It's Official

Liberal environmentalists and lawyers are complete fuckwits, especially
the Californian ones

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/5365672.stm
The state of California is suing six leading car manufacturers

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Hog

Heh. I was just thinking that the car manufacturers could kill this in a
heartbeat by simply refusing to sell any more vehicles in CA.

I'd give it a week.

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What a wonderful idea!!

 

"Smoke Screen" by Kyle Mills has a similar premise. Tobacco manufacturers
get so fucked off with being sued for billions that they all get together,
agree that it's too dangerous to sell. They then close down all production
in the USA and withdraw their products from stores, selling only in
countries where they are protected by law from being sued.

Then they wait... for about, ooh 2 weeks... Senators are shitting themselves
because all the tobacco workers are unemployed, Federal Government is
shitting itself because they have lost a multi-billion dollar tax revenue
stream overnight. Border security falls to pieces as smuggling is rampant.
etc etc. Then they say that they will only start selling if nobody who
started smoking in the last 30 odd years can sue them, as they were well
aware of the risks and still chose to smoke.

Thinking about it, it's actually a *fairly* reasonable argument.

 

It is but not sure about 30 but certainly 15 years.

In the car example it would put 2nd hand values through the roof though.

 

Cessna, Piper, et al, were almost destroyed in the 1980s by lawsuits. Then,
in 1994, the US government passed the General Aviation Revitalization Act,
which protects manufacturers against being sued for defects in aircraft
older than 18 years. Seems to have worked fairly well, with Cessna back in
the piston-powered market, and a lot of newcomers making some really nice
'planes.

 

I started smoking 24 years ago (and stopped 5 years ago) and was well
aware of the health risks then but as a teenager I instinctively knew
they didn't apply to me.

 

In CA its illegal to sell brand new stick shift diesel powered
cars.............so much for concerns about the environment!

k

 

On one hand I think it's a bit silly, but on the other I'm glad
someone is prepared to give vehicle manufacturers a good kick up to
arse to start producing cleaner, more efficient, vehicles.

 

I think they have done so, vehicles have improved enormously in 20 years
in safety and efficiency.

If there has been incompetence, and IMHO there certainly has, it has
been governmental. If they had brains and a genuine interest they would
have legislated two things over the past 10 or so years.

# MPG by engine capacity/duty cycle requirements (1)
# development and dispensing of alternative fuel (2)

If we only accepted that public utility power should not be generated by
burning fossil fuels (3) we could all run efficient combustion engine
based personal and airline transport without damaging the environment
unduly. I think said mobility is the great modern revolution, should be
a right of every citizen and should be as cheap as possible. Fuel and
vehicle taxation is a social crime.

(1) realistic achievable targets but getting gradually tighter tied to
technology improvement
(2) electric power with onboard (bio diesel burning) turbine based
generators
(3) We should by now have had *all* our electricity from Nuclear backed
up with Hydro/tital and wind

 

"Who killed the electric car"

 

It is the concern for the environment that makes it illegal to sell certain
vehicles here in California. If a vehicle can't meet California's strict
emissions requirements (the strictest in the world, I believe), it can't be
sold in the state.

Despite European grumblings that diesels are "better for the environment",
the fact is that they are only better in one regard - they are more
efficient, and so produce less carbon dioxide than similar
gas/petrol-powered vehicles. But they produce other harmful emissions,
mainly carbon monoxide and oxides of nitrogen, and until very, very
recently, it hasn't been practical to use catalytic convertors to remove
these pollutants from the exhaust stream because high sulphur in the fuel
damages the cat, and particulate matter (soot) clogs it up. As of September
1st, it will be possible to buy ultra-low sulphur diesel in California, with
no more than 15ppm (October 15th for the rest of the country).

 

Which makes a huge amount of sense. Who TF in their right mind buys an
20 year-old nail of a plane/bike/car and expects it not to have suffered
a bit. Nothing will be as it left the factory, and at that age breakages
should be expected.
Slightly different in planes, with hours-expired components being
replaced as and when, but the general principle holds.

 

The scrubbing technology was patented at least 10 years ago

 

I didn't say that the technology didn't exist, only that it has been
impractical to implement.

Diesels haven't enjoyed much popularity in the States for a variety of
reasons: they are (or have been) noisy, smelly, and smokey. The only
reason they are so popular in Europe is because they generally are less
expensive to run; it has little to do with concern for the environment. How
many cars (diesel or otherwise) sold in Europe have any sort of
emissions-control equipment? It's really a rather recent development for
you, isn't it? The US has mandated catalytic convertors since the 1970s.
Can you still buy leaded petrol over there? It's been banned in the US for
on-road vehicles for many years, because it's a dangerous pollutant, and
because it destroys catalytic converters. What about emissions testing?
California has a massive, state-run program, which includes a biannual
smog-check for almost every vehicle on the road. What about VOCs? If
you've been over here, you'll have seen the vapour-control systems on gas
pumps. The US is still decades ahead when it comes to emissions
regulations. And, when there's incontrovertible, hard scientific evidence
that CO2 is bad for the environment, the US will regulate it, just as they
regulated Pb, CO, NOx, VOCs etc, while Europeans did little or nothing about
those pollutants. The notion that Europeans "care more about the
environment than do Americans" is just a myth. I remember British
automotive journalists in the 1970s sneering at the Americans for putting
catalytic converters on their cars. European car manufacturers would build
two versions of each car - one with emissions-controls ("for stupid,
polluting Yanks"), and one without ("for we Europeans who care so much for
our Mother Earth...").

 

Gas Giant wrote

Nah just the one reason: it is a two syllable word.

 

All of them for the past 15 years.

In one or two places but basically, no.

Part of the annual MOT test.

Lean burn is still better than a catalyst.

What was your point?

 

One or two in each county:
http://www.fbhvc.co.uk/fuel/four-star-gges.htm

 

Gas Giant wrote:

That's funny because I thought that as well as removing some of the
more noxious exhaust gases, early cats had the effect of making the
cars they were fitted to *less* efficient and produce *more* CO2. In
fact didn't this blinkered approach contribute to killing off of the
much more sensible lean-burn engine technology mentioned by someone
else? To be fair, I suppose it is easier to bung a great big filter
into a system rather than design it better in the first place.

 

Does anybody have any idea how much pollution is caused by the mining
and refining of the rare earth metals and putting them on the matrix in
the catalyst. Is this pollution more or less than the cat removes from
the car exhaust during its life?