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Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

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Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#71

Post by craftyguy »

abakker wrote: post #67
danans wrote: post #21

It's a strange shift in affairs that China appears to have the greatest incentives (urban pollution, petroleum imports) today to advance clean transportation and energy while the US has stalled or moved backward, at least the Federal level. Western European countries, for whom fossil fuels don't seem to be an identity politics issue like in the US, are also making more progress in electrifying their transportation an…

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

So national policy is essentially catering to the minority that live in rural areas? That seems backwards.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#72

Post by craftyguy »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #49
ams6110 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While electric buses are almost certainly an emissions win compared to the no doubt primitive and dirty Chinese diesel buses, I doubt it is it fair to call them zero-emission? China burns a lot of coal for electrical power.

That is picking nits :-) Not only is China rapidly building nuclear power plants, containing the emissions of one plant burning coal is easier than containing the emissions of the 10,000 buses that plant provides power to operate. There is also a benefit to China converting from oil (something imported[1]) to coal (something available locally[2]). [1] https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Chinas-Becomes-Worlds-... [2…

> That is picking nits

No, actually it's not. The source of electricity matters, and just because something doesn't directly emit pollutants does not mean its power is derived without emitting pollutants.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#73

Post by Mediterraneo10 »

jimmywanger wrote: post #45
_bxg1 wrote: post #15

Worried as I am about China's authoritarian practices and their growing influence, they sure are effective at solving environmental problems.

For some things authoritarianism is very effective at achieving results. For instance, China's government simply mandated that everybody would start using a simplified writing system that was supposed to increase literacy. And the country.. just sort of went along with it. Also, iodizing salt is sort of a big deal. Turkmenistan, being a dictatorship, simply declared non-iodized salt illegal and gave out 11 pounds of…

> China switched to a remarkably different writing system.

The simplified characters are not actually "remarkably different". In many cases, simplification just codified a large number of short forms of the traditional characters that were already being used by the people. Have you ever seen how Chinese actually write many common characters with a paper and pen?

> For instance, China's government simply mandated that everybody would start using a simplified writing system that was supposed to increase literacy.

Orthography reforms happen in non-authoritarian countries, too. After the fall of Communism, Romanian saw a change to its spelling rules. Spanish and German, too, have had changes in recent decades. Even under a democracy, language academies and the big publishers can have enough prestige to push changes.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#74

Post by abakker »

craftyguy wrote: post #71
abakker wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

So national policy is essentially catering to the minority that live in rural areas? That seems backwards.

I didn't say it was a good idea...but yeah, most of America by area is totally dependent on cars for access, because more of America is private property, spread far apart. Not a great use of public transit. In many places, the roads themselves are the only real public property.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#75

Post by tonysdg »

craftyguy wrote: post #71
abakker wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

So national policy is essentially catering to the minority that live in rural areas? That seems backwards.

That minority controls a non-trivial portion of the nation's political power -- just look at the 2016 presidential election for evidence. I'm 100% for clean energy and reducing/eliminating fossil fuel use, but I also recognize the reality that electric vehicles just don't yet have the capability -- and more importantly, infrastructure -- to replace gas- and diesel-powered cars/buses/trucks. Telling rural Americans to piss off is just as bad as asking urban Americans to deal with the smog IMO.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#76

Post by quadrangle »

craftyguy wrote: post #71
abakker wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

So national policy is essentially catering to the minority that live in rural areas? That seems backwards.

It's not about real rural areas, it's sprawl largely. It's been the dominant and TOP-DOWN planned development pattern for a whole generation, and it's totally tragic. Not only from energy perspective but nearly all other variables. There's almost nothing arguably redeemable about sprawl.

https://www.strongtowns.org/ is about the best org discussing these issues and isn't coming from a left- or right-wing perspective but a sane, critical-thinking, research-based perspective.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#77

Post by csours »

craftyguy wrote: post #71
abakker wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

So national policy is essentially catering to the minority that live in rural areas? That seems backwards.

The majority live in Sub-urban/rural areas. Even urban, non-city center areas are not easily servable by buses. See Houston (or anywhere in Texas).

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#78

Post by nradov »

craftyguy wrote: post #71
abakker wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

So national policy is essentially catering to the minority that live in rural areas? That seems backwards.

So we should just abandon our rural areas? That seems backwards.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#79

Post by Gibbon1 »

craftyguy wrote: post #72
ChuckMcM wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is picking nits :-) Not only is China rapidly building nuclear power plants, containing the emissions of one plant burning coal is easier than containing the emissions of the 10,000 buses that plant provides power to operate. There is also a benefit to China converting from oil (something imported[1]) to coal (something available locally[2]). [1] https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Chinas-Becomes-Worlds-... [2…

> That is picking nits No, actually it's not. The source of electricity matters, and just because something doesn't directly emit pollutants does not mean its power is derived without emitting pollutants.

A thing that is pointed out is the life of a vehicle, especially a bus might be 15-30 years. During that time the grid will become a lot cleaner. Where with a diesel bus emissions wise you're all in.

There is also the long tailpipe, diesel buses produce toxic emissions where people are, coal fired power plants produce emissions elsewhere. (not necessarily, but likely)

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#80

Post by jimmywanger »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #73
jimmywanger wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some things authoritarianism is very effective at achieving results. For instance, China's government simply mandated that everybody would start using a simplified writing system that was supposed to increase literacy. And the country.. just sort of went along with it. Also, iodizing salt is sort of a big deal. Turkmenistan, being a dictatorship, simply declared non-iodized salt illegal and gave out 11 pounds of…

> China switched to a remarkably different writing system. The simplified characters are not actually "remarkably different". In many cases, simplification just codified a large number of short forms of the traditional characters that were already being used by the people. Have you ever seen how Chinese actually write many common characters with a paper and pen? > For instance, China's government simply mandated that…

> The simplified characters are not actually "remarkably different".

You're incorrect. As a simple example look at the difference in the character horse between the two character systems. You might be able to sort of figure it out if you knew ahead of time what it meant. Just plopping a whole pile of text in front of you with no translation in the language you're familiar with is fairly incomprehensible.

>Have you ever seen how Chinese actually write many common characters with a paper and pen?

Yes, I have written some stuff in chinese and I have friends who write sloppily. The strokes are still suggested if not perfectly expressed. Have you any experience?

> Orthography reforms happen in non-authoritarian countries, too.

Although there since it's not enforced, you end up with a plurality of languages, like India. You can change any individual language but still have to support the old way.

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