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What do you think of the argument that EVs actually do make this better, albeit not entirely, due to the efficiency difference between[0] (coal-fired) power pla

What do you think of the argument that EVs actually do make this better, albeit not entirely, due to the efficiency difference between[0] (coal-fired) power plants and internal combustion engines in gasoline powered vehicles? [0] https://blog.ucsusa.org/jimmy-odea/electric-vs-diesel-vs-natural-gas-which-bus-is-best-for-the-climate/?_ga=2.226102682.1843563386.1532023761-1843342382.1531829971 https://blog.ucsusa.org/jimmy-odea/electric-vs-diesel-vs-nat...

picture 3y ago
There are many more ways that cars cause problems to our habitat much beyond carbon emission, they include: requiring roads which pave over local ecosystems and create heat islands and exasperates drainage, requiring large open parking lots which make a city less traversable in any form of transportation beside cars (but parking structures are better I suppose), creating noise pollution (a bit part of it is tire noise, EVs aren't silent at medium to high speeds), causing eutrophication and health issues when ablated tire particles get collected into runoff, also that cars are much deadlier per capita than most other forms of transportation like walking, biking, subway, airplane, (but safer than motorcycles if I remember correctly)
usrbinbash 3y ago
> What do you think of the argument... I think that a single train can hold over 1000 people, and requires much less energy, not to mention space, materials, infrastructure and maintenance, than hundreds of individual cars in which these 1000 people sit in 1s or maybe 2s. Again, it doesn't matter how they are powered; cars suck as an idea; simply because of how horribly they scale. They require tons of resources to build, they require tons of resources to maintain. They eat up tons of space. They kill hundreds of thousands of people per year. They are energy inefficienct compared to trains. Oh, and railway-based public transport systems would be trivially easy to automate, compared to cars. If we invested even a sizeable fraction of the resources into public transport that we waste on building ever more lanes and ever bigger parking lot hells right through our cities (aka. our livingspace), barely anyone outside of actual rural areas, would even need a car. And this isn't a pipe dream. This is how actual people in actual cities live, today. Many european and asian cities are completely accessible by public transport.
- kortilla 3y ago
  It sounds like you’re more interested in trains than solutions to global warming. > This is how actual people in actual cities live, today. Many european and asian cities are completely accessible by public transport. And many people hate it too. Look at the popularity of cabs/ubers/limos in those cities. Scaling up packing as many people as possible into cities is not a desirable goal to significant chunks of people.
  - usrbinbash 3y ago
    > It sounds like you’re more interested in trains than solutions to global warming. No, it really doesn't sound like that. Trains, and other public transport vehicles, in comparison to the damage that individual traffic does, ARE a contributing solution to global warming. > Scaling up packing as many people as possible into cities is not a desirable goal to significant chunks of people. Oh really? Then how did cities come to be in the first place? But you know what really makes cities a hell to live in? Covering them with multi-lane roads and giant parking lots for those flotillas of pointless metal boxes with rubber wheels.
    - kortilla 3y ago
      > Oh really? Then how did cities come to be in the first place? Because it was and is the only way to escape poverty for many people. I grew up in a small city and the majority of my classmates had to go to larger city to get a good job. This effect was very extreme during the early 1900s especially when the Great Depression hit. Either starve on the farm or move to filthy city. Cities being desirable for anyone but the rich is a very recent phenomenon.
- low_tech_love 3y ago
  Honest question: doesn’t the factor of individual freedom to move anywhere you want any time you want have any weight in this matter for you? You’ve got good points and I live in a rich European country for 7 years without a car, but there are other aspects of this kind of forced communal life that depress me quite a lot. In fact the problem here for me is exactly that you don’t need a car because even if you have, there is nothing interesting to do with it.

picture 3y ago

There are many more ways that cars cause problems to our habitat much beyond carbon emission, they include: requiring roads which pave over local ecosystems and create heat islands and exasperates drainage, requiring large open parking lots which make a city less traversable in any form of transportation beside cars (but parking structures are better I suppose), creating noise pollution (a bit part of it is tire noise, EVs aren't silent at medium to high speeds), causing eutrophication and health issues when ablated tire particles get collected into runoff, also that cars are much deadlier per capita than most other forms of transportation like walking, biking, subway, airplane, (but safer than motorcycles if I remember correctly)

usrbinbash 3y ago

> What do you think of the argument... I think that a single train can hold over 1000 people, and requires much less energy, not to mention space, materials, infrastructure and maintenance, than hundreds of individual cars in which these 1000 people sit in 1s or maybe 2s. Again, it doesn't matter how they are powered; cars suck as an idea; simply because of how horribly they scale. They require tons of resources to build, they require tons of resources to maintain. They eat up tons of space. They kill hundreds of thousands of people per year. They are energy inefficienct compared to trains. Oh, and railway-based public transport systems would be trivially easy to automate, compared to cars. If we invested even a sizeable fraction of the resources into public transport that we waste on building ever more lanes and ever bigger parking lot hells right through our cities (aka. our livingspace), barely anyone outside of actual rural areas, would even need a car. And this isn't a pipe dream. This is how actual people in actual cities live, today. Many european and asian cities are completely accessible by public transport.

kortilla 3y ago
It sounds like you’re more interested in trains than solutions to global warming. > This is how actual people in actual cities live, today. Many european and asian cities are completely accessible by public transport. And many people hate it too. Look at the popularity of cabs/ubers/limos in those cities. Scaling up packing as many people as possible into cities is not a desirable goal to significant chunks of people.
- usrbinbash 3y ago
  > It sounds like you’re more interested in trains than solutions to global warming. No, it really doesn't sound like that. Trains, and other public transport vehicles, in comparison to the damage that individual traffic does, ARE a contributing solution to global warming. > Scaling up packing as many people as possible into cities is not a desirable goal to significant chunks of people. Oh really? Then how did cities come to be in the first place? But you know what really makes cities a hell to live in? Covering them with multi-lane roads and giant parking lots for those flotillas of pointless metal boxes with rubber wheels.
  - kortilla 3y ago
    > Oh really? Then how did cities come to be in the first place? Because it was and is the only way to escape poverty for many people. I grew up in a small city and the majority of my classmates had to go to larger city to get a good job. This effect was very extreme during the early 1900s especially when the Great Depression hit. Either starve on the farm or move to filthy city. Cities being desirable for anyone but the rich is a very recent phenomenon.
low_tech_love 3y ago
Honest question: doesn’t the factor of individual freedom to move anywhere you want any time you want have any weight in this matter for you? You’ve got good points and I live in a rich European country for 7 years without a car, but there are other aspects of this kind of forced communal life that depress me quite a lot. In fact the problem here for me is exactly that you don’t need a car because even if you have, there is nothing interesting to do with it.