Most of them are, and Erdogan is trying to follow the lead of the other dictators and make Turkey a dictatorship. Thankfully there is the Turkish army, which is famously sektarian and weary of muslim extremists. Hopefully Erdogan will be "dissappeared" soon.
you get to solve an even bigger chunk of the problem
Even better, ignore the millions of little ones, that are both hard to fix, costly to do and in addition will contribute close to nothing at all, even when we move to low-emission (CO2) power generation. Remember, removing all private CO2 emitting cars, even if you don't replace them with anything the reduction in emissions is statistically irrelevant at about 3%. What we need to focus on is what matters, and that is three main areas, all which will contribute significantly with very, very little work. Power production, forestry and agriculture. Cut them all by a measly 50% and it will have an order of magnitude more impact on emissions in percentage points than making all cars completely CO2 emission free.
Even if we could, magically, make all personal cars emission free, the theoretical max impact is 7%.
explain why you singled out solar power for criticism
Wow, you really are devestatingly retarded, are you not? I just pointed out the very obvious fact that solar uses rare-earth minerals, and that the mining for rare-earth minerals is devestating for the areas where it happens. You can, for example, read this.. I did not insinuate, say or state that it pollutes more or less than this or that, only that it has devestating effects as a source of pollution.
If you can admit that fossil fuels are worse for the environment in every measurable way when compared to solar and EVs
The misunderstanding is all yours, created entirely using your own imagination.
I would recommend you try to argue for a point with facts and figures from reality rather than just throwing snarky remarks and personal insults at people. It will make you seem less of a moron.
Did you point out anywhere in the above where I had told a lie? What specifically have I said that was not true? Nothing. I have said that producing solar panels generates a lot of pollution. It does. I have not compared it to anything else, I have just pointed out that it pollutes. Doesn't it?
Well, they're doing something right, aren't they?
Yes, they are, but it has nothing to do with EVs, it has to do with the fact that all electricity in Norway is, and has always been, renewable. Always has been, and if Norway doesn't grow its population dramatically, it always will be.
Wow. Personal insults now? No, I didn't start. If you think I called you retarded, read what I wrote again.
Oh, and no, you don't start with cars, they are the hardest place to start and there is almost nothing at all to gain. The easiest place to start, technically, is with electricity production. One place. One thing to clean. We have the technology to clean it. We do not, on the other hand, have political players with the guts to tell the people "hey, your power prices are going up since we do not want to drown Holland".
You are simply ignorant of the facts:
8,000 lbs Electric Vehicle
13,000 lbs Conventional Gas Vehicle
Nope, you are just ignorant of maths. So, let's look at it with your numbers. 13% of CO2 emissions are from transportation. Half (a little less except in the US) is from personal transportation. That'll be 7% (a little less, but OK). According to what you say, you can save 40% by moving over, leaving the CO2 emission savings at 2.7%. That's nothing. Just maths.
Well, perhaps in your bizarre alternate reality. Here on planet earth
Goodnes. I wish you'd try to read what I actually said rather than what the little green dude on your shoulder is whispering in your ear (you forgot your meds again btw). I have never said that solar panels will not reduce CO2 emissions, I said that producing them creates a lot of pollution. Remember, Pollution and CO2 are not the same thing. Pollution is not CO2 - in this case I was talking about the process of mining rare-earth minerals which is extremely polluting, and believe it or not, CO2 is not, never has been, and never will be a pollutant. Again, please respond to what I actually write, not the voices in your head and what they are trying to tell you I am writing.
all of the lies you are spitting back up
Please point to a single lie. Just one. All my numbers are from IPCC and similar sources. Where is the lie? Again, from what I have actually said, not from what the voices in your head says.
So quit it with the uninformed assertions
Show me one.
What country do you live in now, and what is their policy towards helping the expansion of EV usage?
Norway. Policy towards pushing EV usage: Ultra extreme. You can see it in the tax on new cars. The Tesla S has been compared to the german luxury market, so let's compare taxes on a BMW M6 in Norway, compared to a Tesla S.
BMW M6 price in Norway, approx $350,000 - in the US approx $110,000.
