12 ms·

The history of the elimination of leaded gasoline

130 points by tjr 5y ago

zodo123 5y ago
Private aviation in the US is still, somehow, allowed to use leaded avgas for small planes. It’s a small market but still enough to have an impact on the communities near airports. The FAA has shown little interest in the impact of the problem, and one can only hope the EPA will step in at some point. https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/leaded-gas-was-phased-out-25-years-ago-why-are-n1264970 https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/leaded-gas-wa...
- TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
  Lead byproducts are spewed all over the neighborhoods surrounding small airports.
- toomuchtodo 5y ago
  Post: "FAA, do your damn job" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30943466 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30943466 https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ Can your Congressional rep and the FAA and ask why this isn't done yet.
  - dougalm 5y ago
    Is it worth trying to apply pressure at the local level? I read that Santa Clara County banned 100LL in January. I have young kids. We live near Hanscom Field and spend a lot of time near Barnstable Airport. Should we try writing our local airports/cities/counties? At Barnstable Airport, the big operator is Cape Air. They make a big show of being green, so maybe they'd want to be early adopters of G100UL. Does anyone know if the existing G100UL STC applies to Cape Air's fleet? Could they switch to it if they wanted to?
    - toomuchtodo 5y ago
      I would complain to anyone who will listen. The health effects of lead exposure are well known, and a suitable replacement is available. Any continued combustion of leaded avgas is out of apathy and laziness. The FAA is dragging their feet because there is no cost to them to do so.
      - hutzlibu 5y ago
        I know nothing of the technical details, so you are saying, no one would need to change anything with their engines etc and just switch to leadfree gasoline?
        toomuchtodo 5y ago
        That is my understanding. https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ > To scrub the playhead forward, last summer at Oshkosh, to great fanfare, the STC approving G100UL was announced. It applied to a limited number of engines and GAMI was tasked with additional testing and data work to expand the engine list. This it did. The Wichita Aircraft Certification Office duly sent a letter to FAA HQ reporting that GAMI met all the test requirements—best-run program they had ever seen, or words to that effect—and was entitled to an STC-AML with every single spark ignition engine in the FAA database approved to use G100UL. ... > At a press conference, Lawrence said he thought PAFI had been “a great success.” I simply cannot agree. I don’t know how anyone in the industry could think this. PAFI was supposed to yield an unleaded drop-in replacement for 100LL. It did not. It was an abject failure and now, even though the FAA has an STC in hand awaiting approval for a fuel that has been proven, ad nauseum, to work in all engines, it wants more money for more testing. While the PAFI program—that was Piston Aviation Fuels Initiative—supposedly produced data, accessing it is all but impossible.
        sokoloff 5y ago
        Yes, but it's "switch to a lead-free gasoline, but one that is different from the currently sold lead-free gasoline used in cars." https://gami.com/g100ul/GAMI_Q_and_A.pdf https://gami.com/g100ul/GAMI_Q_and_A.pdf
- thetinguy 5y ago
  It’s especially crazy because because all the major engine manufacturers have already certified many of their leaded gas engines for high octane unleaded. Some of them are just waiting on FAA rubber stamps. https://www.aopa.org/advocacy/100-unleaded-avgas https://www.aopa.org/advocacy/100-unleaded-avgas
- imoverclocked 5y ago
  “Allowed”… I think you mean “forced.” If you have to fly certain small planes, there is no legal alternative in most places.
  - geoffeg 5y ago
    Don't most of the more popular aircraft have STCs that allow them to run on automotive gas?
    - iamtheworstdev 5y ago
      1. The "MoGas STC" costs money per plane to buy 2. It only applies to low compression engines, which is a lot of engines, but which also rules out most airplanes made since the 70s. There's a few exceptions, but not significant in terms of manufactured numbers to matter. (the STC you're likely talking about is the one that let engines run on 80 octane) If the MoGas STC mattered then pilots would have adopted it because rec fuel (ethanol free gasoline) is significantly cheaper than AvGas
      - sokoloff 5y ago
        1. The cost of the STC rounds to $0. I think when I started flying it used to be $1 per horsepower; it looks like it’s still under $1000, which represents no barrier. #2 and the low availability of mogas at airports is the reason for a lack of adoption fleet wide.
        iamtheworstdev 5y ago
        re: #2... because... ? Because they aren't going to stock a fuel that only applies to a handful of airplanes. The demand for it is near nil.
        sokoloff 5y ago
        Exactly. You can barely sustain a fuel farm on the fuel that services 100% of the piston GA fleet. It's incredibly difficult to make the economics work to add a second fuel farm that serves only 30% of the gasoline sold, cannibalizing sales from your other fuel farm. That's the premise/promise of G100UL: it can serve all the spark-ignition piston aircraft.
- 535188B17C93743 5y ago
  What do we want? G100UL! When do we want it? As soon as possible!
  - MaxBarraclough 5y ago
    Until then, here's a good podcast episode interviewing George Braly, the man behind G100UL. [0] Incidentally I recall a later episode mentioning that a couple of decades ago someone was able to get an unleaded fuel approved for aviation in, iirc, Sweden. Unsure why that didn't get much traction. [0] https://aviationnewstalk.com/tag/unleaded-fuel/ https://aviationnewstalk.com/tag/unleaded-fuel/
  - _moof 5y ago
