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Interesting that nobody every talked about tyre/brake dust until it became clear that cars aren't going away as we phase out fossil fuels, they're just going el

Interesting that nobody every talked about tyre/brake dust until it became clear that cars aren't going away as we phase out fossil fuels, they're just going electric. Is this a serious environmental concern compared to the climate/emissions issue, or just the 'r/fuckcars mentality'? Meanwhile, here in the UK, one of the more interesting alternatives - personal light EVs (ebikes/scooters) are being utterly demonized, and are never likely to be legal on the roads beyond the very limited 250W/15mph pedelec class of e-bikes. Wouldn't be surprised if even that is banned before long, too.

marcosdumay 2y ago
The exhaust used to be really nasty until just a little while ago. Nobody was focusing on the less harmful emissions. Now we mostly fixed it, so it's time to look at the other stuff.
- nayuki 2y ago
  > The exhaust used to be really nasty Specifically: Leaded gasoline (with tetraethyllead), nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur oxides (SOx), carbon monoxide (CO), unburned hydrocarbons. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_oxide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_oxide , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOx https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOx
  - marcosdumay 2y ago
    Don't forget about the solid particles.
- homebrewer 2y ago
  > Now we mostly fixed it Only in developed countries. The age of a typical car in my region is over 15 years. Basically, most of what you bought in 2005-2010, drove for a decade or more, and then sold for scrap eventually ends up in countries like mine. Moreover, most people take catalytic converters off their cars and sell them for $80-100 for platinum recycling. I think most "developing" countries have the same problem. So the world at large hasn't really solved it and won't solve it any time soon.
  - tomcam 2y ago
    None of my business but I’d love to know why your English is so good. Mind saying what region or country you live in?
relaxing 2y ago
It’s the “both sides bad” ploy in the service of continuing fossil fuel usage.
ndsipa_pomu 2y ago
Also in the UK and I certainly subscribe to r/fuckcars as I'm a keen cyclist and never got around to learning to drive. I find it annoying that media outlets (BBC - I'm looking mainly at you!) will refer to EVs as being car-shaped and then, as you said, demonise e-bikes by lumping them in with the illegal e-motorbikes (see the recent Panorama program for a clear case of not making clear the distinction between e-motorbikes and e-bikes). As I see it, the biggest problems with cars are their size and weight. With electric propulsion, the weight is a problem as they have to propel the vehicle and the batteries which obviously means even more weight (though they're typically only slightly more than ICE cars). This also leads to the problem of the vehicles taking longer to recharge and thus requiring upgraded infrastructure to allow people to charge them quickly. However, if we get as many people to use e-bikes or e-scooters, then the size and weight issues pretty much disappear. It's often feasible to have removable batteries, so the vehicle can be "recharged" instantly by swapping the battery (I believe this is very popular in some countries for food delivery riders). This also means that the battery recharging can be performed using a normal power socket without requiring upgraded infrastructure although it may be wise to keep an eye on the batteries whilst charging to prevent house fires. Incidentally, Mrs ndsipa_pomu recently bought a good quality e-bike (i.e. not one of the duck-taped conversions) and absolutely loves commuting on it as she sails past the traffic that she was previously trapped in. Though it's limited to assist only up to 15.5mph, she finds it powerful enough to cope with the hills.
- light_hue_1 2y ago
