In modern time's, both LA and London pollution issues are significantly contributed to by vehicle emissions. Partculate NOx, SOx, CO, O3, Volatile organic components & Particulate Matter.
Note that CO2 is not on the list, so improving urban air quality is not directly connected with decreasing CO2 emmisions.
In California major progress on smog has been made via tough emission rules, regular emissions testing of the vehicle fleet and the likes.
In many major European cities, urban air quality has gone dramatically backwards in the last 15 years. In short, in effort to reduce CO2 emissions more efficient diesel vehicles were promoted. Sadly in the real world, while great for reducing Co2 output, they produce a lot more NOx, Particulates etc. The promotion of diesel's is now seen as a mistake. In the UK many town centers now ban diesel vehicles.
I don't follow your logic that EV's won't help. Assuming they replace existing vehicles, what different emissions are you talking about? While not perfect (break dust etc), EV's are clearly much cleaner than petrol / diesel cars.
If you are talking about emissions from the power grid, Large power stations emissions are tightly monitored and can be controlled. - Quite viable to do things like exhaust scrubbing for a power station. In the UK, 42% of power comes from natural gas (accepted as a clean burning fuel from an air quality perspective), 25% nuclear (getting phased out), 25% renewable. Coal is only 9%.
In NZ over 80% of our power is renewable, so way way cleaner than burning petrol.
s_nz,
Dec 26, 10:01pm
Pre industrial CO2 level was around 280PPM. 280 to 411 is not a little rise.
Not really sure why you want me personally to research the "Real" cause of Climate change. There is already a scientific consensus that: "Human activities (primarily greenhouse gas emissions) are the primary cause". Would you really trust a published paper that I authored more than the large number of existing papers?
I agree that some good comes from CO2, but I haven't seen anything saying that current levels are insufficient to derive that benefit, and it seems the planet was just fine with cira 280ppm levels.
bill-robinson,
Dec 26, 10:11pm
so an increase of 131 PARTS PER MILLION is huge in your life is it
s_nz,
Dec 26, 10:49pm
I never said it was huge. I said it wasn't a little rise.
Its a 47% increase. Quite significant, but if wouldn't be too bad if we could stop the rise now. Sadly the trend line is still heading upwards.
harm_less,
Dec 26, 10:53pm
Yes all life pollutes with their byproducts but humans are the only species that has been able to do so on a scale that is physically changing the envoronmental parameters of the planet we inhabit. Essentially there are too many of us and we are consuming the limited resources of Earth, most markedly for energy sources. ICEs consume that energy source and release it in its fractional components, including CO2, and waste heat. The energy from those hydrocarbons originated from the Sun millions of years ago, was harvested by plants using photosynthesis and then laid down in geological deposits which we have now figured out how to extract and use in an irreversible combustion process.
By comparison EVs can use the Sun's energy harvested by way of PV, wind or hydro turbines. The energy source is unlimited and the storage medium (batteries) are recyclable.
Don't know what "history" you are referring to but both UK and LA are leaders in moving away from fossil fueled vehicles to alleviate the health and environmental issues associated with their respective environmental issues. It's called learning by your past mistakes and is what history is valuable in teaching us.
bill-robinson,
Dec 26, 11:35pm
let me put into numbers that all can understand for you 0.0001% increase is huge to you. i say it is not worth worrying about. no body has given the cause of this tiny little increase yet.
s_nz,
Dec 27, 12:17am
As per my previous post it is a 47% increase on pre industrial levels.
If you want to quote to work out concentrations as a percentage and quote subtract one from the other, you need to describe your answer as percentage points, not percent to avoid being wrong.
Please stop hammering on about co2 concentrations being expressed in ppm as an argument that the situation is not a big deal. Pleanty of substances including CO2 high impact when concentration is changed by "just" a few hundred ppm.
