Good MPG Target for Mass Market (Eco Rant)

[Grant-53]

In the quality Assurance dept. we used Cause/Effect charts to discover the root cause of a process problem. Ask "why" five times to get to the bottom of an issue. Why is carbon emission detrimental? Why are greenhouse gases affecting average temperatures? What other factors drive climate conditions? How will different people groups be affected by expected weather patterns? What can I do to minimized waste heat?

[AlexanderB]

Originally Posted by Fingie

I honestly think we could just remove the car taxes, and tax fuels instead.

Be careful what you wish for or you might end up with both, like we have. (They want to add mandatory GPS loggers to tax "by the kilometer" on top, because apparently fuel tax only goes so far until people start going to other countries to refuel more cheaply.)

Oh, and its also illegal to drive on much lower taxed foreign plates if you're not a foreign national. Because why puhish foreigners when you can punish your own subjects first and foremost.

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

You mean to tell us you paid all that money as some kind of penance towards global warming, got nothing in return and you don't feel better about your self?

Hah, thats one way to look at it. Honestly though, I'd rather have some tax reduction, I could save that money and buy an electric car.

Originally Posted by Hersbird

other problems don't allow government to come in and take away more freedom.

'Terrorism' and child predators are good candidates too for getting rid of privacy and freedom too.

Originally Posted by Ecky

What isn't taken into account is cost - where I live, 33.7kwh of electricity costs about $6, while a gallon of gas only costs about $2.30. Since I can reliably get 70mpg tanks in my Insight, an EV would need to get 2.5x that, or 175MPGe to break even in cost per mile, not taking oil changes and other maintenance into account.

Where I live 33.7kw costs about the same as a gallon of gasoline, at about $7.
This is mostly due to government putting tax on fuel, supposedly to discourage wasting but mostly to punish people for having a job.

On top of that, electric cars are currently road-tax exempt at least until 2020, where fossil powered cars pay anywhere from $20 to hundreds a month to be allowed on the road, based on weight and fuel type. Especially diesel cars, which are taxed 2.5~3x as high as gasoline cars are hit hard.

All in all, we're about at the tipping point, and a lot of electric cars are already in use by those who can afford to buy one..

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On the other end of the scale is Norway, pretty much the only European country that has higher fuel prices than we do, lower electricity prices due to hydro power, and a subsidy program on electric cars, and it shows in their sales statistics. (30% of new cars in 2016 was electric, gov't goal is to have 100% of new car sales electric by like 2020-something, I'd have to look it up.)

They have a much higher income standard though, makes those expensive electric cars (also, the pricy gasoline) a lot more affordable..

[oil pan 4]

Funny how they tax all your money away then force you to buy a more expensive electric car.
Do they want everyone to rely on government dependence?

[AlexanderB]

It feels like it, yes.

As a student, I'm barely scraping by on the money I make from work and the money my parents donate me. I'm told the wellfare program pays almost triple what I spend a month, but as far as I can tell I'm not eligible, as I 1: already have a job (even if its a couple hours a week), 2: am an able-bodied person, 3: not a single mom.

Talking about forcing to buy new cars, I 'had' to get rid of my mid 90's, 50+ mpg diesel econobox because the gov't decided that "old" diesel cars are bad. The replacement is a solid 25 mpg landbarge, but at least LPG is cheap and clean-burning, so I guess thats what they wanted?
Oh, and then dieselgate happened, also, research showed that the banning of the older diesel cars did nothing for the air quality, turns out 1: new cars emit just as much, 2: most particulate matter is brakes and tires, but instead of fixing the traffic lights, the current thought proces is that if you make a city completely unreachable by having it gridlocked forever, people will give up on cars eventually and take the public transport instead. I guess they'll carry their ladders and toolboxes to work in their purse or something, idk.

[oil pan 4]

Yeah when you are a service provider like plumber, electrician, thatcher, builder, repair man or woman, mover or maybe you have a digger to move.
Yeah public transportation isn't really an option.

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Originally Posted by AlexanderB

Talking about forcing to buy new cars, I 'had' to get rid of my mid 90's, 50+ mpg diesel econobox because the gov't decided that "old" diesel cars are bad. The replacement is a solid 25 mpg landbarge, but at least LPG is cheap and clean-burning, so I guess thats what they wanted?