  I cycled for like 30 years before we had kids and needed a car. The ebikes that the post refers to are a menace and should be banned. Both as a cyclist and a driver. I've almost been plowed over by some idiot sitting on what should be a motorcycle but riding on the bike path. And I've almost had my kids run over. Also, as a driver you just don't expect someone to be going so crazy fast in the bike lane. I've had people at insane speeds just appear from behind parked cars. I'm all for pedal assist! But there should be strict speed limits. I also find that people just don't take these electric motorcycles seriously. They zone out because they aren't doing anything. That's also very dangerous.
  - 2y ago
oliwarner 2y ago
Firstly, this is another positive for EVs. They do have brakes but most have regenerative braking too, which is clean. Secondly, ebikes are rampantly misused in pedestrian areas, often used without helmets, often upclocked, many used for delivering, or kids. And because they're not a regulated vehicle, nobody has third party insurance. There are legal ebikes and nobody has any more of a problem with them than normal bicycles when used in the right places.
- ndsipa_pomu 2y ago
  However, even illegal e-bikes (or unregistered e-motorbikes to be more accurate) are preferable in my view to the problems associated with car traffic. At least when an e-bike rider does something stupid and crashes, they will typically end up hurting themselves which can be an important learning moment. Car drivers don't have the same "skin-in-the-game" to ensure that they're paying attention. It's harm reduction - let's encourage the most irresponsible car drivers to be irresponsible e-bike (legal or not) riders and we should end up with far less congestion, pollution and collisions.
- mschuster91 2y ago
  > And because they're not a regulated vehicle, nobody has third party insurance. At least here in Germany, assuming it's not a tuned bike, it's covered by your regular liability insurance.
  - ghaff 2y ago
    In the US at least, I'm not sure what "regular liability insurance" means. Might be something on a homeowner's policy and something on auto insurance but it's probably not something the average person necessarily has.
dynm 2y ago
I looked into this in detail a while ago [1]. Electric cars produce much less brake pollution than traditional cars due to regenerative braking. They do probably create more tire pollution, simply because batteries are heavy. And, current emission standards for gasoline engines are so strict (and engines so well designed) that the engines themselves probably do create a negligible fraction of the overall particulate pollution. So it's plausible that with current technology, hybrid cars might create the least total particulate pollution. But all electric cars are probably better than all-gasoline cars. That said, I'd think we could probably do lots more to reduce the tire pollution. And, obviously, electric cars have other advantages! [1] https://dynomight.net/tires/ https://dynomight.net/tires/
steelframe 2y ago
> very limited 250W/15mph pedelec class of e-bikes Meanwhile in the Wild West (a.k.a. the United States) we have children hurling 100+ lb 750W throttle-controlled motorcycles (I'm sorry, "e-bikes") at up to 28 mph on mixed-use pedestrian trails. The best we can do is put up plastic signs on the trail begging them to slow down and be careful around other people.
- scottbez1 2y ago
  And yet, despite the wild west regulatory situation you claim, bicycles kill and injure way fewer people than cars, and don't require insurance because it's nearly impossible to cause the level of damage with a bike as even a minor fender bender in a car. And, even considering how "dangerous" bicycles are, studies have repeatedly shown them to increase life expectancy of the rider. Meanwhile cars are among the highest cause of accidental death of children of nearly all ages in the US. Your argument is actually a strong one in favor of bicycle-favoring transportation policy: despite limited existing regulation they're still incredibly safe, and we can always tweak policy to handle the worst case exceptions as needed if they end up causing significant problems as bicycle share grows.
