previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25101766
Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
111–120 of 352 posts
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean, with new teslas, their range is similar enough to gas cars that you only need to charge them about once a week, if that. And they charge fast enough that it's not terribly dissimilar from hitting the gas station, which currently is perhaps a 10 minute affair for gas. Bumping that to ~20min isn't a dealbreaker. It's feasible, if a little bit annoying, to have a refueling story for them that's similar to that o…
> which currently is perhaps a 10 minute affair for gas. Bumping that to ~20min isn't a dealbreaker Here in the UK 10 minutes is already on the upper end of acceptable, I can't remember the last time it took me that long. 20 minutes would definitely be a dealbreaker for the vast majority of people.
Given that the alternative is not having a car at all (unless hydrogen takes off), surely people can adjust?
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#113This perfectly epitomises the uk (and the rest of the worlds) attitude to global warming: * it's a non binding commitment to do something but not for at least a decade * it's not enough even if it does happen * it will be too late by then (it probably already is for anything but drastic action) * it's totally at the whim of future governments who will be no more willing to spend the money/time/popularity than the cur…
I think you’re being a bit unfair here. The UK has made good progress in moving away from fossil fuels in recent years.
As of June this year, the UK was generating more power from renewables than from fossil fuels. A decade ago hardly any power was being generated from renewables. The UK has gone months without burning coal this year, and plans to decommission the last three coal power plants in the next five years.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-52973089
These aren’t empty promises, this is solid progress.
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are many things that can be done, in this very same moment. The problem is the high cost in political resources that no one is willing to pay. Some examples: - Start by implementing a odd/even rule for license plates in big cities, even full bans on weekends. - Tax and/or de-subsidize the meat industry. - Incentivize the installation of wind or other renewable energies. Energies with no CO2 emissions, like nucl…
> - Start by implementing a odd/even rule for license plates in big cities, even full bans on weekends. > - Tax and/or de-subsidize the meat industry. And just like that, you've been voted straight out of office. Better luck next life connecting to the electorate. You can't do those things. Humanity is a distributed consensus problem. Climate change presents an interesting change in the fitness landscape topology ahe…
Absolutely correct. And this is probably the "great filter". Unless we do something now we are headed down a very bad road. Our only option is going to be geo-engineering which is a risky business
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#115Many, many houses do not have anything other than on-street parking here. Since 2012 I've lived in 5 houses, and three of them had no driveway. I'm currently buying a house which has no drive way, with no way of fitting one. Apparently 1/3 houses have only on street parking. Unless they also provide huge, huge grants to rapidly implement dense onstreet charging, and fast, this is a pipedream and will end up getting p…
It's not that hard to build curbside chargers. You don't need high current chargers when most parking spots have a charger. A kilowatt or two will be plenty. Cars spend 23h a day parked. EVs use 15-25kWh/100km. Most people drive less than 50km a day. Sprinkle some fast charging along highways for longer road trips and charging is no longer an issue.
This is hilariously impractical. Have you seen curbside chargers? There's some up the road from me and by no means does it look simple to install them, not to mention that you'd have to do it along _every_ single residential street _everywhere_ and we don't have the electrical capacity to do it anyway!
If it really is so simple, why when I live in London do I not see entire streets filled with chargers? Surely you'd think that'd be in place by now given the time frames?
I think it's hand-wavey to say 'oh you can just charge at low current'. And if you've ever seen a petrol station near a motorway here you'll realise the idea of parking your car for x * 10 mins to charge would simply not work, there'd be multiple mile tailbacks.
Overall the govt treats this issue like it's a smaller problem than it really is.
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are way off. It took about 15 years to go from cities dominated by horse carriages to them being dominated by cars. It took longer in agriculture and rural areas. But the shift to electrical vehicles is trivial in comparison. Technically and economically we could easily prohibit new fossil fuelled cars by 2025. Sun and wind power is already much cheaper to install than coal powered plants, and once sun and wind p…
In the field of electricity generation, sure. Technology is there, apart from storage technology. But, given still higher costs and range anxiety, it will be very difficult to convince most consumers to buy electric cars. It will be most probably only generational shift: people born before ~1990 will still buy petrol cars till they die out, and younger generations will progressively shift, having different habits. It…
There is a HN article about using iron for industrial heat. The only downside is that transportation is expensive. If it can be electrolyzed on site it's going to be a game changer.
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#117[deleted]
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#118Many, many houses do not have anything other than on-street parking here. Since 2012 I've lived in 5 houses, and three of them had no driveway. I'm currently buying a house which has no drive way, with no way of fitting one. Apparently 1/3 houses have only on street parking. Unless they also provide huge, huge grants to rapidly implement dense onstreet charging, and fast, this is a pipedream and will end up getting p…
I recently got a Tesla while living in London with no off street parking. I had the same basic concerns, and only went ahead because I knew I'd be moving somewhere with off street parking within a few months.
But it actually turned out to be a complete non issue. My usage pattern (short occasional trips around town to shops etc and regular long trips to Bristol and back) could be handled entirely by stopping off for 15 mins at a supercharger when I went passed one. A bit more frequent than ordinary refuelling but not much more. It's reasonable to assume that 10 years from now fast charging will be at least somewhat more effective and a lot more ubiquitous.
I didn't have to touch any of the other charging infrastructure in London but there is a lot of it.
If we had been staying long term we would have used the 7kw chargers being built into lampposts all over the place[1]. The council will add one in if you have a car and ask for one, but there was already one within my usual parking area.
The lamppost thing seems to be London focused for now, but they're extremely straightforward installations and news like this is going to see them pop up everywhere.
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#119Where is the climate emergency? Can someone show me something I can see?
Sea levels haven't risen. There are more small birds around where I live than when I was younger. Things seem to be doing ok.
I am a skeptic and I'm very far from trusting experts. I don't want to be in a state of belief, I want to know. But I am put in a position that I must take it on trust that it is real. Is carbon dioxide bad? Surely, it would just make trees grow. In reverse, if we had more oxygen in the air we would be more active. How is it that in the 70s we were told we were going into a mini ice age?
On the other hand, I can lay my hands on documents that indicate the Club of Rome and other organisations, want to use climate change as a lever to change the world. I mean, how does coronavirus relate to climate change, such that we cannot go back to normal, unless we take all these actions?
So, for me, climate change and corona virus are a means to get everyone (almost) on board with re-sculpting the world, to suit those who own the big corporations and run those organisations like the UN, WEF, etc. It is an excuse to usher in a technocracy where those who own everything are able to micro-manage every detail of our lives - where we go, how much electricity or water we use, what job we do, etc, etc.
Frankly its dystopian. Its also blinkered to talk about climate change in isolation of how this issue serves the mega-plans that are in place.
Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
On this specific issue, what more could be done, really? Bring the ban to 2025? 2022? One can't simply expect mass production to switch that fast. UK has already tightened emissions rules on vehicles and VED taxes more polluting cars more heavily. They could, and probably will, ratchet things more. The right response on this policy is to say: great thanks Boris, you can clearly see the potential in green tech, now co…
Why does China get a free pass? It's the worlds largest miner of coal and is building many new coal fired power stations. For instance. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-28/riozim-se... and https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-will-china-build-hundre...
Who mentioned China? USA is more of a problem, twice the CO2 emissions per capita as the average developed economy, China makes more EV busses every day than the rest of the world has in total.