How the car industry hid the truth about diesel emissions

Post by davidzweig » Sat, Mar 23, 2019, 2:41 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #108

fulafel wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teslas are still huge in mass (2000+ kg) and space/dimensions compared to what's needed from a car, and have a correspondingly big carbon footprint from building the thing and batteries. We should aim for 500 kg cars. We could do a 4 person 500 kg car in 1957 after all (Fiat 500).

> We should aim for 500 kg cars. So you want a Tesla without batteries? A single battery cell weights approx. 200 lbs (90 kg). The Model 3 has four. The total weight of the batteries is thought to exceed 1000 lbs (inc. housing, harnesses) or about 500 kg. Then add on all the legally mandated safety technology a vehicle from 1957 wouldn't have (front airbags, seat belts, windshield defroster/washer, taller seats, and…

Post by stefan_ » Sat, Mar 23, 2019, 3:08 PM UTC

TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #80

topspin wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Excuse me, but what more did the author expect the government to do?" It is not some outrageous expectation that the $8,000,000,000+/year, 14,000+ employee EPA and/or DOT independently verify the real world emissions performance of passenger cars and other vehicles. The cars were so grossly out of compliance that anyone with a ordinary field emissions testing machine could have caught it. If, as is very likely the c…

I still shake my head at this. If you wrote laws that said manufacturers of a particular thing had to do X, and expected them to adhere to it internally, and then paid expert testing facilities to validate those results, why would you EXPECT that you would have to do additional testing to validate the validation? And further more, why would you think that merely testing the test would lead to a different result? You…

Post by blattimwind » Sat, Mar 23, 2019, 3:19 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #96

blattimwind wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Filtering airborne particulates is pretty much the baseline reason to use masks ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (However surgical masks aren't meant to do that, they're only meant to catch things expelled from you, not the other way around. So I guess your interjection is somewhat correct in that running around with a surgical mask does pretty much nil to improve the quality of the air you inhale.)

Doctors also have masks to protect them from external things (for example, when they deal with patients that have tuberculosis), although I've just learned from Google that they are not technically called masks, but respirators (N95 respirators). They are quite uncomfortable to wear, though. You can breathe just fine for extended period of time but it feels (at least to me, a layman in these things) like you get less…

Post by justasimpleman » Sat, Mar 23, 2019, 3:31 PM UTC

justasimpleman wrote: post #65

maccam94 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except lithium ion batteries are very recyclable, and rare earth elements aren't in limited supply, they're just usually very sparsely distributed.

Wear from car tires cause the majority of microplastics that get into the seas (around 50%, if I'm reading understanding this study correctly): http://epanet.pbe.eea.europa.eu/ad-hoc-meetings/workshop-pla...

Post by LifeLiverTransp » Sat, Mar 23, 2019, 3:57 PM UTC

bboreham wrote: post #30

alkonaut wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why mazda or some other competitor didn’t find this by doing their own research? I make software for structural engineering and when some competitor launches a program that makes “better designs” it has usually turned out to be because they simply don’t follow the design codes/regulations. We wouldn’t be pushed from the market by that - we’d fund the analysis, reverse engineering and legal processes necessar…

My conclusion, from the first time I thought about it, is that they were all cheating. Engineers move job; they talk to each other. Every car company had to have people who knew the truth and, if they were being unfairly competed against, could publish this truth.