Green Group discussion
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Vehicle emissions and electric cars
Going backwards can be reversed if individual states don't go along with the government's inability to come up with a policy that works for everyone.https://e360.yale.edu/features/after-...
BNSF Railway and GE Transportation, are working together to develop an all battery-electric locomotive.https://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/ne...
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Recently in London which has a similar congestion charge, the only vehicles I saw on the streets were buses and commercial vehicles. The tax just gets passed straight on to the consumer. Meanwhile the exhaust smoke all looked filthy and traffic was often idling at traffic lights. From way above, we could see a yellow grey dense layer of smog over the streets. From street level, I was fine but my husband felt his asthma kick in.
https://earther.gizmodo.com/new-yorks...
Two of the three routes from New Jersey to New York City won't be taxed leading NJ officials to believe that traffic will shift from the taxed route to the other two, increasing the wear and tear and fallout from increased traffic on the other two already overcrowded routes.The overloaded and in need of the same kind of overhaul NJ mass transit system of trains, buses, and smaller vehicles ties directly into the NYC mass system. None of the money is slated to improve that leg of the system.
NJ is considering taxing New York residents who use NJ's transportation system to make up for the money that NYC collects from NJ residents and doesn't share with NJ.
Due to commerce disputes in the early 20th century, a good portion of the regional transportation system between NY and NJ is overseen by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, created in 1921. It has no authority to tax, it collects money from tolls and fees.
People who live in the new congestion tax zones will be exempt from the taxes. The number of ride hailing vehicles was capped last year in NYC. There is a new idea circulating around that owners of vehicles could lease their vehicles use to others, same as new B and B industry lets people lease out their homes for temporary use. Companies located in the area could also build up their own fleets. This could add to the number of vehicles being on the road longer as the same ride hailing vehicle is passed around in shifts. It's possible this could lead to the restriction of the number of vehicles privately owned and leased in the area, the same way the number of taxi cabs and ride hail vehicles are limited in the area. If electric vehicles in the area are going to be exempt from the tax this could increase their numbers substantially.
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No matter how it gets done it's going to be plain madness.Manhattan is an island. The tax isn't going to stop the congestion so much as it raises money to rebuild part of the mass transit system. That's the biggest problem with letting "things" constantly increase in value so "investments" for investors can increase in value. The cost of building, maintaining, expanding and repairing the public infrastructure increases past the point of being economically feasible to do.
The idea that there is a name for diminishing returns just goes to show that people never learn anything from the past. One possible reason for that is that we just don't remember the past the way it actually happened.
The two tunnels and the bridge are major traffic routes for all kinds of traffic, not just for business in the city. The one being taxed is the George Washington Bridge. The two two routes not being taxed are the Holland Tunnel and the Lincoln Tunnel. It's the location of the bridge where it enters into the congestion area. The tunnels are not feeding that area. Its felt that people who would normally use the bridge will use the tunnels instead. All the local streets that feed that area will have license plate readers to tax the vehicle traffic.
The congestion taxing would be better suited to the flow of money and not the flow of people. Or the congestion charge could be based on the amount of use a company uses the public infrastructure to make money. That would pretty much guarantee the average person would pay nothing.
Official NYC traffic data:
"The Holland Tunnel opened to traffic in 1927, the toll was 50 cents, the trip took eight minutes, and 51,694 vehicles passed through on opening day. Today, the toll is four dollars, the trip can take up to an hour, and more than 100,000 vehicles pass through the tunnel daily." Needless to say, cars went a lot slower in 1927.
The Lincoln Tunnel is about 100,000 vehicles per day.
The George Washington Bridge is around 300,000 vehicles per day.
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It's like taxing people on carbon use without encouraging them to insulate their homes, fit solar and change to power saving bulbs. The options have to be available or you just have impoverished people and a bad environment in which to do business.