    Surely you mean "as soon as practicable." :)
- Melatonic 5y ago
  There is finally a replacement gas being developed / made so we might actually be rid of this crap soon while still keeping private aviation alive
- giantg2 5y ago
  "an area where 2.5 percent of children under 6 years old who were tested had detectable levels of lead in their blood" "The presence of this fuel means the areas near these airports are often inundated with tiny lead particles" I agree that we should find lead free alternatives (some exist, so it sounds like this is purely bureaucracy). There's really no reason to keep using it. That said, it seems there is some fear mongering going on in this article. If the air is truly inundated, why is it that only 2.5% of the kids have a detectable level? If it's in the air and everywhere, then it should be detectable in vastly more children in that area. The biggest question in my mind is, why is this area so low when 50% of US children have detectable lead levels?
- colechristensen 5y ago
  I'd like to see a risk comparison to measure the effects of living near an airport with heavy avgas users in units of tuna-sandwich-equivalents per month. Yes exposure isn't zero and effects from that exposure aren't zero, but let's get a good idea of how big the effect size is, because it really seems like some people have an out-of-proportion idea of what the risk actually is. I'm much more concerned about the heavy metal exposure from nearby coal plants than I am by general aviation fuel.
  - sfblah 5y ago
    I agree with this methodology. People should use a different sort function for their outrage. It's like how people fail to compare the number of cancers caused by radioactive release from coal plants vs nuclear plants. The latter seems like it would be more of a problem, but actually the former is far far worse.
  - MaxBarraclough 5y ago
    It's detectable, [0] but it's not the top cause of lead poisoning. That honour goes to lead-based paints. [1] [0] https://news.sccgov.org/news-release/study-commissioned-county-santa-clara-finds-increased-lead-levels-children-living-near https://news.sccgov.org/news-release/study-commissioned-coun... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning#Paint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning#Paint
chaxor 5y ago
Does anyone know how to get in touch with media outlets to run these stories? I can't help but notice how some of the issues brought up by John Oliver made decent progress after they ran an episode on it. They have an episode on lead, but it was focused on Flint. Everyone here should send an email to the address at the bottom of "FAA, do your damn job" and to one of the writers of John Oliver. That may get people to apply the right pressure for a change.
s_dev 5y ago
When people look to solutions of the free market this is an interesting example. We knew lead from petrol was poisoning everything -- deformed babies, ruined ecosystems etc. and yet the price incentive ensured it would never be dropped as a consumer product -- people kept buying leaded petrol as the cost would always be externalized somewhere else. The government had to step in and and ban the practice. Why didn't the free market solve this particular problem? Neil DeGrasse Tyson looked at Clare Patterson's work (the whistleblower of leaded petrol being harmful) in an episode of Cosmos. Highly recommend it -- very interesting episode.
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  > Why didn't the free market solve this particular problem? Information asymmetry & greed. And consumers who would fail the marshmallow test.
  - giraffe_lady 5y ago
    I sense that you're using "marshmallow test" as shorthand or euphemism for essentially calling people stupid, or undisciplined. Basically saying that as long as people have some agency to avoid a consequence, experiencing that consequence is their choice and fault. Anyway these things and more are part of "the market" too. If a market framework can't find effective solutions in the presence of real people with human faults and weaknesses, then what value is it to us?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- whatshisface 5y ago
  The free market obviously didn't work because it was a third party being harmed - unless you're in a capitalist anarchy like Snowcrash with gangs for hire there is no market-based mechanism for representing the interests of anyone not party to a sale. The real question is why the liability plus liability insurance system (the actual alternative to regulation) did not work. Why did those companies not fear litigation when it started becoming known that they could be subject to a class action with the size of the entire population? Who was protecting them, and how?
smm11 5y ago
Not related, but CA has banned gas-powered lawn equipment (mowers, weed destroyers, blowers). Sort of the "small airplane" thing first.
- yabones 5y ago
  Honestly, a way better approach is to just stop having lawns that need mowing. More people need to plant native species that actually belong there instead of a monoculture of invasive plants. And, much more importantly in some drought-prone areas, plants that need little or no irrigation.
- jandrese 5y ago
  I was glad CA did this, because suddenly every big box store is selling electric lawn equipment that was designed in this century. Just a few years ago I went looking for an electric lawnmower and they were still using 6v lead acid batteries for 20 minutes of runtime on a 12" blade and cost a small fortune. Two years ago suddenly everybody has affordable lithium powered modular battery systems. Granted, they're all made out of cheap plastic, but getting people actually buying them is the most important first step in getting good and affordable equipment.
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  While they're writing regulations about it, I wish they'd mandate a standard for rechargeable batteries for the lawn equipment. As it stands, we get proprietary standards like cordless power tools where batteries have something like 90% margins.
