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You cant make a car not pollute. Even EV pollutes the local neighborhood. Ever notice how tires and the stains on the curbs and the black soot you wipe off the

You cant make a car not pollute. Even EV pollutes the local neighborhood. Ever notice how tires and the stains on the curbs and the black soot you wipe off the window sills are all the same color? How tires get bald? You are probably breathing tire right now. It is probably getting on your plate of food and you are eating tire.

AnthonyMouse 2y ago
I feel like this is just making the point. Originally cars ran on leaded gasoline, which was very bad. But we didn't ban cars, we got unleaded gasoline. Then they were emitting too much in terms of sulfur and nitrogen oxides, so we got low-sulfur fuels and catalytic converters. Then it was brake dust from friction brakes, but now hybrids have regenerative braking. Then it was CO2, so we got electric cars that can be charged purely from the sun -- they can emit less CO2 than most mass transit systems despite the lower passenger density because transit systems regularly use diesel buses or locomotives or run after dusk on electricity generated from coal and natural gas because they don't have internal batteries that can charge exclusively from the sun. Somebody is going to invent some tires that last for 800,000 miles because they're made of something with such high internal cohesion they never get bald, or erode into something already commonly found in nature, and then people would find something else to complain about. And then someone would solve that too.
- kjkjadksj 2y ago
  You are right, we will get bailed out by some yet uninvented technological solution and never face consequences for our own hubris. The climatologists are handwringing as you suggest because the solution is surely around the corner in the mind of some broccoli headed teen developed on a tick tock attention span. The ship will sail quite smoothly into the future. We have never been wrong before.
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    Your complaint was about tires, which is a much smaller problem than the ones that have known solutions, and one that has plausible solutions because it's a normal materials science problem. "Climatologists" are talking about CO2, which is the thing we already have everything we need in order to solve. You use electric ground vehicles, charge them with solar panels or nuclear reactors. Use synthetic or biofuels for aircraft. Switch to electric heat pumps to heat buildings. This isn't a matter of "we don't know how to do it" or "the only option is to reduce energy consumption", it's only a question of whether people are willing to adopt these things fast enough, because adopting them faster sometimes costs more in the short-term. So that's still a thing we actually have to do, but it isn't really a question of what to do, only a question of how to get people to do the known thing.

AnthonyMouse 2y ago

I feel like this is just making the point. Originally cars ran on leaded gasoline, which was very bad. But we didn't ban cars, we got unleaded gasoline. Then they were emitting too much in terms of sulfur and nitrogen oxides, so we got low-sulfur fuels and catalytic converters. Then it was brake dust from friction brakes, but now hybrids have regenerative braking. Then it was CO2, so we got electric cars that can be charged purely from the sun -- they can emit less CO2 than most mass transit systems despite the lower passenger density because transit systems regularly use diesel buses or locomotives or run after dusk on electricity generated from coal and natural gas because they don't have internal batteries that can charge exclusively from the sun. Somebody is going to invent some tires that last for 800,000 miles because they're made of something with such high internal cohesion they never get bald, or erode into something already commonly found in nature, and then people would find something else to complain about. And then someone would solve that too.

kjkjadksj 2y ago
You are right, we will get bailed out by some yet uninvented technological solution and never face consequences for our own hubris. The climatologists are handwringing as you suggest because the solution is surely around the corner in the mind of some broccoli headed teen developed on a tick tock attention span. The ship will sail quite smoothly into the future. We have never been wrong before.
- AnthonyMouse 2y ago
  Your complaint was about tires, which is a much smaller problem than the ones that have known solutions, and one that has plausible solutions because it's a normal materials science problem. "Climatologists" are talking about CO2, which is the thing we already have everything we need in order to solve. You use electric ground vehicles, charge them with solar panels or nuclear reactors. Use synthetic or biofuels for aircraft. Switch to electric heat pumps to heat buildings. This isn't a matter of "we don't know how to do it" or "the only option is to reduce energy consumption", it's only a question of whether people are willing to adopt these things fast enough, because adopting them faster sometimes costs more in the short-term. So that's still a thing we actually have to do, but it isn't really a question of what to do, only a question of how to get people to do the known thing.