Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions • Hacker News Board

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#231

Post by Radim » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:29 AM UTC

barnacled wrote: post #180

CraigJPerry wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Did I suggest not addressing it? Yes, you said: >> The correct approach is a practical middle ground where we try to do what we can Then provided no examples of what we can do, in your opinion. This isn’t a problem that can be solved by right leaning politics, this is the right’s blind spot. You’ll need some creative lefty types to sort this out and then you’ll need some efficient righty types to come in a clean up…

You are correlating 'a practical middle ground' with 'not addressing it'. I am also really not sure why you are bringing politics into this. I get the analogy but that's such an easy way to turn this into a divisive discussion that I think we should leave that there. You are also glossing over the consequences of an extreme response to climate change - an honest discussion talks about the cost as well as the benefits…

> in democratic countries when you take actions that result in severe economic consequences, people will just vote in a govt that reverses it

If you're the type of person who believes they're saving humanity, you naturally don't fret over details like what do people want, or some rational cost/benefit analysis. You know better. The axioms are set and indisputable.

Barnacled, you're quite articulate and reasoned in this thread, but I doubt you're changing anybody's mind.

And FYI, the same type of personality also likes to compile "lists of ideological opponents". It's an old book played a hundred times before, so it's good to be aware of that.

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#232

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:30 AM UTC

feralimal wrote: post #209

acallaghan wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Climate change and coronavirus isn't some masterplan created just to incovenience you . You're a person out of 7 billion other people on this planet, our collective actions have consequences. You can't see your cells, smell or see carbon monoxide, or touch the other planets - yet you trust that you have red blood cells, CO gas kills you in your sleep, and that mars is made from rock. You've been told this as well by…

Climate change and coronavirus are pretexts for the rollout of a technocratic system. They are geopolitical stories to get our buy in to all they have planned for us. This can be seen in the way all our governments are acting in tandem. We have a 'new normal', 'build back better', etc. Klaus Schwab lays out the plans in detail if you want to know what's coming up. What happened to 3 weeks to flatten the curve? We're…

[deleted]

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#233

Post by lopmotr » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:30 AM UTC

barnacled wrote: post #83

LatteLazy wrote: post #30

This 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…

This comment perfectly epitomises the 'climate crisis' extinction rebellion Greta Thunberg school of response to climate issues. Firstly - any response to climate change that does not include China and really India and other emerging economies too is more or less useless. Why should we deny such countries the benefits of full industrialisation? Secondly - while in some respects you are correct, looking at CO2 numbers…

Absolutely. It's too late? For what? Temperature has already risen a little so obviously you can't change the past. Too late for some vague "catastrophe" is the implication. But science already tells us it won't be extinction, and the best estimate they have (that I've seen) is as many deaths per year in 2100 due to warming as we currently have due to car crashes. So it might be no big deal or it might be something nobody knows. Just like the future always is.

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#234

Post by rand49an » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:31 AM UTC

brigandish wrote: post #192

crispyporkbites wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, there’s 6 weeks to go and there’s still no trade agreement in place, nothing material has happened in the last 4 years. Any business that imports/exports has no clue what will happen on 1st Jan. But yea I can get a blue passport now. What a great thing to waste years on.

Because nothing much needs to change, which is (partly) what was so funny about the debate surrounding it.

Nothing did need to change, but since we've decided that we want no part of the single market or any regulatory alignment things will have to change unless we decide otherwise. Because of our own foolishness for 4 years, we have created a deadline for ourselves.

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#235

Post by lopmotr » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:33 AM UTC

mavhc wrote: post #128

barnacled wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment perfectly epitomises the 'climate crisis' extinction rebellion Greta Thunberg school of response to climate issues. Firstly - any response to climate change that does not include China and really India and other emerging economies too is more or less useless. Why should we deny such countries the benefits of full industrialisation? Secondly - while in some respects you are correct, looking at CO2 numbers…

How is improving our energy supply so it's cheaper and cleaner going to harm the economy? Pretty sure there's a lot of jobs creating new power sources, and once everyone has cheap power they'll have more money left for the economy. The cost to fix global warming only gets greater each year. China buys more electric cars than all other countries.

If it's going to be cheaper, why does it need government support? Won't industry just do it to be more competitive on its own? Or perhaps there's some kind of first mover/network effect/chicken and egg problem that the free market can't surmount on its own?

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#236

Post by barnacled » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:33 AM UTC

matthewmacleod wrote: post #220

barnacled wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really think I advocate for no action to be taken? Taking your first sentence at face value it appears you believe in an all or nothing approach. Also, and again I know this is a sensitive area so I understand why you are coming across this way, but comments like 'you should be much more worried about this problem than you are' are unnecessary and divisive. I am extremely worried about climate change. That is…

Do you really think I advocate for no action to be taken? Taking your first sentence at face value it appears you believe in an all or nothing approach. I think you take a commonly-seen approach that tends to argue that any even moderate efforts to deal with the problem are too extreme. I do not think the phrase you have repeatedly used - “all or nothing” – has any value, since it tends to define even relatively mode…

RE: climate hysteria I was actually responding to the parent who was saying this was nowhere near enough.

