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

Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 342 posts

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#191

Post by Beltiras »

pathseeker wrote: post #83
shermozle wrote: post #36

Please stop linking to Bloomberg. The auto-play video at least is muted, but when you go and press the pause button it... unmutes the video. Then you have to press it again to actually pause. Fuck these guys and their dark patterns.

Better than the NYT/WSJ/etc links that slam you right into paywalls.

Use this bookmarklet:

    javascript:window.location.href='https://m.facebook.com/l.php?u='+encodeURIComponent(window.location.href);

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#193

Post by lmm »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #87
craftyguy wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

I don't disagree the source of electricity does matter. But who is to say where the electron coming out of the plug came from? Perhaps it came from one of their existing nuclear plants[1] ? For me, when you get to the point where you can construct two valid statements that both are supported by available information, yet one disproves a statement and the other proves it, you have reached the point of 'nits'. In this…

> But one has to wonder, what is the point of arguing at that level when, as the article states, the pollution where the buses are deployed is significantly less?

Pollution where deployed isn't the issue, overall pollution is (the main impact of CO2 is climate change on a global scale). Significant reductions in pollution are to be celebrated, but it's wrong - and takes away from your point - to emphasise something as "zero emission" when it isn't.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#194

Post by DoctorOetker »

bertil wrote: post #163
DoctorOetker wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how do you contain CO2? its a gas so very voluminous, do you propose liquefying it and keep it refrigerated?

CO2 has numerous industrial applications, so you typically don’t store it but bottle it and send it elsewhere. Beer manufacturing (to add bubbles) is an anecdotic use; green house or urban farm agriculture is a growing need.

the need for CO2 is extremely low, why is carbonating drinks even referenced whenever carbon capture is mentioned?

the amount of CO2 absorbed in the drink will be released upon opening the drink, or else burping or farting.

the amount of CO2 the plants in a green house absorbs is offset by atmospheric CO2 not absorbed by the plant...

yes CO2 has niche uses, but whenever I see people mention CO2 utilization in the context of emissions reduction, it instantly unmasks their lack of knowledge.

The idea that we simply capture it at the chimney, and then bring it to where we need it is in fact very similar to the thought process in a perpetuum mobile.

consider pure graphite as a model of coal, you can burn it, which binds 2 oxygens for each carbon atom, now we capture the CO2, strip the oxygens, and cram all the carbon atoms together into a neatly disposable clump... the burning releases an amount of energy, the reverse process takes at least the same amount of energy.

in the form of CO2 its just incredibly voluminous or incredibly pressurized or incredibly cold to keep stored.

sure you can pump it underground, but the CO2 will still diffuse... then we are just obfuscating the dump

the capture technology is useful if you power it with nuclear or windmills in case CO2 levels and global warming get out of hand. but it is not useful to capture CO2 from the power plant. it is better then to generate the energy with either renewables or nuclear directly.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#195

Post by l0b0 »

stephengillie wrote: post #170
lenepp wrote: post #62

One interesting feature of articles like this that I don't really get is that they often leave out a huge huge quality of life benefit that electric vehicles bring: reduced urban machine noise.

The visceral excitement from the noise and vibration is a key part of auto marketing, and automakers are struggling to sell cars without it. Some people enjoy the attention they get from their loud, smelly cars - old Porsches, Harley Davidson motorcycles, and large trucks come to mind. Which is why some EVs play engine noises from internal speakers.

This sounds so bizarrely immature to me - like the trolls that sabotage their vehicle's noise suppression. I wonder if they realise they catch people's attention because the onlookers are simply waiting for them to leave so they can resume hearing themselves think.

Also, I thought EVs make noise to alert pedestrians and bicyclists, because the general public isn't used to quiet cars yet and honking the horn is likely to have the wrong effect.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#196

Post by talonx »

tialaramex wrote: post #168
Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a simple example look at the difference in the character horse between the two character systems. If you are a foreign learner just looking at typeset ways of representing this character, then the difference may seem great between traditional and simplified. But in fact, the rapid way of writing 'horse' before the script reform, is where the simplified form was eventually taken from. > The strokes are still sugg…

So, the thing about India is that it has two scripts which an outsider, not concerned with Indian politics would say are simply used to write the same language. This sort of thing happens in Eastern Europe all the time, there's a big powerful culture (Russia) using Cyrillic on one side of you, and another (Western Europe) using Latin, and so you end up writing your words in whichever system is convenient, politically…

Which two scripts for which language are you referring to? There are 22 officially recognized languages.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#197

Post by spodek »

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…

> the US has stalled or moved backward, at least the Federal level.

It has at the individual level too for most individuals. Try to get someone to consider flying less. Look at the size of vehicles on the road. How much meat we eat. Air conditioning to point of needing sweaters in the summer and heating to wearing shorts in the winter.

All personal choices anyone can make, no legislation necessary. We can blame fossil fuel companies, and they are abusing their power, but we have a long way to go as individuals before legislators see that regulation will result in more votes, not less.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#198

Post by rsynnott »

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…

Climate change is a political and verging in religious question in the US; it's something that you believe or don't believe in. This isn't really the case elsewhere (there is SOME climate change denialism in Europe and elsewhere, but it's way more fringe, and in politics mostly confined to libertarians and other weirdos).

The US's current political problem RE climate change could be regarded as temporary and will quite likely be resolved in 2020, but until the unique dynamic where half the country refuses to believe that climate change is a thing goes away, the US is always going to struggle on this stuff.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#199

Post by nvarsj »

coldtea wrote: post #157
nickserv wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In principle, the US government represents the will of the people. Government officials may be corrupt and in the pockets of corporate interests, but clinging to power is an even bigger motivator. If enough voters demand something, they are usually forced into delivering it, at least partly. The major problem in my view is the systematic and continuous disinformation campaigns regarding climate change and environment…

> In principle, the US government represents the will of the people. Unfortunately that's not really encoded in how you guys and gals do elections. From gerrymandering, to the stale two-horse race for party-approved candidates, to the emphasis on a single person (the "President") with roman senate undertones as opposed to collaborating MPs (and where are the coalition governments?), to legal lobbying, to the undue ro…

On the other hand, this probably allowed the US to become the superpower it is. I feel the US is the closest example in the modern world to capitalism unchecked - with both the pros and cons that entails.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#200

Post by rsynnott »

freddie_mercury wrote: post #96
seandoe wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think abakker's point is that the US is much less densely populated compared to China and the EU. The US has much of its population distributed far distances from urban areas, which makes electric vehicles a less desirable option.

Sweden's population density is less than the US but they have better transit. The US's urbanization rate is 82% which is higher than Canada, Norway, Spain, France, Greece, Taiwan, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, Portugal, Ireland, and 150 other countries. The US doesn't have much of its population distributed outside of urban areas compared to most countries. The US actually has few people outside of urban area…

One issue here, though, is that US urbanisation is _weird_. A lot of that 'urbanisation' is vast suburbs of detached houses; it's not very dense at all.
Post reply on HN