See who is polluting!

[Brian Ellis]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3143798.stm

[Jon P. Inghram]

In the short-term, Russia stands to gain billions of dollars through emissions trading - selling its unused emissions entitlement to developed countries which want to emit more than the protocol allows them to.

Really useful treaty they got there...

[Brian Ellis]

Yup! I don't like the notion of emissions trading either nationally or internationally

[Jon P. Inghram]

It's all rather absurd if you think about it too much. My favorite waste of energy is automobiles, can't be a good consumer if you don't buy a new car every year or so. And of course the cars are made to be difficult if not impossible to upgrade to new emmision/performance/safety/whatever standards so that they can insure an (almost) never-ending supply of business.

[Brian Ellis]

Well, I'd rather have a car that is reliable than one that can be upgraded like a computer (having just suffered from a HDD failure ) Imagine the chaos if you had PCI slots in your car

If I could, I'd halve my car emissions, but the Prius is not available here.

[Paddy]

The Prius looks very cool!

[gt40]

We have mandatory emissions tests here, and I have never had a vehicle fail - in fact they always have passed with a very large margin (even my 1988 with 240,00 km and2 year old oil in it had 0.0 for C0).
This is true for most NA produced vehicles, especially the larger displacment vehicles.
However, many foreign jobbies - mostly the Hondas, fail repeatedly. These little motors ride so close to the limits to gain every last possible HP, that they fail will fail for almost no reason.

-something to think about before you criticize those bigger motored vehicles for creating more pollution than the cars with the sewing machine engines in 'em.

[Fluff]

The whole car thing in america is complicated is everything is so god damn far away from each other. Other things like there is a more varied climate in the states. More 'need' for aircon, and in winter it gets cold so more heating bills.

In uk temperature ranges from -4celcius at the lowest on a winters night if you are unlucky, to say 32celcius in the summer (if youre lucky).

[rylan]

I can just imaging what kind of pollution and crap China is pumping out now, and how bad it will be in a couple years.

[Fluff]

The scary thing, is it is generally our fault (the west) that china is going to be pumping all this stuff out.My keyboard, scanner, printer, amplifier. Probably most of the electronics stuff is made over there / taiwan / japan.

[Dr Mordrid]

Maybe in the future that'll be the case, but right now China's problem is its huge dependence on charcoal and wood as heating/cooking fuels and nowhere near the regulation on industrial pollutants seen here ih the west. Imagine those activitites in the quantity necessary for a population of over a billlion. Now add in India.

Welcome to the main causes of the Asian "brown cloud".

Dr. Mordrid

[Brian Ellis]

Worse still, China uses vast quantities of poor quality coal for both domestic and industrial fuels. Charcoal/wood is too expensive as much of their old forests are depleted. When I was there, I observed numerous households do their cooking over coal. In fact, they have an ingenious system. They take an old 200 l oil drum and cut the top off and make a hole in the side, about 150 mm from the bottom, to which they attach a small centrifugal blower. The whole of the side is then lined with a good 100 mm of fireclay. They have a more or less permanent coal fire burning in it but when they want to cook, they just switch on the ventilator which takes the temperature up to white heat (more like a blast furnace ). The wok sits neatly on the fireclay and a whole meal is ready, well-cooked, in a couple of minutes or so. The ventilator is then switched off until the next meal. This is a very hygienic, as well as tasty, cuisine but the smell from the sulfurous coal is awful Of course, it is always used outside (CO, as well as SO2)

Originally posted by gt40
We have mandatory emissions tests here, and I have never had a vehicle fail - in fact they always have passed with a very large margin (even my 1988 with 240,00 km and2 year old oil in it had 0.0 for C0).
This is true for most NA produced vehicles, especially the larger displacment vehicles.
However, many foreign jobbies - mostly the Hondas, fail repeatedly. These little motors ride so close to the limits to gain every last possible HP, that they fail will fail for almost no reason.

-something to think about before you criticize those bigger motored vehicles for creating more pollution than the cars with the sewing machine engines in 'em.

Sorry, you miss the point, entirely. First, nearly all western countries have mandatory emission controls, even this little one and the small cars pass just as easily as the large ones. However, the important point is not CO, HC, NOx or SOx emissions which are controlled but CO2 emissions. And there, they are proportional to the fuel that is burnt. So, if you need 10 l of fuel to go from A to B in a small car, you will produce half the greenhouse-gas pollution than if your large car needs 20 l for the same journey. This is what is important. Even the US Administration has recently reluctantly admitted that climate change is for real, after reneging on the Kyoto Protocol three years ago. Ask anyone in Florida.

[Paddy]

Sorry, you miss the point, entirely. First, nearly all western countries have mandatory emission controls, even this little one and the small cars pass just as easily as the large ones. However, the important point is not CO, HC, NOx or SOx emissions which are controlled but CO2 emissions. And there, they are proportional to the fuel that is burnt. So, if you need 10 l of fuel to go from A to B in a small car, you will produce half the greenhouse-gas pollution than if your large car needs 20 l for the same journey. This is what is important. Even the US Administration has recently reluctantly admitted that climate change is for real, after reneging on the Kyoto Protocol three years ago. Ask anyone in Florida.

My point exactly

[UtwigMU]

I think America has a long way to go towards accepting small cars - I recall Doc posting, how judge sentenced someone on driving car no more powerful than 130HP.

This is considered normal to good for a big car (Passat/A6/Mondeo class).

With a small car such as Peugot 206 110HP is enough for speeds over 200km/h and some pretty good acceleration.

[Greebe]

Originally posted by Brian Ellis
Worse still, China uses vast quantities of poor quality coal for both domestic and industrial fuels. Charcoal/wood is too expensive as much of their old forests are depleted. When I was there, I observed numerous households do their cooking over coal. In fact, they have an ingenious system. They take an old 200 l oil drum and cut the top off and make a hole in the side, about 150 mm from the bottom, to which they attach a small centrifugal blower. The whole of the side is then lined with a good 100 mm of fireclay. They have a more or less permanent coal fire burning in it but when they want to cook, they just switch on the ventilator which takes the temperature up to white heat (more like a blast furnace ). The wok sits neatly on the fireclay and a whole meal is ready, well-cooked, in a couple of minutes or so. The ventilator is then switched off until the next meal. This is a very hygienic, as well as tasty, cuisine but the smell from the sulfurous coal is awful Of course, it is always used outside (CO, as well as SO2)



Sorry, you miss the point, entirely. First, nearly all western countries have mandatory emission controls, even this little one and the small cars pass just as easily as the large ones. However, the important point is not CO, HC, NOx or SOx emissions which are controlled but CO2 emissions. And there, they are proportional to the fuel that is burnt. So, if you need 10 l of fuel to go from A to B in a small car, you will produce half the greenhouse-gas pollution than if your large car needs 20 l for the same journey. This is what is important. Even the US Administration has recently reluctantly admitted that climate change is for real, after reneging on the Kyoto Protocol three years ago. Ask anyone in Florida.

Florida here
The previous years heatwave here wasn't caused by Global warming but El Nino. We're in a mid phase La Nina - El Nino conversion now which is bringing on all these WTF, not another bloody hurricane!