Off Topic The Environmental & Pollution Thread

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Don't know if I mentioned it here, a couple of weeks back regarding the clear skies over New York post the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and expressed an interest as to what we might be seeing since air traffic has been virtually grounded. Here, Dave explores the subject of the sudden massive reduction of transport emissions and how that affects the globe on this week's Just Have A Think:

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Today (31/03/20) is the day when Trump allows the US Environmental Protection Agency to let any company pollute as much as they want, while the C-19 crisis occurs. The town of Flint in Michigan has been coping with dirty and unhealthy drinking water since 2014. And they haven't yet solved the problem. So instead of just be-moaning the scenario, here is a technology that can overcome the situation while they sort out their broken infrastructure. Will they, I wonder?

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And Trump? He doesn't give a ****. 10% of US citizens have no reliable drinking water. I honestly don't know how the administration gets away with it.
 
Hydrogen for personal transport is being pushed as a "good thing". In all honesty, it is hardly better than fossil fuels, especially when you consider how it would be made and how much it would cost the consumer and the environment. Plus, how ridiculously inefficient it is compared to putting electricity into a battery electric car.
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I'm beginning to see reports that the huge reduction in air pollution, caused by radically reduced vehicle and air transport, and the reduced need for dirty power, by order of world governments in response to the Coronavirus outbreak, is almost certainly already saving many more lives than Covid-19 is taking.

Of course, this shutdown is unsustainable in the long run. But are we actually going to go back to killing people in greater numbers when this is over, just by resuming our everyday polluting ways? I certainly don't think we can. Business cannot be as usual.
 
TheSecondStain said:
I'm beginning to see reports that the huge reduction in air pollution, caused by radically reduced vehicle and air transport, and the reduced need for dirty power, by order of world governments in response to the Coronavirus outbreak, is almost certainly already saving many more lives than Covid-19 is taking.

Of course, this shutdown is unsustainable in the long run. But are we actually going to go back to killing people in greater numbers when this is over, just by resuming our everyday polluting ways? I certainly don't think we can. Business cannot be as usual.
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I'd hope there'd be a change TS2 but the cynical side says the like Johnson, Trump, that Brazilian ringpiece et al will use this as an excuse to loosen the environmental restraints in the name of "economic recovery"
 
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StJabbo1 said:
I'd hope there'd be a change TS2 but the cynical side says the like Johnson, Trump, that Brazilian ringpiece et al will use this as an excuse to loosen the environmental restraints in the name of "economic recovery"
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Actually, Trump already has. During the week he got rid of Obama's CAFE rules on progressively cleaner vehicles and replaced them with SAFE [I kid you not]. Basically, it allows legacy vehicle manufacturers to produce cars in North America that will be more polluting than under Obama's CAFE reductions. GM, Ford, etc wanted the change. All European manufacturers and Kia/Hyundai from Korea, selling in the USA opposed it, because they could reach the CAFE standards, which were laxer than European standards, and now certainly will be more so. The rules do not directly affect vehicle manufacturers like Tesla, Rivian, Lucid, BYD, Byton, Nio, Proterra, and several others, who ONLY produce electric vehicles. However, because the legacy manufacturers won't have to spend money on R&D in order to make their cars far less polluting, they might make cheaper cars and they might steal a few sales off EVs. In truth, I don't think it will make too much difference. The writing is on the wall - the oil industry has had its time. Time to start bowing out.
 
TheSecondStain said:
Actually, Trump already has. During the week he got rid of Obama's CAFE rules on progressively cleaner vehicles and replaced them with SAFE [I kid you not]. Basically, it allows legacy vehicle manufacturers to produce cars in North America that will be more polluting than under Obama's CAFE reductions. GM, Ford, etc wanted the change. All European manufacturers and Kia/Hyundai from Korea, selling in the USA opposed it, because they could reach the CAFE standards, which were laxer than European standards, and now certainly will be more so. The rules do not directly affect vehicle manufacturers like Tesla, Rivian, Lucid, BYD, Byton, Nio, Proterra, and several others, who ONLY produce electric vehicles. However, because the legacy manufacturers won't have to spend money on R&D in order to make their cars far less polluting, they might make cheaper cars and they might steal a few sales off EVs. In truth, I don't think it will make too much difference. The writing is on the wall - the oil industry has had its time. Time to start bowing out.
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Yes I saw the chump in the ****ehouse was doing that and I think more oil leases slipped through to.
One thing on the bright side is the possible change in attitude by car users. Having had their use curtailed perhaps alternatives, especially for those in cities, such as bikes and public transport, car shares if necessary. I haven't owned a car since 2001 so bang the biking/public transport drum. Some friends over her in the Netherlands who have suspended car use and the costs that go with it are pleasantly surprised by the savings and in one case the weight loss and fitness gain.
 
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Latest episode from Just Have A Think. Here, Dave talks about the cleaner air and HICC repercussions that has become a side effect of this Coronavirus pandemic:

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From the first day that Donald Trump became POTUS he has been taking the bungs from the carbon lobby. How else does he put a former coal power chief in charge of the US Environmental Prtection Agency [EPA]. The EPA has now become a tragic joke. Many industries in the USA are disregarding the lowered standards set by the EPA, and are keeping the previous raised standards, simply because they know that cleaner power and products will overwhelmingly be the asset that succeeds in the end. The US EPA is now a major danger to the environment, rather than its protector. Here's the latest measure that has been taken to reduce protection of the environment, and therefore people themselves:

https://electrek.co/2020/04/16/epa-...le-putting-pregnant-women-minorities-at-risk/
 
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