  - cptskippy 5y ago
    > I wish they'd mandate a standard for rechargeable batteries for the lawn equipment. This has never occurred to me but that seems obvious. I wonder if it's just not something on lawmaker's radar. We know that all tool makers will scream and say "how can we be sure 3rd party batteries won't explode in our tools?" I wonder if there could be some sort of certification for both batteries and tools that would mitigate such an issue.
hristov 5y ago
Is there a country by country list as to when they banned leaded gasoline?
- s_dev 5y ago
  There's a good one in the article!
- baud147258 5y ago
  there's a partial one on wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead#Phaseout_and_ban https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead#Phaseout_and_ba...
jhallenworld 5y ago
I was wondering which generation was the most poisoned by the lead: well it's Gen-X: "Researchers found that estimated lead-linked deficits were greatest for people born between 1966 and 1970, a population of about 20.8 million people, which experienced an average deficit of 5.9 IQ points per person." https://news.fsu.edu/news/health-medicine/2022/03/08/fsu-research-team-finds-lead-exposure-linked-to-iq-loss/#:~:text=The%20study%20is%20published%20in,Professor%20of%20Sociology%20Matt%20Hauer https://news.fsu.edu/news/health-medicine/2022/03/08/fsu-res....
Maursault 5y ago
One can compare lead added to gasoline with carcinogens added to cigarettes. Both were introduced to make the use of the product smoother, and with it came massive health issues, and both industries funded fraudulent studies to create the false impression the product was safe. While carcinogens are still added to cigarettes, and will be forever since while the government's case against Big Tobacco revealed the practice, banning the practice was not included in the settlement for inexplicable reasons, and most of the massive fine was ultimately forgiven by the early naughts. Oddly, health issues are not the reason why leaded gasoline was phased out; it was phased out because leaded gas fowled catalytic converters, which were mandated to reduce emissions.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
pastor_bob 5y ago
It took 26 years to remove a simple additive from automotive gasoline in the US. Talk about slow walking a change. Under a similar bureaucracy, it'll probably take a 100 years plus to phase ICE cars entirely
- LordDragonfang 5y ago
  Depending on how you measure it, the first concerns over global warming and the "greenhouse effect" were penned what is already over 100 years ago (though regarding coal, not gasoline), and scientists have been aware of the growing magnitude of the issue for around half a century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_climate_change_science#First_calculations_of_greenhouse_effect,_1896 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_climate_change_scie...
- asdff 5y ago
  Pretty sure 100 years plus is the plan anyhow
ncmncm 5y ago
> Now, we do not have to worry that our IQ will be lowered, at least not by lead from vehicles emissions, anymore. Now by Twitter and Facebook, instead.
- cbg0 5y ago
  While this is a very facile jab to throw, social media is mostly a channel for the spread of stupid, but not the reason why people are stupid.
  - WillPostForFood 5y ago
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/05/30/twitter-hurting-intelligence-not-smart-study/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/05/30/twitter-hur...
    - cbg0 5y ago
      So the investigation says they made half of the students use Twitter to analyze a novel by posting quotes and their own reflections & commenting on tweets written by their classmates, while the others relied on traditional classroom teaching methods. The winner is visible from a mile away, but the takeaway for me is that using the wrong tool for the job is stupid, not that Twitter itself makes you dumb.
      - ncmncm 5y ago
        You seem to suggest you think that Twitter is the right tool for some job. Using it had, manifestly, the observed effect, regardless of what other tool might or might not be deployed elsewhere. Using another tool simultaneously enabled quantifying that effect.
polymerist 5y ago
This is kind of crazy since the technology to move away from leaded gasoline or fuels has been around for DECADES. The fact that anyone is still using tetraethyl lead as a fuel additive is horrendous. We can hit right around 100% octanes right now too from a synthetic chemistry perspective.
- sokoloff 5y ago
  At this point, this is much more of a regulatory hurdle than a chemistry hurdle.
colmmacc 5y ago
Not linked from the article for some reason is a great, and very readable, paper "The U.S. Experience with the Phasedown of Lead in Gasoline" https://web.mit.edu/ckolstad/www/Newell.pdf https://web.mit.edu/ckolstad/www/Newell.pdf . I found it a fascinating and inspiring story of everything that went into the transition, including setting up dedicated public banks to help refineries manage the investments they would need to make.
DoreenMichele 5y ago
Humorously, my recollection is that President Reagan asked someone to do a cost benefit analysis to support his desire to weaken controls on lead gasoline and the guy in charge did the opposite and his cost benefit analysis showed that we would save tons of money by eliminating lead, so that's how lead gasoline got eliminated in the US. My recollection is this was the end of this guy's government career but he won some kind of award (a la Nobel Prize levels of money from somewhere) that let him pay cash for a house while working as a professor -- or something like that. I tried to do a search and came up with this article that fits with that recollection but doesn't exactly verify the details I remember and I have no idea how to track down the guy's name, etc etc. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1984/04/01/cost-benefit-foes-surprised/ca65d1a9-aa94-461f-a882-10853c1f375a/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1984/04/01/c...