Tesla Model S price in Norway, approx $75,000 - in the US approx $65,000
No surprise Tesla sells more cars in Norway than any other place in the world.
Taking the US price as "base" price, the BMW has a "tax" of just over 200%. The Tesla has a "tax" of a little over 13%. For an oil producing nation, Norway thinks it is taking big steps against CO2 emissions. The steps are purely symbolic of course. Buying quota and taxing gas guzzlers. Moronic both.
But given a world full of electric cars, it makes solving a decent chunk of the problem a lot more feasible
No, it would not be a lot more feasible, it wouldn't matter at all. Let's pretend to be magicians. Today the amount of CO2 produced by personal transportation is X metric tonnes. Then at midnight we wave our wands and voila, all cars used for personal transportation are magically converted into electrical cars, world wide, the total drop is CO2 emissions would be ZERO. So, not a decent chunk, no chunk at all.
Also Nuclear is a great alternative
Absolutely, so France and Japan (and Norway which is 100% hydro) will see a reduction in emissions by moving to EVs. Not huge, the max potential emission drop is about 6-7%, which, though small, is not entirely insignificant.
Absolutely. For the general health of the population, and for people with respiratory issues, absolutely. That wasn't the topic of the discussion though. For CO2 and climate gas emissions, talking about personal transportation is moronic.
Where are numbers giving personal transport as percentage of all transportation?
In the US it is 62-65%, in Europe it is quite a bit lower. I do not know the world wide number but given the state of the economies, personal transportation is likely to be significantly lower than US and Europe for obvious reasons.
There are plenty of ways to solve our commuting problem,
Absolutely, and if you want to solve congestion problems, problems with particle pollution and problems for asthmatics, cars is one place to start. If you want to cut CO2 emissions, even putting cars into the discussion (personal transportation) is ignorant and stupid, since removing all gasoline powered cars will not have any impact on what you are trying to solve.
Are you saying we can't do the same?
Probably. Did you get the impression I said anything else, or anything at all regarding this? I am talking about the retards who focus on personal transportation as it relates to CO2 emissions. What we should focus on is electricity production etc, since that can have an impact. Moving to EVs will not.
Do not forget that renewables are extreme polluters though. The most common, wind and solar, uses rare-earth minerals which are strip-mined in China in a process that devestates city after city, river after river and mile after square mile of fertile land. When it comes to absolute pollution, Solar (for example) has a devestating impact on the environment.
it were 1900, you'd be arguing that electricity wasn't as safe as kerosene
No, I wouldn't. For many reasons. One, I am not retarded, but I am starting to wonder about you. I have only stuck to the reality of the matter, and when it comes to CO2 emissions, the reality of the matter is that if you move the entire world to EVs using magic tomorrow, the total impact on CO2 emissions would be very close to zero. That is the only thing I am saying. I am not talking about the virtues of renewables, so why you bring them up is a little unclear to me.
Oh, and also, I am not living in the USofA. Not any more. That's the problem with people like you. People who "feel" rather than actually think. You jump to conclusions with no basis in reality every time some one pokes your God (Gaia).
With EVs, a reduction in the pollution from generating electricity is instantly realized.
In most of the world, moving to EVs will have an instant realization of approximately zero percent realization. That's what makes it moronic to include private transportation in the discussion at all. EVs are also close to the absolutely hardest place to start. Electricity production is an easy place to start, and nobody is doing anything about it since it would be political suicide.
Moving to EVs has an impact on peoples concience and their feeling of contrubuting, it has zero impact on CO2 emissions. Why focus on something that even theoretically can not contribute to any reduction in CO2 emissions? That's just retarded.
Yes, I see you're trying to cut down to personal transport
I am not "cutting down" on anything. In relationship to CO2 emissions, private car usage is irrelevant and a moronic place to focus.
It's just a mistake to say this is only happening with private transport
I am not saying it is only happening with private transport, I am saying that private transport is a retarded place to start. Also, since transport as such, that is trains, planes, cars, trucks, boats etc, only contribute 13% of the total, transport as such is the wrong place to start. The maths doesn't lie, it's the wrong discussion. The right discussion would center on electricity production, which there is far too little discussion, forestry (where there is no discussion) and agriculture (where there is no discussion).
