Buying used, instead of new for environmental reasons -Pros and Cons ?

[freebeard]

I have to hand carry my laundry down to a cinder-block laundry room. Cursed or blessed, it's another day in paradise.

I can sympathize...I often think of my work place (and maybe the rest of my life) as prison, and 20-cents an hour is about what I have to work with at the end of the day...

Nothing new — 1971

Sometimes I think this whole world
Is one big prison yard
Some of us are prisoners
The rest of us are guards

Dylan —George Jackson

[JSH]

On the original topic - a car is a durable good. As long as it has value it will get passed down from owner to owner and be used. Then when it has no value in one country it gets passed down to another. (Southeast Europe is full of old cars from Western Europe. Asia is full of cars from Japan, Latin America is full of cars from the USA) I don't see a big environmental difference of where someone chooses to buy into that car life cycle.

I personally like to buy used cars for financial reasons and will generally buy a 3 year old car for 60% of the new price and keep it until it is 10 years old. To me that is the sweet spot of ownership cost, features, and maintenance headaches. However, someone had to buy that car new for me to buy it used and the environmental cost of manufacturing is shared by every owner.

I do support the relatively recent moves to ban old cars for major cities. Old cars are massively more polluting than new cars and cities all over the world have major smog problems.

I have this dilemma with my old motorcycles. I have a 1976 and 1979 Kawasaki KZ400. They basically have no emission control systems and even when they are in good tune you can smell the unburned fuel behind them. I can't in good conscience commute to work on a vehicle that is putting out the pollution of 100 cars.

CARB doesn't have records back to 1976 but even the newer 1982 KZ440 puts out 1.44 grams of HC per mile and 11 grams of CO. That compares to 0.014 grams HC and 0.5 grams CO for my 2014 TDI. That is 103 times the HC and 22 times the CO.

[Stubby79]

Time to install fuel injection and some kind of catalytic converter on your KZ400?

Or run propane and forget about it.

[freebeard]

Originally Posted by JSH

...a car is a durable good

Looking forward there is an interesting race. One or two million mile batteries are becoming a thing. At which point the 'powerplant' outlives the 'airframe'.

This is IMHO the most significant aspect of the Cybertruck. A chassis that can be handed down through generations without the resto-modding, or in military terms rear-echelon maintenance, stamped steel chassis require.

[Piotrsko]

Yeah but a forever vehicle goes into the issues of obsolete technologies that require substantial time, skill, and money to upgrade. A prime example is the steering rack for split window ty 2 you posted. Few people leave their model T bone stock then use it as a daily driver.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Stubby79

Time to install fuel injection and some kind of catalytic converter on your KZ400?

Or run propane and forget about it.

The problem with fuel injection is that to be much cleaner that a carb you need a closed loop system with feedback from an O2 sensor. It is a lot of work to fabricate and install a complete new intake and exhaust system and then tune it to run right. Even then the emission improvements will be modest - maybe only 25 times worse than a modern car.

I've thought of propane - much simpler for some pretty good emission improvements. The problem there is finding room for a propane tank of suitable size. I could always do the propane cylinder "saddlebag" method.


I've also thought of doing a sidecar which would provide plenty of room for some tanks.

The bigger problem is that the KZ400 is by any objective measure a pretty crappy motorcycle compared to anything remotely modern. The power is anemic, the brakes suck, and the suspension is basically poggo sticks. So why bother trying to turn an ancient 45 year old motorcycle into something remotely modern when a 2020 Honda CB300 will do everything better for less than $5K new or half that used?

[Stubby79]

I have a lovely 11lb bottle - 8" around - for such an experiment. One of these days. Refilling is the main headache, though as few rides I get a year, really shouldn't be too much of a deterrent.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Stubby79

I have a lovely 11lb bottle - 8" around - for such an experiment. One of these days. Refilling is the main headache, though as few rides I get a year, really shouldn't be too much of a deterrent.

If I'm doing my calculation correctly that is the equivalent of 1.9 gallons of gasoline. For my KZ400 that would be about 95 miles on a bottle.

[Stubby79]

You're off by 1 gallon!

A pound is roughly a litre - nice and convenient, that - so its 2.9-3G.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Stubby79

You're off by 1 gallon!

A pound is roughly a litre - nice and convenient, that - so its 2.9-3G.

I was going by energy equivalent.

Propane is 4.2 lbs per gallon
Gasoline is 116,000 btu per gallon
Propane is 84,250 btu per gallon

11 lb / 4.2 = 2.62 gallons of propane
2.62 / (114,1000/84250) = 1.94 gallons gasoline equivalent.