maeil 2y ago
> Is this a serious environmental concern compared to the climate/emissions Yes. > or just the 'r/fuckcars mentality'? No. "Recent studies have found tire particles made up 94% of microplastics in Switzerland, 61 to 79% in Sweden, 54% in China and 30% in Germany". "If everyone just drove EVs we could merrily go on driving cars all day" is the 'r/HeadInTheSand mentality'.
Moto7451 2y ago
It’s also the reward of increased regulations on tailpipe emissions. We now have a new target to clean up. It’s not as if this is new, it just used to be we had lead fuel, poorly burned fuel, tire dust, asbestos in brakes, and many other problematic forms of pollution. We’re just going down the list. Also, what you’re looking at is an overweighted responsibility on people/consumers to own the solutions to pollution. No matter what car you buy today it is emitting less pollution than ten, twenty, and especially thirty to fifty years ago. Meanwhile we still burn bunker oil (the leftovers from petroleum distillation) in shipping. It’s as if we swore off doing anything better for the planet if it inconveniences a large company. https://harvardpolitics.com/climate-change-responsibility/ https://harvardpolitics.com/climate-change-responsibility/
- mschuster91 2y ago
  > No matter what car you buy today it is emitting less pollution than ten, twenty, and especially thirty to fifty years ago. Sure, but a single bus would emit way less than the 60-150 cars (yes, large buses here have a total capacity of about 150 people [1]) it replaces. And if you have a bikable city like about every city in the Netherlands is, there's zero emissions. > Meanwhile we still burn bunker oil (the leftovers from petroleum distillation) in shipping. It’s as if we swore off doing anything better for the planet if it inconveniences a large company. We do, but even there there is progress! In fact, the regulations on sulphur content going into effect showed that this actually had climate impacts on the scale of an ultra-large geoengineering project [2]. On top of that, bunker fuel is banned in many countries' 12-mile-zone or at the very least near ports, ships have to burn diesel there. [1] https://infoportal.mobil.nrw/technik/bussemitkonventionellemantrieb/gelenkbus.html https://infoportal.mobil.nrw/technik/bussemitkonventionellem... [2] https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01442-3 https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01442-3
  - duskwuff 2y ago
    > In fact, the regulations on sulphur content going into effect showed that this actually had climate impacts on the scale of an ultra-large geoengineering project... ... but not in the desired direction. Sulfur dioxide emissions from shipping appear to have actually been slowing (!!) global warming by seeding clouds which reflected sunlight.
blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
> Is this a serious environmental concern compared to the climate/emissions issue, or just the 'r/fuckcars mentality'? It’s a minor issue in terms of impact. I see it over amplified because it is a tool for the anti car crowd. It’s not like we are measuring or discussing all the environmental issues from everything else people do in their lives. It’s a lopsided focus on everything related to cars, and there’s a reason why.
epistasis 2y ago
We are just barely beginning to investigate the harms from PM2.5 particles. It seems like every month we discover some new and harmful effect, or that it was worse than initially estimated from smaller sample sizes, etc. I don't think it's a conspiracy, just the way that discovery happens. We also have a tendency to completely oversight the harm of new tech in comparison to older tech. People get super worked up about the supposedly super toxic lithium ion batteries, but have little concern for the far greater amount of mining necessary to build the frame of a car. So it's good to have a baseline of the amount of harm done with current tech to compare to and center our reactions to these large population scale effects.

