4 ms·

> The DoD and all of its sub-departments, is exempt from EPA regulations Ho-ly shit. I mean I know blatant corruption is basically under ever political rock ev

> The DoD and all of its sub-departments, is exempt from EPA regulations Ho-ly shit. I mean I know blatant corruption is basically under ever political rock ever everywhere, but that is... wow.

abduhl 5y ago
This is not corruption, this is as designed. The DoD's mission is national security and Congress has determined that national security trumps environmental protections which, to be quite honest, are mostly procedural hurdles put in place to slow down innovation and progress. The question is whether or not we should hinder our ability to protect ourselves from external (and internal at this point) enemies in order to (possibly) protect the environment. Congress has decided that we shouldn't. You can, of course, come to a different conclusion, but I doubt Congress ever will.
- zdragnar 5y ago
  I will concede that incorrectly handling waste is bad, and shouldn't be tolerated. On thr other hand, I am amused some people seem to think armored tanks should be getting 35mpg...
  - abduhl 5y ago
    It's a bit hard to follow environmental standards when you're designing/testing/shooting depleted uranium.
  - tristor 5y ago
    > On thr other hand, I am amused some people seem to think armored tanks should be getting 35mpg... Distance, a need for speed, and difficulty of logistical support for mid-air refueling has resulted in massive advancement in airframe design and energy efficiency in the military compared to earlier designs. Had the energy efficiency requirements been mandated it would simply have acted as a forcing function. The same is true for armored vehicles. Yes, carrying around a lot of dense steel plating is a problem, but we don't really do that as much anymore because we've found better ways to armor vehicles as steel plating has been defeated by ultra-dense metallic penetrators (DU/TC) and complex projectiles like HEIAP rounds. Ablative armoring combined with ceramic plating (which achieves better results than hardened steel at lower weights) HAS actually created an environment where fuel efficiency for vehicles like tanks has increased (or more accurately in most cases, their top speed has increased given a set engine performance when not gearing limited). Do I think that Congress was wrong to carve out this exemption? Maybe, maybe not. The one thing I think they definitely should NOT have been exempted from is the safe handling and disposal requirements for toxic waste. Personally, I'm not super concerned if a fighter jet or tank is fuel efficient, I am concerned about us utterly decimating the ground water and ecology of our own country by haphazardly dumping toxic substances.
  - dekhn 5y ago
    well, if you want to win wars, you make tanks that drive fast. This is a well understood concept.
tristor 5y ago
Honestly, I thought this was common knowledge. I don't see it as a form of corruption, it was encoded into law primarily because most environmental regulations were passed in the midst of the Cold War. As a country, at that time, we didn't want to do anything which might impede the progress of military advancement and force superiority, which meant that national security concerns utterly trumped newly formulated (and somewhat hotly contested) environmental regulations. I don't think there were any backroom deals involved, I believe all parties, including the staunchest supporters of these regulations at the time, were in support of military exemption.
- mandmandam 5y ago
  The Cold War which ended 3 decades ago yes? There wasn't some other Cold War necessitating wanton environmental destruction that I missed? ... As a country, at this time, there is no excuse for this exemption remaining on the books, none, none at all.
  - tristor 5y ago
    To be clear, I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm more just trying to provide context for how it came to be. The environmental regulations the US operates under were mostly passed during the Cold War. We've had no significant environmental regulation since. Maybe we should have some... but we haven't.

> The DoD and all of its sub-departments, is exempt from EPA regulations Ho-ly shit. I mean I know blatant corruption is basically under ever political rock ever everywhere, but that is... wow.

abduhl 5y ago

This is not corruption, this is as designed. The DoD's mission is national security and Congress has determined that national security trumps environmental protections which, to be quite honest, are mostly procedural hurdles put in place to slow down innovation and progress. The question is whether or not we should hinder our ability to protect ourselves from external (and internal at this point) enemies in order to (possibly) protect the environment. Congress has decided that we shouldn't. You can, of course, come to a different conclusion, but I doubt Congress ever will.

zdragnar 5y ago
I will concede that incorrectly handling waste is bad, and shouldn't be tolerated. On thr other hand, I am amused some people seem to think armored tanks should be getting 35mpg...
- abduhl 5y ago
  It's a bit hard to follow environmental standards when you're designing/testing/shooting depleted uranium.
- tristor 5y ago
  > On thr other hand, I am amused some people seem to think armored tanks should be getting 35mpg... Distance, a need for speed, and difficulty of logistical support for mid-air refueling has resulted in massive advancement in airframe design and energy efficiency in the military compared to earlier designs. Had the energy efficiency requirements been mandated it would simply have acted as a forcing function. The same is true for armored vehicles. Yes, carrying around a lot of dense steel plating is a problem, but we don't really do that as much anymore because we've found better ways to armor vehicles as steel plating has been defeated by ultra-dense metallic penetrators (DU/TC) and complex projectiles like HEIAP rounds. Ablative armoring combined with ceramic plating (which achieves better results than hardened steel at lower weights) HAS actually created an environment where fuel efficiency for vehicles like tanks has increased (or more accurately in most cases, their top speed has increased given a set engine performance when not gearing limited). Do I think that Congress was wrong to carve out this exemption? Maybe, maybe not. The one thing I think they definitely should NOT have been exempted from is the safe handling and disposal requirements for toxic waste. Personally, I'm not super concerned if a fighter jet or tank is fuel efficient, I am concerned about us utterly decimating the ground water and ecology of our own country by haphazardly dumping toxic substances.
- dekhn 5y ago
  well, if you want to win wars, you make tanks that drive fast. This is a well understood concept.

tristor 5y ago

Honestly, I thought this was common knowledge. I don't see it as a form of corruption, it was encoded into law primarily because most environmental regulations were passed in the midst of the Cold War. As a country, at that time, we didn't want to do anything which might impede the progress of military advancement and force superiority, which meant that national security concerns utterly trumped newly formulated (and somewhat hotly contested) environmental regulations. I don't think there were any backroom deals involved, I believe all parties, including the staunchest supporters of these regulations at the time, were in support of military exemption.

mandmandam 5y ago
The Cold War which ended 3 decades ago yes? There wasn't some other Cold War necessitating wanton environmental destruction that I missed? ... As a country, at this time, there is no excuse for this exemption remaining on the books, none, none at all.
- tristor 5y ago
  To be clear, I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm more just trying to provide context for how it came to be. The environmental regulations the US operates under were mostly passed during the Cold War. We've had no significant environmental regulation since. Maybe we should have some... but we haven't.