Neat thing about buses: they run a set route so you can power them from overhead wires and not even have to carry batteries
Don't know about the situation in San Fran as it comes to economy, but the local bus company in my current town, Bergen, Norway, refuse to run electrical buses unless the city pays for them since their operations are much more expensive than diesel buses. Don't know why, electricity in Norway is quite cheap and all clean since it is all hydro powered.
Then why focus on the thing that doesn't (currently) solve anything. Oh, yes, because "cleaner energy generation (already starting to happen" - sorry to bubble burst here, but no, it is not so. Quite the opposite. The increase in oil production in the US has already pushed coal prices much lower, increasing the amount of coal (and oil) being used for energy production.
The "make the changes where changes have an actual impact" argument should not be that hard to argue, should it? Focus on Energy, Industry and Forestry and you'll cut (if you can make them emission free) emissions level back to a pre-industrial level or something of that order. Then you can just sit down and welcome the new ice age.
Your article doesn't say anything at all mostly. Here are some numbers that are actually useful, but that put the transportation number significantly lower than I did. I stuck with higher numbers from another source to make the impact of cars as high as possible. Going by the world-wide numbers from the link above, the move to electrical cars will have even less impact than I stated.
The IPCC report from 2007 (referred in this article) puts the number at 13% for all forms of transportation, that includes, personal vehicles, professional vehicles, trains, planes, boats etc. Large ships are huge emitters of both CO2 and also bad pollutants (CO2 is not a pollutant as such).
5% to 7% of all CO2 emissions is quite a LARGE number
Yes, it would be, if it meant that you would cut the emissions by 100% by switching from gas to electrical. You don't. In Europe, where the vast majority of the population drive small to mid-sized cars, the difference between a Tesla and a regular car is negligeble. Apparently the Tesla emits about as much as a Honda Accord, which is a mid-sized car by Eurpean standards. So, if we are hugely optimistic and assume massive improvements in electrical cars, perhaps a Tesla would emit half of the CO2 of a regular car, in other words, about a 3% reduction. In reality it is probably significant less than this since the difference between an average car and a Tesla is not 50% by a long shot.
it took the collective effort of the world's governments to regulate and limit the use of CFCs
Yeah, but they worked on something that had a theoretical chance of actually having an effect. Electrical cars for personal use is not something that has a chance of actually making a difference.
You seem to have jumped from 15% to "no measurable impact",
No, I did not. 15% is all motor vehicles, where about half (a bit more in the US, significantly less in the rest of the world where there is a significant difference between the emissions of a truck and a personal transportation car) is for personal use, and the remainder is for other uses. The campaigning is for personal use. That takes us down to about 7-8%. Now, an electrical car is nowhere near a 50% reduction in CO2 emissions, so the total reduction, if you convert to all electrical is nowhere near half of 7-8%, in other words, not even close to 4%. See where this number is going?
There might be a flowery tea pot in orbit around the sun somewhere beyond Pluto containing two astronaut mice running away from lab experiments conducted on earth. The problem is we'll never be able to disprove this. We'd also be total morons to think it likely or even pondering about wondering if we should consider considering it.
Mainly because they do not solve any problems. Cars (as in the ones you and I drive) are not big enough contributors for it to matter. Even if we stopped driving entirely and sat down and worked (assume CO2-emission free) from home, the total reduction in CO2 would be quite small. About 7% or so. Electrical vehicles may get to the point where they cut CO2 emission compared to a regular car by about half (not there by a long shot yet). So, moving to el-vehicles is not going to change anything. It is a retarded discussion.
Move from coal to nuclear, and all is well. Nuclear is quite low on CO2 emissions and very safe - more people die every day due to coal extraction than has died in nuclear accidents total. If you include the rather estimations of cancer increase due to radiation, more people die in coal extractions every year than has ever died directly or indirectly as a result of a nuclear accident.
Slashdot Mirror
It would, but that is another discussion entirely.