marcosdumay 2y ago

The exhaust used to be really nasty until just a little while ago. Nobody was focusing on the less harmful emissions. Now we mostly fixed it, so it's time to look at the other stuff.

nayuki 2y ago
> The exhaust used to be really nasty Specifically: Leaded gasoline (with tetraethyllead), nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur oxides (SOx), carbon monoxide (CO), unburned hydrocarbons. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_oxide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_oxide , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOx https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NOx
- marcosdumay 2y ago
  Don't forget about the solid particles.
homebrewer 2y ago
> Now we mostly fixed it Only in developed countries. The age of a typical car in my region is over 15 years. Basically, most of what you bought in 2005-2010, drove for a decade or more, and then sold for scrap eventually ends up in countries like mine. Moreover, most people take catalytic converters off their cars and sell them for $80-100 for platinum recycling. I think most "developing" countries have the same problem. So the world at large hasn't really solved it and won't solve it any time soon.
- tomcam 2y ago
  None of my business but I’d love to know why your English is so good. Mind saying what region or country you live in?

relaxing 2y ago

It’s the “both sides bad” ploy in the service of continuing fossil fuel usage.

ndsipa_pomu 2y ago

Also in the UK and I certainly subscribe to r/fuckcars as I'm a keen cyclist and never got around to learning to drive. I find it annoying that media outlets (BBC - I'm looking mainly at you!) will refer to EVs as being car-shaped and then, as you said, demonise e-bikes by lumping them in with the illegal e-motorbikes (see the recent Panorama program for a clear case of not making clear the distinction between e-motorbikes and e-bikes). As I see it, the biggest problems with cars are their size and weight. With electric propulsion, the weight is a problem as they have to propel the vehicle and the batteries which obviously means even more weight (though they're typically only slightly more than ICE cars). This also leads to the problem of the vehicles taking longer to recharge and thus requiring upgraded infrastructure to allow people to charge them quickly. However, if we get as many people to use e-bikes or e-scooters, then the size and weight issues pretty much disappear. It's often feasible to have removable batteries, so the vehicle can be "recharged" instantly by swapping the battery (I believe this is very popular in some countries for food delivery riders). This also means that the battery recharging can be performed using a normal power socket without requiring upgraded infrastructure although it may be wise to keep an eye on the batteries whilst charging to prevent house fires. Incidentally, Mrs ndsipa_pomu recently bought a good quality e-bike (i.e. not one of the duck-taped conversions) and absolutely loves commuting on it as she sails past the traffic that she was previously trapped in. Though it's limited to assist only up to 15.5mph, she finds it powerful enough to cope with the hills.

light_hue_1 2y ago
I cycled for like 30 years before we had kids and needed a car. The ebikes that the post refers to are a menace and should be banned. Both as a cyclist and a driver. I've almost been plowed over by some idiot sitting on what should be a motorcycle but riding on the bike path. And I've almost had my kids run over. Also, as a driver you just don't expect someone to be going so crazy fast in the bike lane. I've had people at insane speeds just appear from behind parked cars. I'm all for pedal assist! But there should be strict speed limits. I also find that people just don't take these electric motorcycles seriously. They zone out because they aren't doing anything. That's also very dangerous.
- 2y ago

oliwarner 2y ago

Firstly, this is another positive for EVs. They do have brakes but most have regenerative braking too, which is clean. Secondly, ebikes are rampantly misused in pedestrian areas, often used without helmets, often upclocked, many used for delivering, or kids. And because they're not a regulated vehicle, nobody has third party insurance. There are legal ebikes and nobody has any more of a problem with them than normal bicycles when used in the right places.

ndsipa_pomu 2y ago
However, even illegal e-bikes (or unregistered e-motorbikes to be more accurate) are preferable in my view to the problems associated with car traffic. At least when an e-bike rider does something stupid and crashes, they will typically end up hurting themselves which can be an important learning moment. Car drivers don't have the same "skin-in-the-game" to ensure that they're paying attention. It's harm reduction - let's encourage the most irresponsible car drivers to be irresponsible e-bike (legal or not) riders and we should end up with far less congestion, pollution and collisions.
mschuster91 2y ago
> And because they're not a regulated vehicle, nobody has third party insurance. At least here in Germany, assuming it's not a tuned bike, it's covered by your regular liability insurance.
- ghaff 2y ago
  In the US at least, I'm not sure what "regular liability insurance" means. Might be something on a homeowner's policy and something on auto insurance but it's probably not something the average person necessarily has.

dynm 2y ago

I looked into this in detail a while ago [1]. Electric cars produce much less brake pollution than traditional cars due to regenerative braking. They do probably create more tire pollution, simply because batteries are heavy. And, current emission standards for gasoline engines are so strict (and engines so well designed) that the engines themselves probably do create a negligible fraction of the overall particulate pollution. So it's plausible that with current technology, hybrid cars might create the least total particulate pollution. But all electric cars are probably better than all-gasoline cars. That said, I'd think we could probably do lots more to reduce the tire pollution. And, obviously, electric cars have other advantages! [1] https://dynomight.net/tires/ https://dynomight.net/tires/

steelframe 2y ago

> very limited 250W/15mph pedelec class of e-bikes Meanwhile in the Wild West (a.k.a. the United States) we have children hurling 100+ lb 750W throttle-controlled motorcycles (I'm sorry, "e-bikes") at up to 28 mph on mixed-use pedestrian trails. The best we can do is put up plastic signs on the trail begging them to slow down and be careful around other people.

