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Automotive News & Views Are automobiles a major cause of global warming?
6987 messages, Last post on Dec 07, 2009 at 9:03 AM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: steve_ (Apr 12, 2007 7:08 am) Oh hell, I missed the Jr. part. "How can you not like the guy?" He looks WAY better than I do. Of course, by that logic, I ought to be irritated by 95% of the adult male population.... 
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Recently, the US Supreme Court ruled that CO2 is a pollutant and the federal gov't has the right to regulate it. I can see it all now: "Well Mr. Smith you were seen driving your 20 hp Sludge mobile over the national 20mph speed limit. We have to tax you $8ooo." Next, they will make us buy carbon credits for the CO2 we breath out. Don't worry about not having a car, hell, worry that some gov't bureaucrat will come to your house and stuff a gag in your mouth to "save the planet". This is the logical conclusion when radical enviromentalism morphs into "Giaism" (worship of mother earth). |
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Replying to: euphonium (Apr 10, 2007 10:25 am) Localized pockets of air stagnation that frequents the LA area deserve strict emission standards, but it is not cost effective to inflict those same emission gadgets on new cars operated in sparsely populated regions. Exactly - euph. Oil fires in Kuwait that burned out of control for a year, also made zero difference in the world's or even the region's climate - It's arrogant for humans to think they actually have that much control over the planet's natural order of things. |
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electric bill to heat my house with electric from coal burning electric plant: $450/month in January electric bill to cool my house in summer: $170/month. Much less. Cold months cause more coal burning than the hot months do for us northerners. Gasoline for my houshold to drive for a month: $525 at $2.95/gal Cost to move closer to job :$20,000. 7% realtor commission, etc. Cost of a higher efficiency car: $25,000. My 11 yr old 3690 lb. car gets 27 mpg. My family's monthly gas savings from replacing our worst, 22 mpg car with a 35 mpg car: $24. More could be saved by replacing our Astro van but it can't be replaced by anything more efficient in it's equivalent size. The Astro gets 23 hwy and has 170 cu ft. cargo capacity. Tax on new car in first month of ownership, including excise for 1st year: $1440 Number of 24's in a 1440: nearly 60. 5 years is a long time just to recoup the day 1 taxes on the efficient car. If you double the 6000 miles a year we drive our least efficient car to 12,000 miles a year, then the taxes are recouped in 30 months. Savings from driving less since 2004 when gas started going up: $56/mo. Cost to do that: $0. this looks more promising. Does a new high efficiency car really help the planet? Gas consumed for workers to earn $18,000 which is the value of the efficient replacement car? I figure the avgerage contributor to the car makes $18/hr, so 1000 hours of work is required. that's half a year. Avg energy consumed by 1/2 year for an American worker? I assume they live just to make the car. I guess 6 months electric bill at $1200 and 6 months gas at $1200. It takes energy to make food and water too but I'll leave that out. That $2400 of energy, which if converted to all gas at $2.50/gal is 960 gallons burned. How many miles does the new car have to drive at 35 mpg instead of the old car at 22 mpg to save these 960 gallons? It saves 169 gallons/10k miles. So it takes 56,800 miles to hit the break even point for the planet for gas consumed. How many people keep their car more than 56,800 miles? Both cars don't have equal emissions, but the driver of the 35 mpg car probably drives a bunch of extra miles because it's so efficient. Then consider the manufacturing and houshold waste products of everything that goes into making the new car and someone living to make the new car. Way more landfill for that stuff than the car itself will ever need. Luckily, the US greenhouse gasses are only 10% attributable to personal vehicles. The Airplanes, Trains, ships, semi's, busses, power plants, nascar, and all the other things make the other 90%. The US is a tiny piece of the Earth's population, maybe 5% of it. A reduction in US private auto emissions or an increase in US car mileage would not be noticable on a global scale. In how many months does the world's population grow by the population of the US? Maybe 30? So I see the best moves as keeping your car as efficient as possible, driving efficiently, consolidating trips, and buying new only when necessary. I'm not always doing these things myself. Strangling our American industries with emissions or CAFE regulations can't help much and might end up increasing imports that can be made in China where they don't care at all about pollution and a new coal burning power plant comes online every day. Why should they (US industry) have to act much better than we do? Their health enables them to provide us the jobs we can't survive without. |
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The automaker's will be dead because of CAFE. I guess it's back to the Horse and Buggy or will they even be allowed. Will we have to hook up a emissions sensor underneath the tails and make sure they pass Al Gores, standards ? I'm sure the 4-legged creatures will have to wear some sort of particulate filter to capture the smell and fecal matter problem.-Grin. Oh well it could be worse as we might be forced to walk......  Rocky |
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only because they get a $3,000 Fed Tax Credit Plus another big credit on their state income tax. Every once in a while we are subjected to myths. Before GW it was the Millenium/Computer problem and today most people still think the new millenium began in the year 2000.
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Replying to: euphonium (Apr 13, 2007 6:54 pm)
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Replying to: nvbanker (Apr 14, 2007 5:36 pm) I wonder if by some miracle he was elevated to the Presidency, how he would approach our energy needs and "GW"?
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A few weeks ago Oswego, NY was contending with sub zero temps under 12' of snow. Tonight Blizzards are hitting the NE and this is the middle of April. Latest report from ski resort Whistler/Blackcomb is they have had over 42 feet of snow fall on them this season. Just as sure as there are more airplanes in the bottom of the oceans than submarines in the sky GW is a political myth. 
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