Not every Muslim country is a dictatorship
Most of them are, and Erdogan is trying to follow the lead of the other dictators and make Turkey a dictatorship. Thankfully there is the Turkish army, which is famously sektarian and weary of muslim extremists. Hopefully Erdogan will be "dissappeared" soon.
why bring up the fact that it's "devastating" for the environment
Because it is.
when it's the best option we currently have
It isn't. It isn't even a particularly good option.
you get to solve an even bigger chunk of the problem
Even better, ignore the millions of little ones, that are both hard to fix, costly to do and in addition will contribute close to nothing at all, even when we move to low-emission (CO2) power generation. Remember, removing all private CO2 emitting cars, even if you don't replace them with anything the reduction in emissions is statistically irrelevant at about 3%. What we need to focus on is what matters, and that is three main areas, all which will contribute significantly with very, very little work. Power production, forestry and agriculture. Cut them all by a measly 50% and it will have an order of magnitude more impact on emissions in percentage points than making all cars completely CO2 emission free.
Even if we could, magically, make all personal cars emission free, the theoretical max impact is 7%.
explain why you singled out solar power for criticism
Wow, you really are devestatingly retarded, are you not? I just pointed out the very obvious fact that solar uses rare-earth minerals, and that the mining for rare-earth minerals is devestating for the areas where it happens. You can, for example, read this.. I did not insinuate, say or state that it pollutes more or less than this or that, only that it has devestating effects as a source of pollution.
If you can admit that fossil fuels are worse for the environment in every measurable way when compared to solar and EVs
The misunderstanding is all yours, created entirely using your own imagination.
I would recommend you try to argue for a point with facts and figures from reality rather than just throwing snarky remarks and personal insults at people. It will make you seem less of a moron.
So you can't weasel out of the truth again
Did you point out anywhere in the above where I had told a lie? What specifically have I said that was not true? Nothing. I have said that producing solar panels generates a lot of pollution. It does. I have not compared it to anything else, I have just pointed out that it pollutes. Doesn't it?
Well, they're doing something right, aren't they?
Yes, they are, but it has nothing to do with EVs, it has to do with the fact that all electricity in Norway is, and has always been, renewable. Always has been, and if Norway doesn't grow its population dramatically, it always will be.
Wow. Personal insults now? No, I didn't start. If you think I called you retarded, read what I wrote again.
Oh, and no, you don't start with cars, they are the hardest place to start and there is almost nothing at all to gain. The easiest place to start, technically, is with electricity production. One place. One thing to clean. We have the technology to clean it. We do not, on the other hand, have political players with the guts to tell the people "hey, your power prices are going up since we do not want to drown Holland".
If these renewables have 0 CO2 emissions (they don't) even then by only 6-7%. A wholly retarded place to start.
You are simply ignorant of the facts:
8,000 lbs Electric Vehicle
13,000 lbs Conventional Gas Vehicle
Nope, you are just ignorant of maths. So, let's look at it with your numbers. 13% of CO2 emissions are from transportation. Half (a little less except in the US) is from personal transportation. That'll be 7% (a little less, but OK). According to what you say, you can save 40% by moving over, leaving the CO2 emission savings at 2.7%. That's nothing. Just maths.
Well, perhaps in your bizarre alternate reality. Here on planet earth
Goodnes. I wish you'd try to read what I actually said rather than what the little green dude on your shoulder is whispering in your ear (you forgot your meds again btw). I have never said that solar panels will not reduce CO2 emissions, I said that producing them creates a lot of pollution. Remember, Pollution and CO2 are not the same thing. Pollution is not CO2 - in this case I was talking about the process of mining rare-earth minerals which is extremely polluting, and believe it or not, CO2 is not, never has been, and never will be a pollutant. Again, please respond to what I actually write, not the voices in your head and what they are trying to tell you I am writing.
all of the lies you are spitting back up
Please point to a single lie. Just one. All my numbers are from IPCC and similar sources. Where is the lie? Again, from what I have actually said, not from what the voices in your head says.
So quit it with the uninformed assertions
Show me one.
What country do you live in now, and what is their policy towards helping the expansion of EV usage?
Norway. Policy towards pushing EV usage: Ultra extreme. You can see it in the tax on new cars. The Tesla S has been compared to the german luxury market, so let's compare taxes on a BMW M6 in Norway, compared to a Tesla S.