130 points by tjr 5y ago

Private aviation in the US is still, somehow, allowed to use leaded avgas for small planes. It’s a small market but still enough to have an impact on the communities near airports. The FAA has shown little interest in the impact of the problem, and one can only hope the EPA will step in at some point. https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/leaded-gas-was-phased-out-25-years-ago-why-are-n1264970 https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/leaded-gas-wa...

TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
Lead byproducts are spewed all over the neighborhoods surrounding small airports.
toomuchtodo 5y ago
Post: "FAA, do your damn job" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30943466 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30943466 https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ Can your Congressional rep and the FAA and ask why this isn't done yet.
- dougalm 5y ago
  Is it worth trying to apply pressure at the local level? I read that Santa Clara County banned 100LL in January. I have young kids. We live near Hanscom Field and spend a lot of time near Barnstable Airport. Should we try writing our local airports/cities/counties? At Barnstable Airport, the big operator is Cape Air. They make a big show of being green, so maybe they'd want to be early adopters of G100UL. Does anyone know if the existing G100UL STC applies to Cape Air's fleet? Could they switch to it if they wanted to?
  - toomuchtodo 5y ago
    I would complain to anyone who will listen. The health effects of lead exposure are well known, and a suitable replacement is available. Any continued combustion of leaded avgas is out of apathy and laziness. The FAA is dragging their feet because there is no cost to them to do so.
    - hutzlibu 5y ago
      I know nothing of the technical details, so you are saying, no one would need to change anything with their engines etc and just switch to leadfree gasoline?
      - toomuchtodo 5y ago
        That is my understanding. https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ https://www.avweb.com/insider/faa-do-your-damn-job/ > To scrub the playhead forward, last summer at Oshkosh, to great fanfare, the STC approving G100UL was announced. It applied to a limited number of engines and GAMI was tasked with additional testing and data work to expand the engine list. This it did. The Wichita Aircraft Certification Office duly sent a letter to FAA HQ reporting that GAMI met all the test requirements—best-run program they had ever seen, or words to that effect—and was entitled to an STC-AML with every single spark ignition engine in the FAA database approved to use G100UL. ... > At a press conference, Lawrence said he thought PAFI had been “a great success.” I simply cannot agree. I don’t know how anyone in the industry could think this. PAFI was supposed to yield an unleaded drop-in replacement for 100LL. It did not. It was an abject failure and now, even though the FAA has an STC in hand awaiting approval for a fuel that has been proven, ad nauseum, to work in all engines, it wants more money for more testing. While the PAFI program—that was Piston Aviation Fuels Initiative—supposedly produced data, accessing it is all but impossible.
      - sokoloff 5y ago
        Yes, but it's "switch to a lead-free gasoline, but one that is different from the currently sold lead-free gasoline used in cars." https://gami.com/g100ul/GAMI_Q_and_A.pdf https://gami.com/g100ul/GAMI_Q_and_A.pdf
thetinguy 5y ago
It’s especially crazy because because all the major engine manufacturers have already certified many of their leaded gas engines for high octane unleaded. Some of them are just waiting on FAA rubber stamps. https://www.aopa.org/advocacy/100-unleaded-avgas https://www.aopa.org/advocacy/100-unleaded-avgas
imoverclocked 5y ago
“Allowed”… I think you mean “forced.” If you have to fly certain small planes, there is no legal alternative in most places.
- geoffeg 5y ago
  Don't most of the more popular aircraft have STCs that allow them to run on automotive gas?
  - iamtheworstdev 5y ago
