Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

latimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 101 posts

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#71

Post by pfranz »

thinelvis wrote: post #41

Truck traffic in LA is by far the problem, not so much the car traffic (though that is horrible, based on the population). Ships come into Long Beach, the containers are offloaded, the trucks begin a lumbering journey to points East. Belching all the way. I'm not making up the claim. California rules put in place over ten years ago had trucks retrofitted or whatever, and this change to TRUCKS ONLY was like removing 3…

> Truck traffic in LA is by far the problem

Any citation on that? The article itself says the peak of pollution isn't as high, just the longevity. The article also mentions climate change modifying weather patterns which could be a contributor. As someone who lived in LA you're always preying for rain to wash out ash or smog from nearby fires (which seem more common) or pollution and precipitation has been rarer over the past few years.

No doubt reducing pollution (and trucks have been a huge contributor) will help, but since you mentioned Long Beach, boats have very few regulations and burn giant amounts of the lowest-quality fuel.

An addition, a bunch of recent studies I've seen over the past few years show that up to 30% of the air pollution on the west coast comes from Asia.

It just seems like something that should be addressed on multiple fronts and with things objectively getting worse, every bit helps.

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#73

Post by bsder »

seppin wrote: post #46
bsder wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is relatively straightforward to solve. You take the existing CA gas tax and have it increase a couple of pennies every single month indefinitely. Gasoline in California is still about 1/2 the price in Europe. By making the tax small and gradual, everybody can PLAN around the fact that gas is going up instead of the dislocation from when gasoline prices whipsaw. The problem is that we have zero political will to…

> Gasoline in California is still about 1/2 the price in Europe. And already the highest priced in the US

And?

The problem here is that we implicitly (and sometimes not so implicitly) subsidize the infrastructure for cars and the moment you try to start making that subsidy explicit everybody loses their minds.

The primary issue, as people have pointed out, is that gasoline taxes tend to have a regressive effect and hit the poorest the worst. To make matters even more complicated, the poorest also tend to have the oldest cars that pollute the worst--so letting them completely off the hook isn't really a valid solution, either.

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#75

Post by drawnwren »

bsder wrote: post #61
nradov wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's only a loose correlation between gasoline consumption and smog emissions. Newer passenger vehicles are very clean (not counting CO₂ emissions which are a separate issue). The smog problem is caused by diesel engines, and older gasoline engines. Those need to be banned, or bought back and crushed (like with the "Cash for Clunkers" program several years ago).

> There's only a loose correlation between gasoline consumption and smog emissions. For only automobiles, possibly. But a slow and consistent increase in petroleum price incentivizes the trucking industry as well. And, as the article points out, the trucking industry is responsible for huge pollution hotspots near the ports.

This plan would only incentivize trucks to have a big enough gas tank to drive from Nevada to LA and back. The entire cost would pass directly to consumers.

Before you think that's isn't possible, it's not uncommon for a semi to have a range of 2000 miles.[1]

1 - https://www.quora.com/What’s-the-average-range-for-a-diesel-...

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#76

Post by chrisbrandow »

pfranz wrote: post #71
thinelvis wrote: post #41

Truck traffic in LA is by far the problem, not so much the car traffic (though that is horrible, based on the population). Ships come into Long Beach, the containers are offloaded, the trucks begin a lumbering journey to points East. Belching all the way. I'm not making up the claim. California rules put in place over ten years ago had trucks retrofitted or whatever, and this change to TRUCKS ONLY was like removing 3…

> Truck traffic in LA is by far the problem Any citation on that? The article itself says the peak of pollution isn't as high, just the longevity. The article also mentions climate change modifying weather patterns which could be a contributor. As someone who lived in LA you're always preying for rain to wash out ash or smog from nearby fires (which seem more common) or pollution and precipitation has been rarer over…

Trucks and shops are definitley one of the biggest problems for riverside. These are the biggest source of pm2.5 precursors because the wind patterns basically funnel all of the LA basin atmosphere out there and the pollution transforms over the 24-36 hr journey.

I used to work for air pollution regulators. I don’t have the citations but I’ve seen the presentations.

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#77

Post by justsomedood »

NickBusey wrote: post #38
jpmattia wrote: post #37

If interested, here is a link to the air quality index, as measured by purple air monitors: https://www.purpleair.com/map#11/34.0244/-118.4531 The map extends worldwide, but only reports data from those who have purchased their monitors.

Whoa, what's going on in Utah? https://www.purpleair.com/map#6.74/39.975/-111.145

Lots of fires. For the past couple of months something has been burning here and the air has been mad much more often than not.

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#78

Post by bsder »

drawnwren wrote: post #75
bsder wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's only a loose correlation between gasoline consumption and smog emissions. For only automobiles, possibly. But a slow and consistent increase in petroleum price incentivizes the trucking industry as well. And, as the article points out, the trucking industry is responsible for huge pollution hotspots near the ports.

This plan would only incentivize trucks to have a big enough gas tank to drive from Nevada to LA and back. The entire cost would pass directly to consumers. Before you think that's isn't possible, it's not uncommon for a semi to have a range of 2000 miles.[1] 1 - https://www.quora.com/What’s-the-average-range-for-a-diesel-...

I suspect the issue with truck pollution at the LA ports is idling rather than driving.

Re: Southern California just saw its longest streak of bad air in decades

#79

Post by adrianN »

swingline-747 wrote: post #30
bsder wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is relatively straightforward to solve. You take the existing CA gas tax and have it increase a couple of pennies every single month indefinitely. Gasoline in California is still about 1/2 the price in Europe. By making the tax small and gradual, everybody can PLAN around the fact that gas is going up instead of the dislocation from when gasoline prices whipsaw. The problem is that we have zero political will to…

That won't work in the real world, it will just tax the poorest people and accomplish nothing tangible. There's very inelastic demand for travel by car in LA because everything is so spread out, making other forms of transport unworkably moot. People have to work and live, so they're just going to hate you for making their lives harder while they have no workable options. Heck, the auto industry even had the 19th/20t…

Then maybe the increase of the gas tax should go hand in hand with denser zoning and public transport. Internalizing the cost of parking spaces would be a good first step.
Post reply on HN