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"Green" Ice Resurfacing Machines Fail In Vancouver
lurking_giant writes "The Seattle Times is reporting that the Men's 500 meter speed-skating competition was delayed more than an hour Monday evening by the breakdown of the two ice grooming machines at the skating oval. The real story is that the machines that failed were the latest state-of-the-art 'Resurfice Fume-Free Electric Groomers' leased to the Olympics committee. An old, propane-powered Zamboni had to be brought out to fix the ice. This makes two nights in a row with ice resurfacing machine failures. If you're going to spend twice as much on electric devices to replace non-green designs, at least test the things first."
If you're going to spend twice as much on electric devices to replace non-green designs ...
From the linked NYTimes article:
Electric resurfacers are also cheaper to run — about 25 cents a flood, Mr. Schlupp said, compared with at least $3 for a propane-powered flood and at least $4 for gasoline. The drawback is the cost of the electric machine, which he said would sell for about $160,000, twice the price of a propane model.
So like a lot of 'green' things they are designed to save you money in the long run. Like paying out your ass for CFL bulbs or installing a windmill. Granted that's over 29,000 floods you'd need to recoup the eighty grand, it's a bit misleading to say it's more expensive. The other thing to look at is whether or not the eighty thousand is worth the health of your fans (you know, where you get your revenues from). I mean, fume free might not mean much to me but to the six year old kid suffering from asthma in the front row?
... at least test the things first.
Again, from the NYTimes article:
Mr. Hainault said that so far the machines had run, well, smoothly.
Sounds like they tested them to me. The Seattle Times article is either wrong or confusing when they say that the Zambonis also had problems:
It's the second straight day there have been issues here treating the ice between sessions --- yesterday it was the women's 3,000. Problems with that Zamboni left only one available for today, and then that one that began to have problems. The Zamboni left some piles of slush in the turn near where I am sitting --- which is also the front straightaway.
The Resurfice Olympia models appeared to be the electrics with the Zambonis being the gas fed ice resurfacers. So are they saying they had problems with the Zambonis just as much as the Resurfice Olympia models? Or are they using Zamboni in place of "ice resurfacer" like Kleenex and Frisbee?
I would bet they were having problems with temperatures. I've been to Capitals hockey games were breaks between periods went long since the abnormally high temperatures caused problems with the Zambonis.
My work here is dung.
More like Can'tada!
amirite?
I heard (on TV, so no link) that they weren't allowed to use the old machines because those are not official Olympic partners...
Even the engine (which isn't visible to the audience) had to be made by an Olympic partner.
Anyway, that, plus the fact that the band was only allowed to play 2 songs in the break, showed to me that the Canadians keep to the rules a bit too precise. The organisation seemed so afraid of problems by unexpected events by people that when the machines broke down, all creativity and initiative was smothered under a blanket of Bureaucracy On Ice.
Ever been around a homeless person? Typically, they smell very bad.
You and I take for granted the ability to wash ourselves in a shower or bath. We are able to get much cleaner in a very short amount of time. Homeless people, on the other hand, may not have access to such luxuries and be forced to wash themselves in gas station or park sinks. The water is the same, and given enough time the bums should be able to wash themselves to cleanliness. However it is very inefficient because instead of dousing themselves all at once in hot water, they are forced to wash themselves piecemeal.
Same with electric vehicles vs gas vehicles.
Are you from India, or some other nation where they don't have arenas, let alone natural ice?
During a single high-level amateur or semi-pro hockey game, the ice will be resurfaced:
1) Before the warm up.
2) After the warm up.
3) After the first period.
4) After the second period.
5) After the third period.
6) If the game is tied, there may be one (or more) over-time periods, during which the ice is resurfaced.
During a typical day, the ice at a single rink will be resurfaced approximately 12 to 15 times, and being specialized facilities they're open year-round. So those 29000 resurfacings will have been done in about 6.5 years.
Most arenas these days have three or more rinks within the same complex, serviced by the same machines thanks to staggered schedules. So those 6.5 years could quickly become two years, or less.
And the fact is saying that human CO2 emissions are "infinitesimal" is to miss the point entirely.
An analogy (that does not involve cars). Imagine the balance between CO2 sources and sinks is like a funnel. Into this funnel, you pour one litre per second of liquid. The funnel can allow up to 1 litre per second to leave, too. Therefore, the level of liquid in the funnel remains the same although 1 litre per second is constantly being added. However, add an infinitesimal increase, let's say, just 0.1% more - just one mililitre extra per second, and as sure as night follows day, the level in the funnel increases and eventually it will overflow. What is more, what we have done is effectively not only added more liquid to the funnel, we have also constricted the exit (by removing carbon sinks). The rate compared to other things is totally irrelevant. The only thing that's relevant is - is the CO2 being added at a rate higher than which it is being removed?