    1. The "MoGas STC" costs money per plane to buy 2. It only applies to low compression engines, which is a lot of engines, but which also rules out most airplanes made since the 70s. There's a few exceptions, but not significant in terms of manufactured numbers to matter. (the STC you're likely talking about is the one that let engines run on 80 octane) If the MoGas STC mattered then pilots would have adopted it because rec fuel (ethanol free gasoline) is significantly cheaper than AvGas
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      1. The cost of the STC rounds to $0. I think when I started flying it used to be $1 per horsepower; it looks like it’s still under $1000, which represents no barrier. #2 and the low availability of mogas at airports is the reason for a lack of adoption fleet wide.
      - iamtheworstdev 5y ago
        re: #2... because... ? Because they aren't going to stock a fuel that only applies to a handful of airplanes. The demand for it is near nil.
        sokoloff 5y ago
        Exactly. You can barely sustain a fuel farm on the fuel that services 100% of the piston GA fleet. It's incredibly difficult to make the economics work to add a second fuel farm that serves only 30% of the gasoline sold, cannibalizing sales from your other fuel farm. That's the premise/promise of G100UL: it can serve all the spark-ignition piston aircraft.
535188B17C93743 5y ago
What do we want? G100UL! When do we want it? As soon as possible!
- MaxBarraclough 5y ago
  Until then, here's a good podcast episode interviewing George Braly, the man behind G100UL. [0] Incidentally I recall a later episode mentioning that a couple of decades ago someone was able to get an unleaded fuel approved for aviation in, iirc, Sweden. Unsure why that didn't get much traction. [0] https://aviationnewstalk.com/tag/unleaded-fuel/ https://aviationnewstalk.com/tag/unleaded-fuel/
- _moof 5y ago
  Surely you mean "as soon as practicable." :)
Melatonic 5y ago
There is finally a replacement gas being developed / made so we might actually be rid of this crap soon while still keeping private aviation alive
giantg2 5y ago
"an area where 2.5 percent of children under 6 years old who were tested had detectable levels of lead in their blood" "The presence of this fuel means the areas near these airports are often inundated with tiny lead particles" I agree that we should find lead free alternatives (some exist, so it sounds like this is purely bureaucracy). There's really no reason to keep using it. That said, it seems there is some fear mongering going on in this article. If the air is truly inundated, why is it that only 2.5% of the kids have a detectable level? If it's in the air and everywhere, then it should be detectable in vastly more children in that area. The biggest question in my mind is, why is this area so low when 50% of US children have detectable lead levels?
colechristensen 5y ago
I'd like to see a risk comparison to measure the effects of living near an airport with heavy avgas users in units of tuna-sandwich-equivalents per month. Yes exposure isn't zero and effects from that exposure aren't zero, but let's get a good idea of how big the effect size is, because it really seems like some people have an out-of-proportion idea of what the risk actually is. I'm much more concerned about the heavy metal exposure from nearby coal plants than I am by general aviation fuel.
- sfblah 5y ago
  I agree with this methodology. People should use a different sort function for their outrage. It's like how people fail to compare the number of cancers caused by radioactive release from coal plants vs nuclear plants. The latter seems like it would be more of a problem, but actually the former is far far worse.
- MaxBarraclough 5y ago
  It's detectable, [0] but it's not the top cause of lead poisoning. That honour goes to lead-based paints. [1] [0] https://news.sccgov.org/news-release/study-commissioned-county-santa-clara-finds-increased-lead-levels-children-living-near https://news.sccgov.org/news-release/study-commissioned-coun... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning#Paint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_poisoning#Paint