Banning those old-school Diesels with indirect injection sounds pointless to me. Allowing them to run on veg oils (either waste from cooking, or from crops cultivated in brownfields to rationalize the usage of arable land) sounds more effective to me not just as a matter of ecology but also for the sake of energy safety since it would be less prone to the fluctuations on petroleum-based fuels costs. But you know, the European Union became quite overpowered and is pushing for a self-destructing agenda.

[AlexanderB]

They're quite aggressively pushing for local air quality over global emissions, the results are sometimes quite strange.

Previously, they'd always been pushing for "CO2 reduction" to reduce dependence on oil since the oil crisis, promoting diesels, and more recently plug-in hybrids as they gamed the system and got "infinite" MPG for the NEDC cycle. Also blending 5% bio fuel (mandatory).

LPG is a big of a strange story, its a clean fuel, and yet the gov't is doing everything they can to stop people from using it to its full potential. (You can't DIY the conversion, it has to be a pre-approved car/install combination, the fuel is cheap by our standards but still taxed quite steeply if you look abroad, and you pay extra tax on the car too. Without all the extra tax, it would be a no-brainer to put an LPG tank on everything.)

Now they're trying to push everyone to (full)electric, however, after the initial tax break runs out, the electric and hybrid cars are immediately exported to countries where second hand cars still get tax breaks, leaving nothing for the second hand market.

The worst part really is how hard they're trying to be the good kid, reduce our (already small) emissions more.. The amount of taxation going on to 'punish' people for owning and driving cars is insane, meanwhile, the developing world drives around in our old cars or ****ty new ones made with 80's tech, gets fuel (nearly) untaxed, and generally emits nearly infinitely more pollutants of every kind, but we have to bend over backwards "for the environment".

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Originally Posted by AlexanderB

Previously, they'd always been pushing for "CO2 reduction" to reduce dependence on oil since the oil crisis, promoting diesels, and more recently plug-in hybrids as they gamed the system and got "infinite" MPG for the NEDC cycle. Also blending 5% bio fuel (mandatory).

The NEDC cycle is quite weird. Measuring the EV-mode mileage separate from the hybrid mode would lead to more accurate results. When it comes to biofuels, I'm very favorable to them. Not just biodiesel and vegetable oils, even ethanol despite all the controversies surrounding it, and nowadays there is also biomethane coming out as a viable replacement for both CNG and LPG. It's a shame that the European Union bowed down to Saudi Arabia instead of going further with biofuels. Germany has been a long-time leader in development of technology for biogas/biomethane production, and even the Nazi experience with synthetic gasoline made out of wood chips in Poland could have been developed further in the postwar as an alternative to reduce the dependence on Arab oil. At least it wouldn't lead to the cold-start issues that plague ethanol-fueled cars here in Brazil

LPG is a big of a strange story, its a clean fuel, and yet the gov't is doing everything they can to stop people from using it to its full potential. (You can't DIY the conversion, it has to be a pre-approved car/install combination, the fuel is cheap by our standards but still taxed quite steeply if you look abroad, and you pay extra tax on the car too. Without all the extra tax, it would be a no-brainer to put an LPG tank on everything.)

LPG might be cleaner than gasoline, but since it's also petroleum-based it doesn't sound so attractive at all from a "sustainability" standpoint. It's actually not legal for road use in my country, where CNG is used instead and can be easily replaced or complemented by biomethane. When it comes to DIY installations, gaseous fuel systems are quite complex, and I'm aware of some accidents that happened with precarious conversions not just for illegal LPG conversions but also for sub-standard CNG setups. In my country there are no actual restrictions to CNG conversions into any vehicle, as long as '97 and newer vehicles are fitted with electronically-controlled CNG hardware.

The worst part really is how hard they're trying to be the good kid, reduce our (already small) emissions more.. The amount of taxation going on to 'punish' people for owning and driving cars is insane, meanwhile, the developing world drives around in our old cars or ****ty new ones made with 80's tech, gets fuel (nearly) untaxed, and generally emits nearly infinitely more pollutants of every kind, but we have to bend over backwards "for the environment".

Green is the new red...

[AlexanderB]

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

The NEDC cycle is quite weird. Measuring the EV-mode mileage separate from the hybrid mode would lead to more accurate results.

Its designed in the 70's for underpowered carburated petrol cars driven on very empty roads, not for the current generation of highly powered cars of all kinds of fuel types driven on extremely busy roads and at high speeds. It's results are (obviously) completely not indicative of real world performance.
Really, try driving like the test method on the real road, people would be angrily assaulting you for blocking the way and driving hazardously slow.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

When it comes to biofuels, I'm very favorable to them.

