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Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

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Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#201

Post by sunstone »

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.

Hey some pickup trucks also play enhanced engine noises from internal speakers in order to sound "throatier" to buyers :)

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#202

Post by reissbaker »

ItsMe000001 wrote: post #119
reissbaker wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sheer landmass is less critical for transit than population density. The US has a population density of 33 people per square kilometer; China is nearly five times more dense at 144 people per square kilometer. [1] This sparse population distribution is one of the causes of many of the difficult-to-solve infrastructure problems in the US, such as poor broadband rollout, poor transit, etc. For what it's worth the Unite…

> The US has a population density of 33 people per square kilometer; Yes, and they are evenly spread out across the country, right? What you conveniently leave out, and which turns all these kinds of arguments based on a "total area / total population" numbers into absurd exercises in futility in showing anything useful, is that you have some few mega regions: http://osnetdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/2050_Map…

> Yes, and they are evenly spread out across the country, right?

Not evenly — but the population in the US is in fact much more geographically dispersed than in most of Europe, India, and East Asia. These measurements are not what you claim ("total area / total population"); here is a map of population density per square kilometer over the globe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_density#/media/File...

It's true that there are a few areas in the US that have high density. But from a federal funding standpoint, the US unfortunately has to contend with the fact that its population is widely dispersed over a large area compared to most other highly developed nations.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#203

Post by rsynnott »

pingou wrote: post #124

"they consume 30 times more fuel than average sized cars". Is that true? That seems gigantic, I thought taking so bus was so much better for the planet than taking your car.

I think they mean in total, not per km. A bus might be on the road for 18 hours a day.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#204

Post by rsynnott »

rmason wrote: post #48

What's sad is that the majority of electric buses being purchased both in America and around the globe aren't manufactured in the US. We have a Silicon Valley company, Tesla, that kicked off the world-wide move to battery powered autos. Why is there not a US company recognized as the leader in buses? There are a few California companies on this list but they're tiny. Here in Michigan the leading player is French and…

> Why is there not a US company recognized as the leader in buses?

The US barely uses buses! It'd be surprising if a US company _was_ big in buses, really. Bus innovation mostly happens in countries with extensive public transport systems, as you'd expect; in all but a few cities, the US's is very limited.

The US is also not particularly enthusiastic about tackling global warming relative to the rest of the developed world, or at least it isn't consistently; the Obama administration was quite good on this, but the Bush II and Trump administrations are practically denialist.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#205

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

lmm wrote: post #193
ChuckMcM wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 a…

Pollution where deployed isn't the issue, overall pollution is

I think inhabitants of large Chinese cities that have to wear masks when they go for a walk would disagree.

Actually, both things are quite relevant. Pollution in cities poisons and kills people in the short run, climate change would kill us all in the long run.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#206

Post by AuthorizedCust »

wereHamster wrote: post #146
nickserv wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting then to note that Norway, where the oil company is majority owned by the government, also has the largest per capita fleet of electric cars.

But the norwegian government is owned by people, unlike the US govt which is owned by corporations. And the people know that it's in their best interest to switch to EV. Also, the norwegian government will end their investments into oil & gas: https://www.ft.com/content/611c2e9e-cad9-11e7-aa33-c63fdc9b8...

>the norwegian government is owned by people

Nope. Still a monarchy.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#207

Post by friendzis »

spodek wrote: post #197
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 fossi…

While these are personal choices, there must be some incentive. If increased electricity bill from abusing "Air conditioning to point of needing sweaters in the summer and heating to wearing shorts in the winter" compared to conservative temperatures boils down to single digit percentage values (as non-USian I don't know what those values are) of all annual home upkeep expenses, it is difficult to rationalize saving.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#208

Post by Cthulhu_ »

abakker wrote: post #67
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…

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

How about inside the major urban areas though? The vast majority of people live in cities, which also means they will mostly drive inside the city itself, which means relatively short distances. There's no reason why that demographic couldn't switch to electric cars, or why the government isn't helping them go for more eco friendly alternatives.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#209

Post by bamboozled »

spodek wrote: post #197
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 fossi…

This is so true, one can be thought of as crazy for suggesting some of those ideas you mentioned. I've come to realise that it's the market that drives a lot of demand. Sure, in some cases markets are rigged in the fossil fuel industries favour (by the Government); However, I see more people not caring about environmental issues than anything else so it makes it easier for politicians to do nothing.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#210

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #73
jimmywanger wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some things authoritarianism is very effective at achieving results. For instance, China's government simply mandated that everybody would start using a simplified writing system that was supposed to increase literacy. And the country.. just sort of went along with it. Also, iodizing salt is sort of a big deal. Turkmenistan, being a dictatorship, simply declared non-iodized salt illegal and gave out 11 pounds of…

> China switched to a remarkably different writing system. The simplified characters are not actually "remarkably different". In many cases, simplification just codified a large number of short forms of the traditional characters that were already being used by the people. Have you ever seen how Chinese actually write many common characters with a paper and pen? > For instance, China's government simply mandated that…

I'm Spanish, and ortographical changes made to Spanish by the Royal Academy are very mild and very slow. Typically affecting only a single letter or accent mark in a few words every few years. And still many people resist the changes. While I don't know German, Germans I know say that it's similar for their language.

The change from traditional to simplified Chinese was much more radical. Although there are even better examples. For example, Atatürk changed Turkish from the Arabic alphabet to a modified Latin alphabet in 1928. This was a really profound change, and it was possible because Turkey had no democracy at that time.

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