scottbez1 2y ago
And yet, despite the wild west regulatory situation you claim, bicycles kill and injure way fewer people than cars, and don't require insurance because it's nearly impossible to cause the level of damage with a bike as even a minor fender bender in a car. And, even considering how "dangerous" bicycles are, studies have repeatedly shown them to increase life expectancy of the rider. Meanwhile cars are among the highest cause of accidental death of children of nearly all ages in the US. Your argument is actually a strong one in favor of bicycle-favoring transportation policy: despite limited existing regulation they're still incredibly safe, and we can always tweak policy to handle the worst case exceptions as needed if they end up causing significant problems as bicycle share grows.

maeil 2y ago

> Is this a serious environmental concern compared to the climate/emissions Yes. > or just the 'r/fuckcars mentality'? No. "Recent studies have found tire particles made up 94% of microplastics in Switzerland, 61 to 79% in Sweden, 54% in China and 30% in Germany". "If everyone just drove EVs we could merrily go on driving cars all day" is the 'r/HeadInTheSand mentality'.

Moto7451 2y ago

It’s also the reward of increased regulations on tailpipe emissions. We now have a new target to clean up. It’s not as if this is new, it just used to be we had lead fuel, poorly burned fuel, tire dust, asbestos in brakes, and many other problematic forms of pollution. We’re just going down the list. Also, what you’re looking at is an overweighted responsibility on people/consumers to own the solutions to pollution. No matter what car you buy today it is emitting less pollution than ten, twenty, and especially thirty to fifty years ago. Meanwhile we still burn bunker oil (the leftovers from petroleum distillation) in shipping. It’s as if we swore off doing anything better for the planet if it inconveniences a large company. https://harvardpolitics.com/climate-change-responsibility/ https://harvardpolitics.com/climate-change-responsibility/

mschuster91 2y ago
> No matter what car you buy today it is emitting less pollution than ten, twenty, and especially thirty to fifty years ago. Sure, but a single bus would emit way less than the 60-150 cars (yes, large buses here have a total capacity of about 150 people [1]) it replaces. And if you have a bikable city like about every city in the Netherlands is, there's zero emissions. > Meanwhile we still burn bunker oil (the leftovers from petroleum distillation) in shipping. It’s as if we swore off doing anything better for the planet if it inconveniences a large company. We do, but even there there is progress! In fact, the regulations on sulphur content going into effect showed that this actually had climate impacts on the scale of an ultra-large geoengineering project [2]. On top of that, bunker fuel is banned in many countries' 12-mile-zone or at the very least near ports, ships have to burn diesel there. [1] https://infoportal.mobil.nrw/technik/bussemitkonventionellemantrieb/gelenkbus.html https://infoportal.mobil.nrw/technik/bussemitkonventionellem... [2] https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01442-3 https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01442-3
- duskwuff 2y ago
  > In fact, the regulations on sulphur content going into effect showed that this actually had climate impacts on the scale of an ultra-large geoengineering project... ... but not in the desired direction. Sulfur dioxide emissions from shipping appear to have actually been slowing (!!) global warming by seeding clouds which reflected sunlight.

blackeyeblitzar 2y ago

> Is this a serious environmental concern compared to the climate/emissions issue, or just the 'r/fuckcars mentality'? It’s a minor issue in terms of impact. I see it over amplified because it is a tool for the anti car crowd. It’s not like we are measuring or discussing all the environmental issues from everything else people do in their lives. It’s a lopsided focus on everything related to cars, and there’s a reason why.

epistasis 2y ago

We are just barely beginning to investigate the harms from PM2.5 particles. It seems like every month we discover some new and harmful effect, or that it was worse than initially estimated from smaller sample sizes, etc. I don't think it's a conspiracy, just the way that discovery happens. We also have a tendency to completely oversight the harm of new tech in comparison to older tech. People get super worked up about the supposedly super toxic lithium ion batteries, but have little concern for the far greater amount of mining necessary to build the frame of a car. So it's good to have a baseline of the amount of harm done with current tech to compare to and center our reactions to these large population scale effects.