I'm kinda on the fence, the biggest indicator that something is going wrong is the price of vegetable oil in supermarkets. This used to be a few cents a bottle, but is now always a few cents above the diesel price. Never mind the (il)legalities of driving on SVO or WVO, tax evasion is the most illegal form of crime here..

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

LPG might be cleaner than gasoline, but since it's also petroleum-based it doesn't sound so attractive at all from a "sustainability" standpoint.

Makes sense, the thing is, we have some pretty big refineries sitting in our port, and they literally have a 200 ft flame out the stack, burning off waste LPG/Methane. So the LPG fuel is considered a byproduct/trash anyway, driving on it is already miles better than just setting it on fire.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

[LPG] It's actually not legal for road use in my country, where CNG is used instead

Interesting. We do have CNG, but after the region of our country where NG is extracted started to experience earthquakes, NG prices have gone up and the acceptance of NG has gone way down.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

When it comes to DIY installations, gaseous fuel systems are quite complex

LPG is dead easy, and honestly, not scary. The pressure in the LPG tank is not all that much, and (at least here) all the components need to be safety-marked, so you know its all rated to take the pressure safely. CNG on the other hand is easily 20x the pressure, and personally scares me a little more, though as long as decent components are used should be safe just the same.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

I'm aware of some accidents that happened with precarious conversions not just for illegal LPG conversions but also for sub-standard CNG setups.

Most, if not all the accidents I'm aware of are either from really sub-par materials being used, or people trying to bodge an adapter to put CNG into a LPG system, which obviously (to people who know how the stuff works) is a very bad idea.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

In my country there are no actual restrictions to CNG conversions into any vehicle, as long as '97 and newer vehicles are fitted with electronically-controlled CNG hardware.

Here, LPG and CNG installs need to be checked by our national institure for measuring and checking things (TNO) to make sure they comply with safety and emissions requirements. These tests are done (at great expense) for specific parts/vehicle combinations by the manifacturers of those installations, and once tested, the same combination of parts can then be installed in those vehicles by a licenced installer. Lots of "you can't do it but we can because we paid to get a permit" going on.

There are two exceptions, but they come at a price, the price is in the form of triple-road-tax (similar taxation level as diesel cars.)

If your vehicle is from after 1/7/1990 but before ~1996, it already doesn't meet the emissions standard set for "clean LPG", yet you pay the full price of a professional installation because you're not allowed to DIY, so its completely not worth it, and post-96 cars with the installation already inside are cheaper than the installation itsself. I would know, I own one..

If your vehicle is from before 1/7/1990 you can DIY the install (as long as you have it inspected at a tech station afterwards.), however, you're still gonna pay the triple tax. Especially painful for classic car owners, the tax exemption for classic cars was recently changed to only be for petrol cars, and be full price for LPG and Diesel, because "if you use those fuels you're just driving a classic to save money and you're not a true car enthousiast, so you should pay tax like everyone else". Really nice towards the single-digit-MPG american classics, classic Mercedes'es and 4x4's. Not!
At least you can DIY the install, a decent setup is only 200-300 bucks in parts, instead of 1500-2000 installed.

Our gov't loves to tax, tax and tax some more, and yes, I love complaining about it. Its honestly one of the only but also biggest downfalls of our country, the money grabbing government who insist "saving money" means "taxing your more so we don't actually have to stop spending".
Other than the gov't taking your money its pretty good here, I guess its just better if you make at least twice what the gov't considers monthly minimum wage instead of maybe half.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

Green is the new red...

So it is. Our gov't is no exception, they love spending money on the environment, and want to take it out on those pesky working people who drive around their stupid cars just to pollute the world, they cycle to their gov't desk job, so they think everyone should too. Who even needs a car load of tools for anything?

Anyway, not to get off track, I do agree we need a new testing method for determining 'real world' (more or less) MPG first, and then putting a new target on it. As-is, a lot of cars are made just to game the system, and they often get horrible real world mileage. It's even worse if taxation or funding schemes are based on the test results, as they are here.

[roflwaffle]

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

Global warming that started around 12,000 years ago has been the best thing that ever happened to the human race.
When I read things like "global warming will soon make snowy winters a thing of the past" and "the permafrost is melting" those don't sound like problems, they sound like solutions to problems.

They're solutions if you're Russia.