Progress Of Electric Car Batteries and where it needs to get to before electric cars can significantly change the vehicle population. The biggest drawback not heard about is that the batteries can lose half of their change capacity after 5 years. Apparently the current plan is to have cheaper replacement batteries ready by then so electric car owners can keep using their cars in a practical way without a big expense, or perhaps the cars will have to be traded in for a new or used vehicle with a new battery in it every couple of years. Right now, over the short term or the long term, the less the car is used, the longer the battery lasts.
https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/up...
NYC traffic congestion tax heading for heavy traffic.https://www.nj.com/news/2019/04/get-r...
"The George Washington Bridge enters Manhattan farther north, above the congestion zone, and motorists there likely won’t receive a credit. That raises the specter of thousands of cars shifting from the bridge to the tunnels, both of which already are the site of daily gridlock."
https://www.philly.com/news/new-jerse...
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GPS makes it easy for anyone to do
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Good on ya, Clare! I'm ashamed to admit that I'd probably be utterly lost without Apple Maps directions via my phone these days.
Of course, Apple Maps has taken me on a few interesting "scenic route" detours over the years... so maybe I'm putting way too much trust in the tech! ;-)
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https://www.care2.com/causes/amsterda...
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To keep your diesel engine clean, you need to change the oil regularly as recommended - several times a year if it is always on the road. Change the oil filter every second time (or once a year).
You need to put carbon cleaner in the diesel - I do it every year, you should do it more often if you are always on the road, once a quarter. Use as clean a diesel fuel as you can buy, low sulphur.
And you need to give the vehicle a serious long hot run, like a motorway drive, at least once a year. A vehicle that just idles in traffic and drives at 30 mph does not burn off the carbon deposits.
Diesels have the problem of creating extremely fine particle pollution. No matter how clean it is, the fine particle pollution is there and hard to measure. It can sail right through the skin into the body. The lungs propel the fine particulates into the body in a number of ways. Even if it doesn't accumulate in the area it is being created in, it will drift around eventually concentrating somewhere else.The banned gas is petrol, LPG has it's own problems. It has a very low particulate and hydrocarbon pollutant footprint except for one substance, carbon monoxide which is produces more than petrol or diesel does. Carbon monoxide is a short lasting pollutant but unfortunately it breaks down into carbon dioxide, which is not short lasting, and ozone, which is not so good by itself but can also impede the transformation of methane and other greenhouse gasses into less reactive substances.
Low level carbon monoxide is higher during rush hour and is one of the things where the healthier one is the less it impacts you and the less healthy one is the more impacts the body. Nobody is getting healthier.
I read one article which was framed as a complaint about how inconvenient it would be for people to drive through Amsterdam on their way to somewhere else ( I have the right to pollute because my vehicle pollutes) or to deliver goods and services to Amsterdam, if they had to go around or use electric or LPG vehicles instead of banned vehicles.
I would like to see some reporting on some of the consequences of switching all vehicles to electric power as to how that would impact electricity generation, rates, and pollution from increased production. Short term goals work when there is enough time to do something else but fail when the long time spans for changing have become non existent, a luxury that no longer exists.
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Maybe it will be a case of heavy vehicles continuing to be polluting but stopping at warehouses on the city limits, and electric vehicles continuing the deliveries in smaller chunks.
I'm fairly certain but without direct knowledge that in the not so distant past when a new direction was taken that it was just put in place and life went on, disrupted or not.
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A solar powered train. Granted, it's in Australia, where they get a lot of sun. The technology and physical fittings are the same as for a car.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Y4QG...
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https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4687?fb...
The article contains a link to a Pdf on the subject from the Union of Concerned Scientists. Here it is.
https://www.ucsusa.org/sites/default/...
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https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09...
" The UK already has more charging points than petrol stations but traditional chargers and electric vehicles require between four and eight hours to fully charge – which is obviously not practicable during journeys. Rapid chargers can top up a car in less than an hour to provide 100 miles or so of range, depending on the model. "
I was recently talking to a gentleman who has a range extender in his EV - after the battery dies, a fuel-powered motor can be turned on to recharge the battery.
I think all cars should be made that way. Even if the use is primarily combustion it would go a long way towards getting more electric cars and fewer combustion only cars on the road. That could at least cut down on the constant exhaust from combustion operation vehicles.