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Basically, it is much easier said to clean up a single source than millions of tiny ones.
With that said, electricity is actually better, because few countries rely 100% on Fossil Fuel for their Electricity. China probably has the most at more than 90% Fossil Fueled (and growing). America is less than 50% Coal (and dropping) with another 20% Natural gas (rising, but not that fast). Vancouver has a lot of Coal, but they also have Hydro, and IIRC, they have a nuke there (???? not sure about that).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Although to a certain extent you are correct, you aren't accounting for the scale of the operation. Now, I'm not saying all electric plants are clean - not by any means. However in a large plant it is much easier to have the correct systems in place to clean the exhaust air than it is with small gasoline engines (especially mobile ones like in a car as weight is much more of a consideration). So yes, the electric plants can certainly be a bit of the NIMBY and also the "out of sight, out of mind" that you mention. But really the scale they operate on can work towards better systems to prevent noxious emissions.
No, your math is correct. You also forgot to mention that the propane ones are also "fume free" in terms of producing NO toxic fumes. Someone with asthma is going to be equally effected by the electric one as the propane one.
ALSO, you people are forgetting to mention the carbon footprint the electric one has: is it's power source a petro power station? Or a coal power station? Those cases would make the electric one worse. I love how we are doing a bunch of fancy footwork in the name of "green," but it is just the same old problems all over again (if not worse in the case of CFL bulbs) at twice the cost.
It's really a shame that people believe politics over science.
You are confusing "green marketing" with science. The first one happens to be full of crap, but well, what do you expect from marketing? That however doesn't make the issue they peddle to a non-issue, climate scientist will tell you quite the opposite, CO2 is an issue and current evidence points to a man made climate change, go watch this and educate yourself.
Hey, it's Vancouver. Vancouverites aren't quite sure what ice is. They've heard it's frozen water, but really, if the copious amounts of rain that fall on Vancouver froze that would really hurt, wouldn't it?
Apparently this thing called ice exists on top of those mountains you can see from the city, and there's lots of it on the other side of them on the "prairies," but those are just rumours.
Vancouver (all of BC) uses no nuke, and no coal (at least not for power). We're about 90% hydroelectric. http://www.bchydro.com/about/our_system/generation.html
Yes. OTOH, a lot of power is lost during transport from the central plant to the consuming device.
Basicly we have three fields here:
1) "Greener" energy usage (no local fumes)
2) "Greener" energy production (Windmills vs. whatever)
3) "Greener" energy transport and storage
It's the weakest link that defines overall "greenlieness" amongst these three. (anything else is just shifting from local pollution to remote pollution)
And in addition to these three we have efficiency. Any gain in that directly goes to the total "Green"-Result.
bickerdyke
These machines were not creating any greenhouse gases while they were broken.
The terms green and CO2 are being tossed around as blatant lies to convince people to spend more to get the the same, or in cases like this, to get nothing at all.
It's really a shame that people believe politics over science. It makes me a cynic. Someone obviously decided to buy these "green" ice resurfacing machines because it made them feel like they were doing "their part" to help the environment. The problem is they were sold a lie. Not only were they sold a lie, but a non-functioning lie as well.
Seriously people, CO2 emissions are nothing to be afraid of. CO2 emissions are nothing you should be paying extra to decrease. The fact is that the CO2 that humans put into the atmosphere is infinitesimal compared to volcanoes and the oceans.
The people who bought the electric zams, which are actually pretty common, probably made the decision to reduce the carbon monoxide and particulate emissions that are not so great for the health of spectators in enclosed ice arenas.
Also, you made a blunder in your CO2 rant. The argument that CO2 emissions aren't bad is supposed to be, "increased CO2 doesn't lead to significantly more global warming," not "humans don't significantly affect CO2 levels." The reason for this is that contention 1 may be true, while contention 2 (yours) is demonstrably false. Note the ~25% increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration in the last 50 years shown here.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
Well, starts like a good analogy.
But to be more accurate, you'd need to have that water comming in anything from doplets to gushes, into a funnel thats unpredictably changing it's diameter, periodically clogging up by freezing (at the exit) while some of the water may evaporate because it's boiling. While walking on a tightrope.
And you know that either spilling or letting the funnel run dry is going to kill you.
And so far, it's only the analogy for the natural CO2.
Now you have to take a lieak and the only possibility for that is said funnel. Blindfolded.
I guess thats closer to the actual state of climate research.
bickerdyke
Shush, you. It's no fun making fun of Canadians when you just go bringing up facts about how much better things are up there.