chaxor 5y ago

Does anyone know how to get in touch with media outlets to run these stories? I can't help but notice how some of the issues brought up by John Oliver made decent progress after they ran an episode on it. They have an episode on lead, but it was focused on Flint. Everyone here should send an email to the address at the bottom of "FAA, do your damn job" and to one of the writers of John Oliver. That may get people to apply the right pressure for a change.

s_dev 5y ago

When people look to solutions of the free market this is an interesting example. We knew lead from petrol was poisoning everything -- deformed babies, ruined ecosystems etc. and yet the price incentive ensured it would never be dropped as a consumer product -- people kept buying leaded petrol as the cost would always be externalized somewhere else. The government had to step in and and ban the practice. Why didn't the free market solve this particular problem? Neil DeGrasse Tyson looked at Clare Patterson's work (the whistleblower of leaded petrol being harmful) in an episode of Cosmos. Highly recommend it -- very interesting episode.

rootusrootus 5y ago
> Why didn't the free market solve this particular problem? Information asymmetry & greed. And consumers who would fail the marshmallow test.
- giraffe_lady 5y ago
  I sense that you're using "marshmallow test" as shorthand or euphemism for essentially calling people stupid, or undisciplined. Basically saying that as long as people have some agency to avoid a consequence, experiencing that consequence is their choice and fault. Anyway these things and more are part of "the market" too. If a market framework can't find effective solutions in the presence of real people with human faults and weaknesses, then what value is it to us?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
whatshisface 5y ago
The free market obviously didn't work because it was a third party being harmed - unless you're in a capitalist anarchy like Snowcrash with gangs for hire there is no market-based mechanism for representing the interests of anyone not party to a sale. The real question is why the liability plus liability insurance system (the actual alternative to regulation) did not work. Why did those companies not fear litigation when it started becoming known that they could be subject to a class action with the size of the entire population? Who was protecting them, and how?

smm11 5y ago

Not related, but CA has banned gas-powered lawn equipment (mowers, weed destroyers, blowers). Sort of the "small airplane" thing first.

yabones 5y ago
Honestly, a way better approach is to just stop having lawns that need mowing. More people need to plant native species that actually belong there instead of a monoculture of invasive plants. And, much more importantly in some drought-prone areas, plants that need little or no irrigation.
jandrese 5y ago
I was glad CA did this, because suddenly every big box store is selling electric lawn equipment that was designed in this century. Just a few years ago I went looking for an electric lawnmower and they were still using 6v lead acid batteries for 20 minutes of runtime on a 12" blade and cost a small fortune. Two years ago suddenly everybody has affordable lithium powered modular battery systems. Granted, they're all made out of cheap plastic, but getting people actually buying them is the most important first step in getting good and affordable equipment.
rootusrootus 5y ago
While they're writing regulations about it, I wish they'd mandate a standard for rechargeable batteries for the lawn equipment. As it stands, we get proprietary standards like cordless power tools where batteries have something like 90% margins.
- cptskippy 5y ago
  > I wish they'd mandate a standard for rechargeable batteries for the lawn equipment. This has never occurred to me but that seems obvious. I wonder if it's just not something on lawmaker's radar. We know that all tool makers will scream and say "how can we be sure 3rd party batteries won't explode in our tools?" I wonder if there could be some sort of certification for both batteries and tools that would mitigate such an issue.

hristov 5y ago

Is there a country by country list as to when they banned leaded gasoline?

s_dev 5y ago
There's a good one in the article!
baud147258 5y ago
there's a partial one on wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead#Phaseout_and_ban https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead#Phaseout_and_ba...

jhallenworld 5y ago

I was wondering which generation was the most poisoned by the lead: well it's Gen-X: "Researchers found that estimated lead-linked deficits were greatest for people born between 1966 and 1970, a population of about 20.8 million people, which experienced an average deficit of 5.9 IQ points per person." https://news.fsu.edu/news/health-medicine/2022/03/08/fsu-research-team-finds-lead-exposure-linked-to-iq-loss/#:~:text=The%20study%20is%20published%20in,Professor%20of%20Sociology%20Matt%20Hauer https://news.fsu.edu/news/health-medicine/2022/03/08/fsu-res....