For those of us who live in places where cars are likely to remain the primary mode of transportation for some time, I’m glad that there are still companies out there working on improving them rather than just expecting everyone to shift to public transit, which isn’t feasible everywhere.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_car
The electric car got killed twice, once a little over a hundred years ago. Mass production backed the gasoline powered car making it half the price of a handmade electric car. Twenty years later the electric trolleys also got killed off by the fledgling auto industry which rapidly filled the streets as road hogs unwilling to share the street with anything but another automobile. Fast forward to today where the electric car is the quick easy solution to car pollution but again it is the high prices holding it up. Making green things that not everyone can afford is never going to solve anything.https://www.architecturaldigest.com/g...
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https://jalopnik.com/finally-an-elect...
Drop in electric motor looks very promising. The article does immediately point out that the battery half of the make over is completely missing. I would assume the gas tank is removed and replaced by the battery. That is easy to look at but not that easy to do. The batteries are heavy and big. The gas tank is basically bolted in place so it is easy to remove. The problem might be that the straps that hold a gas tank in place might not be sufficient to hold a battery in place.The articles about the battery half of the equation range from no mention at all about the battery to putting the battery in the back seat, or in the case of a station wagon, just bolting the battery to the rear cargo area. If the rear cargo area is not big enough, the battery placement can be split between now empty space in the engine compartment and wherever else they fit. Still looking for an article where they replace the gas tank with the battery where the gas tank was.
You also need to heat the car interior in some locations. Denmark required testing of the car's new electric set up and body conversion work which cost $10,000. Other places aren't too particular. In the US the inspection is for exemption from having emission testing. No big deal, takes a few weeks for the papers and photos that document the change to be processed. The power windows are a drain on the battery unless you get a big battery set up. The power brakes can be powered by a small electric motor.
This conversion cost $1200 and a lot of hard work which if done by a garage would have been far more that $1200, which was mostly parts. You can see where the batteries go.
https://www.instructables.com/id/Buil...
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Any additional use like air-con, heating, automatic windows, even wi-fi and playing music, all will drain the battery faster.
Power assisted brakes and steering? Power has to come from somewhere. Some classic cars won't have had all these refinements in the first place.
Classic cars here are those over 30 years (for motor tax that is).
Vintage are those built up to 1930, in America.
Vintage in Ireland means over 30 years and of historic interest, here is the official RSA guideline:
" What is the definition of a vintage vehicle? This refers to a 'vehicle of
historical interest' which fulfils all the following conditions:
• it was manufactured or registered for the first time at least 30 years ago,
• its specific type as defined in the relevant national or union law is no longer in production;
• it is historically preserved and maintained in its original state and has not undergone substantial changes in the technical characteristics of its main components.
Are vintage cars pre 1980 exempt from NCT? Yes. Currently private cars registered prior to 01 January 1980 are not required to undergo a roadworthiness test.
However if the vehicle is being used for commercial purposes, e.g. wedding hire then it will require a roadworthiness test.
Why do vintage trucks need to be tested? Vintage trucks can be used for commercial purposes i.e. to carry a load, and this is why they are required to be tested.
These vehicles are tested to the standards that the vehicles concerned were originally designed to meet.
What are the changes for vintage vehicles that are currently
within the scope of testing at NCT Centres? New regulations are:
• from 20 May 2018 all private cars registered post 01 January 1980 that are over 30 years old but less than 40 the requirement to undergo a compulsory NCT will be reduced to every two years
• from January 2020 onwards any vehicle 40 years or older will not require a test "
As far as I can see, that means an EV classic car will not be considered vintage and will have to undergo annual safety testing.
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Its an option on new Telsa cars, has to be factory done, apparently can't easily be added after the car has been built. The extra weight drags down the mileage too much, doesn't help for "bad publicity" reasons. The stock suspension is already partially loaded by the heavy battery weight. That should probably be upgraded. Automatic features need to be automatically turned off for safety reasons. That means extra software.