BMW M6 price in Norway, approx $350,000 - in the US approx $110,000.
Tesla Model S price in Norway, approx $75,000 - in the US approx $65,000
No surprise Tesla sells more cars in Norway than any other place in the world.
Taking the US price as "base" price, the BMW has a "tax" of just over 200%. The Tesla has a "tax" of a little over 13%. For an oil producing nation, Norway thinks it is taking big steps against CO2 emissions. The steps are purely symbolic of course. Buying quota and taxing gas guzzlers. Moronic both.
Need your meds.
But given a world full of electric cars, it makes solving a decent chunk of the problem a lot more feasible
No, it would not be a lot more feasible, it wouldn't matter at all. Let's pretend to be magicians. Today the amount of CO2 produced by personal transportation is X metric tonnes. Then at midnight we wave our wands and voila, all cars used for personal transportation are magically converted into electrical cars, world wide, the total drop is CO2 emissions would be ZERO. So, not a decent chunk, no chunk at all.
Also Nuclear is a great alternative
Absolutely, so France and Japan (and Norway which is 100% hydro) will see a reduction in emissions by moving to EVs. Not huge, the max potential emission drop is about 6-7%, which, though small, is not entirely insignificant.
Absolutely. For the general health of the population, and for people with respiratory issues, absolutely. That wasn't the topic of the discussion though. For CO2 and climate gas emissions, talking about personal transportation is moronic.
Where are numbers giving personal transport as percentage of all transportation?
In the US it is 62-65%, in Europe it is quite a bit lower. I do not know the world wide number but given the state of the economies, personal transportation is likely to be significantly lower than US and Europe for obvious reasons.
Source: http://www.epa.gov/otaq/climate/420r06003.pdf
There are plenty of ways to solve our commuting problem,
Absolutely, and if you want to solve congestion problems, problems with particle pollution and problems for asthmatics, cars is one place to start. If you want to cut CO2 emissions, even putting cars into the discussion (personal transportation) is ignorant and stupid, since removing all gasoline powered cars will not have any impact on what you are trying to solve.
Are you saying we can't do the same?
Probably. Did you get the impression I said anything else, or anything at all regarding this? I am talking about the retards who focus on personal transportation as it relates to CO2 emissions. What we should focus on is electricity production etc, since that can have an impact. Moving to EVs will not.
Do not forget that renewables are extreme polluters though. The most common, wind and solar, uses rare-earth minerals which are strip-mined in China in a process that devestates city after city, river after river and mile after square mile of fertile land. When it comes to absolute pollution, Solar (for example) has a devestating impact on the environment.
it were 1900, you'd be arguing that electricity wasn't as safe as kerosene
No, I wouldn't. For many reasons. One, I am not retarded, but I am starting to wonder about you. I have only stuck to the reality of the matter, and when it comes to CO2 emissions, the reality of the matter is that if you move the entire world to EVs using magic tomorrow, the total impact on CO2 emissions would be very close to zero. That is the only thing I am saying. I am not talking about the virtues of renewables, so why you bring them up is a little unclear to me.
Oh, and also, I am not living in the USofA. Not any more. That's the problem with people like you. People who "feel" rather than actually think. You jump to conclusions with no basis in reality every time some one pokes your God (Gaia).
With EVs, a reduction in the pollution from generating electricity is instantly realized.
In most of the world, moving to EVs will have an instant realization of approximately zero percent realization. That's what makes it moronic to include private transportation in the discussion at all. EVs are also close to the absolutely hardest place to start. Electricity production is an easy place to start, and nobody is doing anything about it since it would be political suicide.
Moving to EVs has an impact on peoples concience and their feeling of contrubuting, it has zero impact on CO2 emissions. Why focus on something that even theoretically can not contribute to any reduction in CO2 emissions? That's just retarded.
Yes, I see you're trying to cut down to personal transport
I am not "cutting down" on anything. In relationship to CO2 emissions, private car usage is irrelevant and a moronic place to focus.
It's just a mistake to say this is only happening with private transport
I am not saying it is only happening with private transport, I am saying that private transport is a retarded place to start. Also, since transport as such, that is trains, planes, cars, trucks, boats etc, only contribute 13% of the total, transport as such is the wrong place to start. The maths doesn't lie, it's the wrong discussion. The right discussion would center on electricity production, which there is far too little discussion, forestry (where there is no discussion) and agriculture (where there is no discussion).
