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Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

e360.yale.edu

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Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#21

Post by irq »

sidfthec wrote: post #14

Strange tone to the article. Very adversarial and doomy. Sounds like 6PPD is essentially required for modern tires. People are researching alternatives but haven't scaled any yet. Other emissions from modern tires are also bad. People are researching alternatives but haven't scaled any yet. Regulatory agencies are pushing to speed this up. What's the issue? It sounds like things are working as intended.

The issue is this shouldn’t have happened in the first place. We as a society should have learned from, at least, the debacle that was leaded gasoline and its impact on populations over generations.

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#22

Post by notatoad »

swader999 wrote: post #12
dTal wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The risks seem to come from tire dust, which obviously is only generated when a tire rolls along the ground. So it's probably not all that bad for playgrounds.

I've seen kids eat the stuff.

rubber and plastic are pretty inert and probably not going to cause too much harm if a kid eats some of it. i'm sure it's not good, but kids eat lots of dumb stuff and it's mostly fine.

the problem isn't somebody eats a chunk of it once, it's when the school is beside a road and kids are breathing the dust in all day, every day, for twelve years.

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#23

Post by kyleee »

Airsinner wrote: post #20
swader999 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen kids eat the stuff.

You've seen neglectful parenting then, which would exist irrespective of what material playgrounds are built from.

It’s actually quite a high bar for a parent to completely prevent unintended items from being put in a child’s mouth.

I suspect you either don’t have children or you are an extremely militant helicopter parent if you can tell us with a straight face you’ve met that bar.

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#24

Post by soperj »

Airsinner wrote: post #20
swader999 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen kids eat the stuff.

You've seen neglectful parenting then, which would exist irrespective of what material playgrounds are built from.

Because people can control what their kids do at school...

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#26

Post by notacoward »

There will be mostly two kinds of response to this article.

(1) Cars and trucks are evil, get rid of them.

(2) Too bad, nothing we can do, get over it.

Neither is helpful. We're going to need lots of tires for a long time. Trains don't (and can't) go everywhere. Bikes can't carry everything, and any imaginable bike that could would have the exact same problem. Trucks of all kinds, and buses, are indispensable and need tires. The question is how to make the tires better. Fortunately-people are working on this.

Bridgestone: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/04/eco-friendly-tires-brid...

Goodyear: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/goodyear-unveils-90... (specifically using soybean oil in place of 6PPD)

What we need to do is not argue tires vs. no tires, but keep the pressure on these makers and others to continue developing less-harmful tires. And the best way to do that is with our wallets. If there's demand for less toxic and more sustainable tires, they're more likely to be made.

We also need to reduce the average weight of passenger vehicles, and reduce the need for vehicular travel to accomplish daily needs. That includes everything from urban design to WFH, but those efforts are largely orthogonal to the issue at hand.

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#27

Post by nirvdrum »

zhrvoj wrote: post #17

Welcome to the truth. Tires wear and all of that stays on the road, or next to the roads, seas, oceans. Years...tires... And then, we have to sort each plastic HDPE bag to save the Earth. Feel guilt if we don't. Ok that. I hope that they are sorting waste in Ukraine. Otherwise, my efforts are in vane.

The indignity! Don't do it if you don't want to, but let's not pretend sorting a plastic bag is a major imposition. Just because something is a worse polluter doesn't mean we can't improve anything else.

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#28

Post by sidfthec »

irq wrote: post #21
sidfthec wrote: post #14

Strange tone to the article. Very adversarial and doomy. Sounds like 6PPD is essentially required for modern tires. People are researching alternatives but haven't scaled any yet. Other emissions from modern tires are also bad. People are researching alternatives but haven't scaled any yet. Regulatory agencies are pushing to speed this up. What's the issue? It sounds like things are working as intended.

The issue is this shouldn’t have happened in the first place. We as a society should have learned from, at least, the debacle that was leaded gasoline and its impact on populations over generations.

I'm not sure what you mean. What would the alternative world look like in this case? Less safe / a lack of tires until we confirm every chemical used isn't dangerous? I don't think that's a good trade off. We still don't have good alternatives in 2023, let alone in the last 100 years.

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#29

Post by ejb999 »

and unfortunately, EV's are worse than ICE cars of similar size, because of the extra weight - so they can go thru tires 30% faster.

"Increased tire wear can also contribute to air quality issues. In Oslo, Norway, where electric vehicles make two-thirds of registered vehicles but a higher proportion of traffic, the "air has unhealthy levels of microscopic particles generated partly by the abrasion of tires and asphalt," The New York Times reports."

from here: https://www.pcmag.com/news/the-unexpected-problem-with-evs-t...

Re: Evidence mounts on toxic pollution from tires

#30

Post by lowbloodsugar »

Funny how now that electric vehicles are winning, it turns out that, no, it’s tires that are bad and gosh look EVs have more tire wear because they are heavier. Regular people with regular sized EVs must be taxed more than gas cars!! (But of course not trucks and SUVs)
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