Now let's get back to talking about how their nuclear plants always explode, their hockey teams always lose and their health care system is stuck in the stone age, okay?
...or install a small diesel generator....
bickerdyke
It's amusing to me that the world sees Vancouver as promoting these "green" olympic technologies, but we here in Vancouver are not fooled by the greenwashing (well, at least some of us). It's been nice and warm here lately, as is usual in Vancouver in the winter, so in order to keep snow on the local mountain where some of the skiing and snowboarding events are, they have to truck it in from another mountain that's quite some distance away. Then they use helicopters to bring the snow from where the dump trucks are, to the event location. The snowboarding halfpipe is actually constructed using hay bales stacked like lego blocks, and then they apply snow on top like icing on a cake. Any idea what the carbon footprint is of a helicopter bringing snow to the top of a mountain is? or the mining trucks used to haul it around?
Then there are the ~100,000 trees cleared for olympic venues, the massive highway expansion that was unnecessary for the games, the construction of huge buildings for various events at a time when homelessness has been increasing for years. The whole thing is a big PR scam, but for the past few weeks it seems like most of the vancouverites on facebook have been abuzz about how silly the whole thing is....except the opening ceremonies for some reason...everyone got all weirdly patriotic about that, which is unusual for Canadians.
"The value of a man resides in what he gives,
and not in what he is capable of receiving."
--Albert Einstein
Vancouver gets its power primarily from hydro electricity, dumbass.
Real scientists will laugh at you for claiming CO2 is an issue,
Where can I read their papers? If they are real scientists they must have published their findings, right?
I'll see your enlightened video link and raise you one.
Sorry, but videos made by people that fabricated their data and misquoted scientists in a fraudulent way don't impress me much. They even tried to sue the misquoted scientist with the notorious UK libel laws after he complained, great way to react to criticism...
Just go watch the video I linked and the other ones in the series, they do a great job of explaining many common climate myth, both from the skeptics side as well as the believers. And if you have any info explaining the errors in the video I linked I would love to read them.
Apparently I've been fortunate. I've been to a LOT of hockey games, and never had trouble with the fumes. I sat on the front row for over 200 college hockey games, and no issue. Usually no fumes.
It may be that there are malfunctioning Zamboni machines out there, and those need to be repaired. But the 'green' push is just about CO2 and being politically correct, not about any widespread or even uncommon CO danger. Pure nonsense, that.
Now, as an aside, making an electrically-driven Zamboni is nontrivial. Those are relatively heavy machines, some include a water heater, and the cold climate makes batteries less useful. All this conspires to make for a difficult design - big battery pack, big motors, high demand, cold, not an easy thing.
And the comment earlier about how the Zamboni left slush in the corner of the straight... Well, sometimes it's the driver. Sometimes it's the ice.
Somehow, this actually seems like a performance problem unrelated to electric or propane.
And of course, we know that propane cars are essentially pollution-free. Right? Propane forklifts are safe enough to use in warehousesM.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Zamboni has had electrics for a long time.
I've been watching US College hockey for a long time. Most rinks have a Zamboni. They last a long time. I've seen a few new ones and usually the go electric because the propane ones generate CO2 and that's not good indoors. I've seen rinks add a 2nd Zamboni for faster resurfacing between periods too.
Zamboni isn't the only maker of ice resurfacers. I bet most rinks in the US are Zamboni though. I remember Union College in Schenectedy had another brand.
FWIW Clarkson University gave Mr Zamboni and honorary degree in 1988 in recognition of his engineering achivement in creating the ice resurfacer.
Cold and batteries don't usually mix.
You might want to check on what ice resurfacing machines do. They sit parked in a garage bay 90% of the time. When it's time for them to work, they go out onto the ice, scrape off the top layer, AND MELT IT. Then they flood the ice surface to make it smooth and nice.
Yes, I know we're talking about ice here. But the point of the machine is to be hot. If you've ever watched one, you might have noticed that they steam. There really is no temperature issue with the batteries.
Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
I'm from the mid-Atlantic and the hockey teams I've heard about only play 82 games in a season, not the 365 that you considered.
As a Canadian, I can verify that the hockey teams you've heard about play 82 games a season. Do you suppose they ever practice? Do you suppose there might be other levels of hockey? The average facility around here is in use 365. (Yes, there are even games on Christmas) You're only thinking about top-level hockey. You're completely forgetting Senior, Club, City league, Junior (Major, A, B, C, D), Women's, etc. Just ask the parents of young hockey players who have been up at 5 am for the child's game because that's the only ice time available.
Yes. Hockey games every day.
You're also from FREAKING CANADA.
Last I checked, we were talking about ice resurfacers purchased for the winter Olympics in Vancouver. Vancouver would be in Canada.