Neat thing about buses: they run a set route so you can power them from overhead wires and not even have to carry batteries
Don't know about the situation in San Fran as it comes to economy, but the local bus company in my current town, Bergen, Norway, refuse to run electrical buses unless the city pays for them since their operations are much more expensive than diesel buses. Don't know why, electricity in Norway is quite cheap and all clean since it is all hydro powered.
Then why focus on the thing that doesn't (currently) solve anything. Oh, yes, because "cleaner energy generation (already starting to happen" - sorry to bubble burst here, but no, it is not so. Quite the opposite. The increase in oil production in the US has already pushed coal prices much lower, increasing the amount of coal (and oil) being used for energy production.
The "make the changes where changes have an actual impact" argument should not be that hard to argue, should it? Focus on Energy, Industry and Forestry and you'll cut (if you can make them emission free) emissions level back to a pre-industrial level or something of that order. Then you can just sit down and welcome the new ice age.
Your article doesn't say anything at all mostly. Here are some numbers that are actually useful, but that put the transportation number significantly lower than I did. I stuck with higher numbers from another source to make the impact of cars as high as possible. Going by the world-wide numbers from the link above, the move to electrical cars will have even less impact than I stated.
The IPCC report from 2007 (referred in this article) puts the number at 13% for all forms of transportation, that includes, personal vehicles, professional vehicles, trains, planes, boats etc. Large ships are huge emitters of both CO2 and also bad pollutants (CO2 is not a pollutant as such).
Yep.
5% to 7% of all CO2 emissions is quite a LARGE number
Yes, it would be, if it meant that you would cut the emissions by 100% by switching from gas to electrical. You don't. In Europe, where the vast majority of the population drive small to mid-sized cars, the difference between a Tesla and a regular car is negligeble. Apparently the Tesla emits about as much as a Honda Accord, which is a mid-sized car by Eurpean standards. So, if we are hugely optimistic and assume massive improvements in electrical cars, perhaps a Tesla would emit half of the CO2 of a regular car, in other words, about a 3% reduction. In reality it is probably significant less than this since the difference between an average car and a Tesla is not 50% by a long shot.
it took the collective effort of the world's governments to regulate and limit the use of CFCs
Yeah, but they worked on something that had a theoretical chance of actually having an effect. Electrical cars for personal use is not something that has a chance of actually making a difference.
You seem to have jumped from 15% to "no measurable impact",
No, I did not. 15% is all motor vehicles, where about half (a bit more in the US, significantly less in the rest of the world where there is a significant difference between the emissions of a truck and a personal transportation car) is for personal use, and the remainder is for other uses. The campaigning is for personal use. That takes us down to about 7-8%. Now, an electrical car is nowhere near a 50% reduction in CO2 emissions, so the total reduction, if you convert to all electrical is nowhere near half of 7-8%, in other words, not even close to 4%. See where this number is going?
Allow me to help you out with your myopia
Yeah, and they are insanely common.
There might be a flowery tea pot in orbit around the sun somewhere beyond Pluto containing two astronaut mice running away from lab experiments conducted on earth. The problem is we'll never be able to disprove this. We'd also be total morons to think it likely or even pondering about wondering if we should consider considering it.
But why the hate?
Mainly because they do not solve any problems. Cars (as in the ones you and I drive) are not big enough contributors for it to matter. Even if we stopped driving entirely and sat down and worked (assume CO2-emission free) from home, the total reduction in CO2 would be quite small. About 7% or so. Electrical vehicles may get to the point where they cut CO2 emission compared to a regular car by about half (not there by a long shot yet). So, moving to el-vehicles is not going to change anything. It is a retarded discussion.
Move from coal to nuclear, and all is well. Nuclear is quite low on CO2 emissions and very safe - more people die every day due to coal extraction than has died in nuclear accidents total. If you include the rather estimations of cancer increase due to radiation, more people die in coal extractions every year than has ever died directly or indirectly as a result of a nuclear accident.