When you take your foot off the accelerator, most electric vehicles automatically kick in a generator function which adds "friction" to the braking process and recharges the battery. When towing a trailer the "erratic" change in power performance might not be a good idea. So all the automatic features need automatic shutdown, otherwise a person could forget to turn something off that you don't want to find out about when towing 2000 to 3000 pounds.
One article said EVs not authorized for towing simply means no one has any idea how the vehicle operates on the road when towing something.
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My science fiction has dual-engine HGVs which are battery powered around town and motor with biodiesel on the open road, hills etc. The batteries are still lithium and heavy.
I think someone has an EV with 4 motors, one on each wheel. Put on two more wheels and add 2 more motors. That would tow anything, including an extra battery for a dual battery design. Unfortunately, at this time, two engines are not cheaper than one.In the 1930's they had 12 cylinder engines. Original combustion engine cars had 1 cylinder engines, then 4 cylinders, then 8 cylinders. The engines with more than 8 cylinders were horizontal progressions, very little of that idea ended up in the future.
Perhaps EVs will have the same progression. Right now adding more engines adds more weight. Not good for an EV. But if it had a motor on each wheel you could get rid of the transmission, that would take some weight off the vehicle which would be replaced by the motors. The transmission probably can't get much lighter but the engines probably still have a long way to go before they reach their "final" designs, at least for awhile. I don't think there is much difference in the way electric motors from a hundred years ago work in principle compared to today's electric motors.
The 1 cylinder engine car was very cheap so it sold well. I would imagine the single engine EV will be around for a long time, as the "cheap" entry vehicle.
One issue which Clare raised which is quite interesting is the issue of weather conditions on electric vehicles.(I live in Canada, so in my case it's the cold that is a potential issue.)
Here is what I said in another thread:
"From what I've read, this can be an issue, in that cold does indeed sap power from electric cars, but this shouldn't prevent them from being quite efficient. (If you consider my province of Quebec for instance, producing an electric car would be particularly eco-friendly given that much of our energy, especially for heating, is hydro-electric.)
I have seen (already) the occasional fully electric vehicle over here, and they seem to run well (purely anecdotal evidence of course, and I have not tried them myself as I am strictly a public transit user!). It is certainly true that in cold weather the distance one can drive with a fully electric vehicle without recharging is definitely less than that achieved by a car with a combustion engine and a full tank of gas. (1, 2)
The main issue here unfortunately, is a more 'structural' one: most petrol stations are still NOT equipped for recharging electric car batteries. It seems to me that if these were more commonplace, it would be a simple matter to recharge and keep going, even in cold weather. :)"
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Given that the Canadian government continues to drag its feet when it comes to doing ANYTHING about climate change, I started a petition on change.org regarding transitioning to EVs.
You don't have to be Canadian to sign!
http://chng.it/4vFQDDYRGc
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References:
(1) How do electric cars start in the bitter cold? Shockingly well, experts say. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toront...
(2) Cold saps power from electric cars, but owners say vehicles still outperform the rest. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manito...
The electric pickup truck business is sputtering along. The production ranges from nothing to future orders of 100,000 vehicles by companies like amazon.https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/8/20...
What to do with used EV car batteries has a couple of choices, nothing has been decided on a industry basis. One idea is to standardize battery construction so robots can take the batteries apart and recycle the materials used to make the batteries. This idea has no timelines or consensus on how or who would do it. Another idea, being explored by Toyota, is to use the old batteries to power houses running on alternative energy systems, or just storing electric power for use during power outages.https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/6/20...
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E-pickups.
Elon Musk unveiled the Tesla but for some strange reason he thought it should have bulletproof windows, and they were easily broken by a guy throwing a metal ball at them from close quarters.
Maybe this was deliberate, just to attract more attention to the vehicle? Because after all, you don't need bulletproof windows in a pickup. No, you don't.
Not unless you want an army contract.
https://jalopnik.com/a-deep-look-at-t...
That's the Tesla one. Looks like Terry Gilliam's Brazil police cars.
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The video is about 15 mins but the last few mins are an ad for another channel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0nA8...