I previously quoted the scientific concensus for the primay cause of climate change: "Human activities (primarily greenhouse gas emissions) are the primary cause"
Denying that human caused climate change is happening or an issue in 2020 is in a similar catogory to believing the earth is flat.
harm_less,
Dec 27, 12:54am
You could use that sort of flawed logic to argue that a car hitting a pedestrian is inconsequential due to the difference in their relative speeds being miniscule compared to the 720,000 km/h that our solar system is travelling within the Milky Way. I don't think that type of reasoning is going to get much support from the pedestrian though.
blogzy,
Dec 27, 1:22am
Yes, if bill gates says so it must be true.
bill-robinson,
Dec 27, 2:26am
if we take the unit '1' and we add another '1' we have 2 which is a 100% increase, but using the dg method it is only an increase of 50% by taking '2' as the unit. that is the trouble with statistical analysis you can prove what you want and it is correct but still rubbish. the units you use are PARTS PER MILLION not numbers taken at random there fore a tiny increase which ever way you look at it. always give the unit it helps people to get a proper grasp of things.
bill-robinson,
Dec 27, 2:27am
but friction, gravity and inertia enter your example
s_nz,
Dec 27, 2:55am
On the topic of climate change, toyota's stance on EV's is not because they don't think climate change is an issue, but rather because the brand is focusing on Hybrids, Plug in hybrids, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, and to a lesser extent on Pure electric vehicles. By 2050, Toyota plans to reduce there emissions in 2050 by 90% relative to 2010 levels.
I had to look up the DG method. Don't think it applies here:
As I have said, before small changes in concentration of stuff like CO2 can have a major impact. Even now at a modest 47% increase over pre-industrial levels we are seeing warming, glaciers getting smaller, small sea level rise, more droughts etc.
That something is dilute is not evidence that it is not harmfull. If you were to increase the concentration of Hydrogen Cyanide to 107PPM in your living room, and you remained in that room, you would be dead in 10mins.
apollo11,
Dec 27, 3:04am
The planet has been warming for the last 15000 years, plus the sea level rises. You need to quantify how much more it is rising due to mankind's activity over and above the natural rise. It is obvious that we are having some impact, but people who say 'we have 12 years left before climate change kills us all (AOC) create distrust in the science. Also, one decent supervolcano blowing it's top will stuff the world's climate far more effectively that mankind has so far managed.
blogzy,
Dec 27, 4:24am
We can't believe everything we read. Bias is real.
In November 2015, Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger told Zach Schwartz in Vice: "I think Wikipedia never solved the problem of how to organize itself in a way that didn't lead to mob rule" and that since he left the project, "People that I would say are trolls sort of took over. The inmates started running the asylum."[13]
The problem is that much of the scientific community have been bought and sold by groups with agendas, and not just in environmental sciences.
harm_less,
Dec 27, 5:51am
Then select for published scientific publications and evaluate the results for reliability. If you aren't knowledgable enough to do that effectively then you're best to just believe whatever you find because you're pretty much going to believe anything anyway. And the conspiracy theorists you're replying to aren't going to understand or believe the evidence in any case.
apollo11,
Dec 27, 6:08am
I've lived long enough to have realised that given enough time, nothing really means anything.
bill-robinson,
Dec 27, 6:29am
the 'DG' method is for do gooders. does that ring a bell. what is causing all this CO2 pollution? find that, and then solve the problem in place of sitting at home bleating.
mechnificent,
Dec 27, 6:47am
From the maps. "We've already shifted from a world in which sea level was stable to one in which it is rising, and it will continue to rise for decades, and in fact, hundreds of years." .
That's bullshit. As Apollo has said, there have been abrupt changes of sea level, of hundreds of feet at a time, repeatedly.
mechnificent,
Dec 27, 6:48am
Sells newspapers though. and gives people something to talk about.
bill-robinson,
Dec 27, 7:02am
yep, there is only a finite amount of water. it needs to be displaced to raise sea levels. insurance co,s love hyper reporting, gives them the perfect reason to increase premiums
harm_less,
Dec 27, 7:06am
Think atmospheric water and ice caps. Enough there to top up the oceans some.
apollo11,
Dec 27, 7:11am
Yes, if all of the land based ice melts the sea level would rise another 70 meters, which would be awesome. I'd love a home close to the beach.
s_nz,
Dec 27, 7:28am
As a boatie, more sea does sound pritty cool.
Need to weight that up against the inconvenience of flooding every coastal city in the world, and the need to rebuild much of our countries infrastructure - Roads ETC.
On a more serious note, most of this stuff is about future generations. Pessimistic projections seem to only expect 1.1m sea level rise by 2100. New infrastructure is already designed for this, but it will still be seriously inconvenient in some low lying area's.
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