Maursault 5y ago

One can compare lead added to gasoline with carcinogens added to cigarettes. Both were introduced to make the use of the product smoother, and with it came massive health issues, and both industries funded fraudulent studies to create the false impression the product was safe. While carcinogens are still added to cigarettes, and will be forever since while the government's case against Big Tobacco revealed the practice, banning the practice was not included in the settlement for inexplicable reasons, and most of the massive fine was ultimately forgiven by the early naughts. Oddly, health issues are not the reason why leaded gasoline was phased out; it was phased out because leaded gas fowled catalytic converters, which were mandated to reduce emissions.

deleted 5y ago
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pastor_bob 5y ago

It took 26 years to remove a simple additive from automotive gasoline in the US. Talk about slow walking a change. Under a similar bureaucracy, it'll probably take a 100 years plus to phase ICE cars entirely

LordDragonfang 5y ago
Depending on how you measure it, the first concerns over global warming and the "greenhouse effect" were penned what is already over 100 years ago (though regarding coal, not gasoline), and scientists have been aware of the growing magnitude of the issue for around half a century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_climate_change_science#First_calculations_of_greenhouse_effect,_1896 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_climate_change_scie...
asdff 5y ago
Pretty sure 100 years plus is the plan anyhow

ncmncm 5y ago

> Now, we do not have to worry that our IQ will be lowered, at least not by lead from vehicles emissions, anymore. Now by Twitter and Facebook, instead.

cbg0 5y ago
While this is a very facile jab to throw, social media is mostly a channel for the spread of stupid, but not the reason why people are stupid.
- WillPostForFood 5y ago
  https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/05/30/twitter-hurting-intelligence-not-smart-study/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/05/30/twitter-hur...
  - cbg0 5y ago
    So the investigation says they made half of the students use Twitter to analyze a novel by posting quotes and their own reflections & commenting on tweets written by their classmates, while the others relied on traditional classroom teaching methods. The winner is visible from a mile away, but the takeaway for me is that using the wrong tool for the job is stupid, not that Twitter itself makes you dumb.
    - ncmncm 5y ago
      You seem to suggest you think that Twitter is the right tool for some job. Using it had, manifestly, the observed effect, regardless of what other tool might or might not be deployed elsewhere. Using another tool simultaneously enabled quantifying that effect.

polymerist 5y ago

This is kind of crazy since the technology to move away from leaded gasoline or fuels has been around for DECADES. The fact that anyone is still using tetraethyl lead as a fuel additive is horrendous. We can hit right around 100% octanes right now too from a synthetic chemistry perspective.

sokoloff 5y ago
At this point, this is much more of a regulatory hurdle than a chemistry hurdle.

colmmacc 5y ago

Not linked from the article for some reason is a great, and very readable, paper "The U.S. Experience with the Phasedown of Lead in Gasoline" https://web.mit.edu/ckolstad/www/Newell.pdf https://web.mit.edu/ckolstad/www/Newell.pdf . I found it a fascinating and inspiring story of everything that went into the transition, including setting up dedicated public banks to help refineries manage the investments they would need to make.

DoreenMichele 5y ago

Humorously, my recollection is that President Reagan asked someone to do a cost benefit analysis to support his desire to weaken controls on lead gasoline and the guy in charge did the opposite and his cost benefit analysis showed that we would save tons of money by eliminating lead, so that's how lead gasoline got eliminated in the US. My recollection is this was the end of this guy's government career but he won some kind of award (a la Nobel Prize levels of money from somewhere) that let him pay cash for a house while working as a professor -- or something like that. I tried to do a search and came up with this article that fits with that recollection but doesn't exactly verify the details I remember and I have no idea how to track down the guy's name, etc etc. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1984/04/01/cost-benefit-foes-surprised/ca65d1a9-aa94-461f-a882-10853c1f375a/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1984/04/01/c...