RE: Viability, I mean perhaps I worded that poorly - I think it's _possible_ to do it, I just think it will be exceptionally difficult (there are many roads that are not so simple to just dig up, huge HUGE disruption caused, etc. etc.) and require probably £100's of billions.

My issue is more that the govt have absolutely not addressed or even mentioned that, and many engaged in this debate won't accept that this is a requirement.

>I think you take a commonly-seen approach that tends to argue that any even moderate efforts to deal with the problem are too extreme. Not at all. I simply do not consider a multi-£100bn investment requiring basically every single residential street in Britain to be dug up and every single substation upgraded (not to mention other parts of the grid that will need upgrading) to be moderate and dislike when people talk about this govt action as if that isn't required.

Actually I would 100% advocate for only hybrids by 2030 (which the govt actually does advocate), but not a banning of hybrids by 2035 as it also advocates. Also more govt pressure to make hybrids considerably more efficient (they are already pretty impressive). Perhaps look at banning hybrids also by 2050? Or some reasonably practical timeframe.

I'd also want to start the program of increasing charging points and substation infrastructure but on a more reasonable timeframe, but be honest about it and get the ball rolling NOW, not in 2030. Something like 'every X streets must have at least Y charging points' could be a start. Practicality.

What I'd also want to look at is - more nuclear, more renewables, investigate means of reducing usage of flights, investment into public transport (outside of London it sucks big time, and more generally e.g. trains are the most expensive in Europe + also the least reliable), more advocacy for work from home, greater subsidies in decarbonisation, but more than anything using economic pressure in league with other countries to pressure (and also not only pressure but help via aid) highly polluting developing countries to reduce carbon output.

There is plenty that can be done, I just don't think hand waving + denial of costs will actually achieve anything. In fact I think it HARMS the climate change cause more than anything.

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#237

Post by rand49an » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:35 AM UTC

twelve40 wrote: post #193

LatteLazy wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first time a government announced they would take action but not for a decade, it signalled action would be taken. This is the 1000th time a government has said "no action today but maybe in a decade". That signals no action. That's the same signal markets have been given for several decades now. I am happy to admit this is a complex issue, one that needs a global solution, an expensive one, maybe an unsolvable o…

how bad will it get for the UK specifically? honest question, I'm not a climate scientist. Brief googling, floods, more extreme temps (like the rest of Europe now?), maybe they did the math and decided that simply shutting down the Thames Barrier and a few other measures would be cheaper than drastic hard ICE bans etc? Not to cast any doubt on the horrible terrible disasters that the global warming will surely bring,…

Not bad in the global scheme of things but hundreds of millions of global refugees isn't going to be good for anyone.

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#238

Post by diegoholiveira » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:35 AM UTC

input_sh wrote: post #169

smilekzs wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> odd/even rule for license plates Friendly reminder that Beijing has been implementing exactly that, then later a variant of that, since 2008. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_space_rationing_in_Beijin...

Friendly reminder that measures like this unevenly affect people in different social classes, because those who are well-off can just buy two cars and be completely unaffected.

This is done in Sao Paulo since 1996 and yes, people have two cars, usually middle class and up.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_restriction_in_S%C3%...

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#239

Post by ppf » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:35 AM UTC

asenk wrote: post #215

ppf wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some simple back-of-the-envelope maths shows that, due to the massively increased amount of energy needed to manufacture an EV, it takes somwhere near half the life of the car (assuming 100k miles) to pay back that "CO2 debt". And even then, you are still limited by the net CO2 emissions of your electricity source. This is why I claim that the CO2 benefits are minimal (not none, or negative). The abstract of the arti…

Actual research vs. "back-of-the-envelope maths". I'll go with the research.

Unless you have paid for the article and read it, we are only discussing an abstract. That isn't enough information to bring to a discussion, as we have absolutely no figures, initial assumptions, or methadologies to explore.

There's nothing wrong with back-of-the-envelope maths. It's not refutable that lithium battery packs take a lot of energy to manufacture (as well as all of the control electronics, which is also a very energy-intensive manufacturing process). Just the lithium cells take around 60kWh to manufacture per 1kWh of pack capacity. Where do you think the ~5.1MWh required to make your Tesla battery pack comes from?

Even if you had 100% renewable power to charge your car, it would take 24,000 miles just to pay back the manufacturing energy of the cells alone. Then you can start paying back the energy cost of the rest of the EV components, which are still considerable. Only after that, can you start saving the planet with your EV.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2515-7620/ab5e1e

Re: Britain to ban new petrol cars and vans by 2030 on road to net zero emissions

#240

Post by Ma8ee » Wed, Nov 18, 2020, 10:37 AM UTC

davidhbolton wrote: post #91

conjectures wrote: post #65

Earlier 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...

Why do you think they does? I’m so tired of always hearing the deflection: “oh lock at China, they are much worse”. No, they aren’t. Their per capita emissions are still much lower than Europe and North America. I wish they did more, but the productive (and mature) thing to do is to focus on what we should do, not whine about what someone else should.