car.html

I agree with you completely, its going to extremely difficult, for California and the rest of the country to actually achieve any of the things we need to without major changes to the infrastructure that will make any of this possible. 

Its the modern equivalent of putting the cart before the horse. 

[NSXCIGAR]

  On 5/6/2023 at 5:30 PM, Monterey said:

Just wow.  I tend to avoid sensitive topics like this, but sometimes I'm left nearly speechless.

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Discussions on global warming often refer to 'global temperature.' Yet the concept is thermodynamically as well as mathematically an impossibility, says Bjarne Andresen, a professor at The Niels Bohr Institute...

Among many others. Not saying I agree or disagree. Just food for thought. 

 

  On 5/6/2023 at 6:27 PM, Monterey said:

To do nothing but to depend on fusion in 50-100 years to fix our current problems is the answer? 

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What about nuclear? 

[Bagman]

  On 5/7/2023 at 2:38 AM, NSXCIGAR said:

What about nuclear? 

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Hugely pro-nuclear.  If only I was in charge.  I keep hoping the tide will change and people will come back around to it.

[MrBirdman]

  On 5/7/2023 at 2:30 AM, Corylax18 said:

They've been passing these same stupid, hollow, poorly thought out laws for over 30 years now. Back in 1990, the requirement was going to be 10% by 2003, it took until 2020 for that % to actually be achieved. 25 years after they had to repeal it, because it was a pipe dream. Just like this new mandate and the ICE engine ban from last year where. It's just buffoons' blowing hot air, like its always been. The article below is from December of 1995, it could have been written yesterday.

https://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/26/us/california-is-backing-off-mandate-for-electric-car.html

I agree with you completely, its going to extremely difficult, for California and the rest of the country to actually achieve any of the things we need to without major changes to the infrastructure that will make any of this possible. 

Its the modern equivalent of putting the cart before the horse. 

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I’m still not sure what upsets you so much about this. I saw no one promise it would be a panacea, or that it would be easy. It’s a goal. It’s part of a much broader ecosystem of infrastructure changes and technological investments. If it proves unworkable it’ll change, but we have to set these goals sometime - why not now? 

When JFK said “we’re going to the moon”, the US hadn’t put a man in orbit yet, little of the technology had been developed, none of the flight techniques had been mastered, and everyone in the spaceflight community though he was nuts. Setting a goal is symbolic, yes. Nonetheless, it is often an important step.

Is your concern that this will diminish momentum for other changes? 

 

  On 5/7/2023 at 2:56 AM, Monterey said:

Hugely pro-nuclear.  If only I was in charge.  I keep hoping the tide will change and people will come back around to it.

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I have scratched my head for a long time at the de-nuclearization trend in Germany, Japan, and elsewhere. To me it always made little sense, both from a climate and geopolitical standpoint, to shut down viable clean energy sources. Here in the US its biggest hurdle (besides high operating costs) has been the boom in natural gas, which nuclear has needed subsidies to compete with. We recently lost 3 Mile in PA because the legislature wouldn’t subsidize it anymore (though this was at the behest of the fracking lobby and not environmentalists). 

[Bijan]

  On 5/7/2023 at 4:09 AM, MrBirdman said:

I have scratched my head for a long time at the de-nuclearization trend in Germany, Japan, and elsewhere. To me it always made little sense, both from a climate and geopolitical standpoint, to shut down viable clean energy sources.

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Again if you revisit my theory. The problem is not mainly the environmental consequences but the social, economic and political consequences.

Nuclear is as much of a capital sucking black hole as fossil fuel will be going forward.

You put in 30 billion dollars for a plant every 20 or 30 years. Then you need to put in the same amount again after that to refurbish the plant to keep it running. Then that takes the plant down so you need 50% or 100% extra plants. France is in this crunch now.

Well it was 30 billion a while ago, might be double that now.

it sounds free but it's not. Hydroelectric is more like that but the potential sites are limited and it's huge ecological damage.

And even with nuclear it's only clean in terms of greenhouse gases and chemical pollution. Nuclear waste is not a solved problem and going 100x or 1000x on production may sterilize the planet nore effectively than climate change.

 

  On 5/7/2023 at 4:09 AM, MrBirdman said:

Here in the US its biggest hurdle (besides high operating costs) has been the boom in natural gas, which nuclear has needed subsidies to compete with.

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Natural gas is a no brainer. If it replaces coal it is way less carbon emissions. If oil still significantly less, also less chemical pollutants I believe.

Also in the end, in rough terms, the carbon footprint of a thing is roughly correlated to its cost (direct emissions excepted).

So paying 3x as much for nuclear than natural gas (3x just an example),  means that the indirect carbon footprint is roughly 3x.

The hope with EVs and green tech is that the prices be such, that it will be a net win all things considered.