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California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

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Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about when the market fails customers, still no government involvement? Food and drugs regulation, environment stuff (you are here) and so on?

The US military-industrial complex is the single largest institutional hydrocarbon consumer and greenhouse gas emitter on the planet. It would be pretty stupid for me to listen to the government's advice about how best we should preserve the environment.

China has been the largest ghg emitter for the last 20 years, and currently emits more than twice as much as the us. Gdp spent on defense is similar as a fraction of gdp (slightly more in the us). So realistically the Chinese military is by far a larger emitter of ghg than the us military.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#232
post #122
post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Undoubtably We need a better argument than that. HN are obsessed with the 'unintended consequences' argument against regulation, a very general idea applied to an actual situation, and as if people can't and don't anticipate and make effective plans. The world turns, things work, regulations work - not everything in the world, but we accomplish a lot. My roads, medications, air traffic, etc. etc. work; people's pla…

> We need a better argument than that. I'm not arguing for or against this consumer information regulation. It would not surprise me if most tire industry folks support it since a acknowledged standard increases consumer trust in the claims of a premium product. Good regulation creates wins for both consumers and producers. Bad regulation typically tries to nudge either consumers or producers in a direction contrary…

You're citations, if accurate, show only that some regulations don't work well. We already know that. But it's not a reason to do nothing.

> Bad regulation typically tries to nudge either consumers or producers in a direction contrary to the prevailing culture and/or economics

We wouldn't need regulation if the prevailing culture / economics was to already do that thing.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#233
post #160

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This is what I always thought. But I have Pirelli Cinturato SF3 tires now. All season. Excellent stiffness and feel. Great handling in the wet. Virtually silent up to 80-90km/h and as efficient as the Michelin summer tires and more efficient than the continental winter tires I had. So apparently, design and compound can cater for a lot. Unfortunately, snow performance on my front drive car is worse than my XC90 has i…

Design and compound matters a lot, but it's still a tradeoff. The easiest way to increase rolling resistance is to reduce the tread depth. Less deformation of the rubber leads to less rolling resistance. So to improve rolling resistance, the designers can reduce tread depth and move to a harder compound, which trades off grip. Modern tires are good, but everything is tradeoffs.

Of course it is trade-offs. But not all trade offs are linear on the same axis and conditions. For example, changing the compound to make it a bit harder may increase the longevity of the tire significantly in moderate climates at only a limited decrease in grip. And maybe even improved cornering.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#234
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much of this is a solvable problem, insofar to the best of my knowledge there is no fundamental workaround for the fact placing heavy objects moving fast on rough surfaces generates friction which leads to the erosion of surfaces? I think particulate pollution would be an acceptable outcome if the tires themselves were biodegradable over 10+ years. But to my understanding the vulcanisation process that's employed…

This company is working on a pollution capture device: https://thetyrecollective.com

Very cool.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#235
post #223

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Most scales don't even log/alert/flag weights below the maximum legal axle weight or axle group weight. So a 2-axle truck can weigh 40k and nobody will hear about it. In the event that they're fancy and integrated with an ALPR (assuming your plate is readable, lots of ways to game that on a box truck) the scales don't typically extend onto the paved shoulder. Even if they do you slow down and drop a tire off the pave…

Ah thanks! So a design/operation flaw of the scales! I didn't realize they were run/monitored so incompetently, where concepts like "make sure the truck is actually on the scale" were ignored. But, I'm in no way surprised! That's governing bodies for ya!

Overloading is for trucks what speeding is for cars. They don't really "care" beyond revenue as long as you're not absurd about it. The rules were never written to be fully enforced.

Once you understand this the whole system makes sense.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worth pointing out the CrossClimate2 tires are all-seasons and exempt from the requirement. The 4/5 is specific to Consumer Reports all-season category - actual efficiency is going to be noticeably lower than the high efficiency tires they are talking about in the article. But you're not wrong in general. There are a lot of garbage tires. And that's not even considering the intentionally "bad" tires like the kno…

You just need social stigma on bad tires. It's the single most important thing on your vehicle, for literally all the reasons out there.

I've tried social stigma on lack-of-using-turn-signals, and have been about as disappointed as you are likely to be hah.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#237
post #199

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I have seen that goofy warning in SBUX stores, for whatever it's worth haha (not on the coffee cup).

Kinda my problem with that label: you have no idea what's it about when you see that label. The spectrum of what got that label is so broad that it's not very useful IMO. Coffee specifically used require Prop65 warning because it releases acrylamide during roasting process, but after a lenghty legal battle coffee got an exeption.

The overly broad selection and vague wording was done intentionally by chemical manufacturer lobbyists to muddy the waters when it was obvious Prop 65 (or something equivalent) was likely to pass. There is a lot of this kind of last minute sabotage in California props.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Discount tire estimates 70% of the current tire options will be illegal to sell in CA. Millions of people will be pushed into different tires than they have based on a limited list of options. Many of those as alternative tires will wear out faster, causing increased particulate pollution and wasting people's money. Many of those tires will cost more money than they save in gas. The limited options on less common siz…

> Discount tire estimates 70% of the current tire options will be illegal to sell in CA. Millions of people will be pushed into different tires than they have based on a limited list of options. You say that like it’s a bad thing. 100% of leaded gasoline became illegal. Outcome? Huge health benefits. 100% of lead paint became illegal. Outcome? Huge health benefits. 100% of new vehicles without catalytic converters, a…

Except there are clear health hazards likely to happen from this change, such as increased tire particulates, and the nominal improvement (co2) is such a diffuse hazard (with limited direct health consequences) that it is likely to get lost in the noise.

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you get (non-LED) lightbulbs you like online? No. They are illegal.

I don’t know that they are illegal, but they are legitimately useless. You can get high-quality LED bulbs and very warm LED bulbs. All my LEDs are about as warm, maybe even warmer, than incandescents. Like orange in color. LEDs are universally better. They use way less energy and last way, way longer. The end result is you save a shit ton of money.

I don't like warm lighting and especially orange lighting. But it's nearly impossible to find cool lighting that doesn't flicker like mad. Even adjustable color temperature fixtures usually don't reach anywhere near their rated brightness at the coolest color temperature...

Re: California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

#240
post #36

Probably the weirdest thing about this is the state doing something that results in it getting less tax money. This was lobbied for by the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Union of Concerned Scientists.

I assume you mean about buying less (taxed) gas. Never fear, California is also talking about shifting to a mileage baded road tax because EVs (which they heavily incentivized) saving money on gas can't go untaxed.

That seems reasonable, no? The goal is for road users to pay for their use of public roads. Gas tax used to be a decent proxy for road usage, but with EVs it's not anymore, so we need something else. Reading people's odometers is a better reflection of their road use.

Of course you can't tell if they were driving on public roads, or just driving around in a circle in their backyard for hours... but that uncertainty exists for the gas tax too.

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