I don't know why they called it a cyber truck, unless it is completely automated. If they dropped the price even lower they could sell a million of them. They look like something from a sci fi movie, like Blade Runner, or Tron. The advertising is already slanted, you see posts claiming 500 miles and $39,000 in the same line but the 500 mile range is $69,000. You get 250 miles for 39K. It does have a lego block assembly look to it so it might be something that can fly out of the factory.
The trucks could be for people who want something other than a car but don't need or want a large truck. 35 years ago small pickup trucks were 4 cylinders, cheap, stylish and popular. The question is does this market still exist. Now if you could hang any body on it from a good selection of styles it might sell.
The window breaking probably happened because they threw all kinds of things at it and the windows and they didn't break during testing before the show. So they kept on throwing stuff and probably had a good time doing it. Unfortunately they probably did end up knicking the glass or whatever it is and while it could take blows from odd shaped objects, the pressure from a sphere being applied to the knicked surface was enough to make it crack spectacularly. If they had changed the glass out before the live demo it probably wouldn't have happened.
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For those who don't watch or read the man, he is a British columnist and presenter of a car show.
I found the story on Gizmodo, apologies that AdBlock Plus tells me it is blocking 66 ads on this page. You might want to google the story and read it elsewhere.
https://jalopnik.com/aging-megastar-d...
He also forgot to mention that the cars he shows on his show always get more expensive, not less expensive. Part of the cost is due to making vehicles environmentally cleaner but the bulk of the cost is to make vehicles for people with money to burn, which is a decreasing percentage of the general population. Young people's likes and dislikes have also disrupted just about every other retail field, none of which is about the environment and instead is all about the lack of funds and changing personal tastes. For instance, a good percentage of younger generations do not see collecting vintage objects of any sort as a worthwhile pursuit of time.
They would rather get music through digital delivery sources rather than by collecting CDs. That in itself is not a new trend, First there were records to transport music around the country but as radio became more common place, that medium took over the distribution of music without possession of it.
Expensive combustion engine vehicles are old news. 100 years old news. But until new vehicles become less expensive, electric or otherwise, ownership of cars will continue to be less important to individuals and instead will be just be viewed as a matter of conveyance, same as a taxi or privately driven car serving the general public's transportation needs.
Until the manufacturers improve the safety and design of cars without the ever increasing price tag, the new cars on his show will continue be less and less interesting to the general public.
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https://www.reuters.com/brandfeatures...
Good article. In some ways the used smart phone market and the used EV battery market are very similar. There will be billions of used large EV batteries. There already are billions of smaller size lithium batteries floating around. How is the recycling going on with them when they have hundreds of different configurations and sizes? They can be, probably are, thrown in the trash. The EV industry needs to standardize the batteries so the recycling can be done easily and cheaply. The batteries need to be easy to replace in the EV vehicles, both installation and removal. That means the batteries will be easy to steal. They strip cars now for their parts, The used battery market will be huge and could easily absorb batteries from any source. Which probably means we won't find good batteries laying around cluttering up the landscape.
Dead batteries present a different situation and they are not something something that can simply be thrown out with ordinary trash. Hopefully the recycle value will prevent them from just being left by the side of the road.
Public transport is a great way to go, but cars, vans, trucks, buses using ICEs (internal combustion engines) are still going to sell. This being the case, various rules are coming into force to drive exhaust emissions to be cleaner.
The EU is bringing in laws soon to make standards tighter.
These rules will apply to new vehicles sold. Each car maker will have to fit the standards at the middle of its range. So if the maker sells a heavy car with a big engine, they tend to also carry a dinky little two-seater runabout with an engine under one litre.
Dearer cars can use carbon fibre and titanium instead of steel to keep weight down. Smaller cars will not sell if they are expensive, so they are now leaving out the spare wheel and putting in a can of flat-fix. The cheapos.
Volkswagen let down the German side by producing cars deliberately to falsify the results on emissions tests.
All of this can leave car makers in a quandary, especially if they have just bought up another car company.
http://www.dw.com/en/psa-inherits-mas...