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“Meet Sustainability Goals: Waymo’s fully electric fleet helps organizations advance their sustainability targets” Taking a private taxi to commute to work or

“Meet Sustainability Goals: Waymo’s fully electric fleet helps organizations advance their sustainability targets” Taking a private taxi to commute to work or school is easily the worst thing you can do environmentally in a city. Doesn’t really matter that you’re not burning dinosaur juice.

asdff 1y ago
Especially when I'm guessing a lot of these "urban tech worker" commutes are mostly on surface streets or congested highways barely moving any faster. In my experience cycling to work I am actually faster on the bike than when I take the car. This is mostly due to filtering to the front of the intersection effectively eliminating any and all effects of rush hour traffic. Another huge factor is I can also park the bike directly in front of the door to the building, no having to walk from a designated parking or drop off zone.
- cortesoft 1y ago
  I would be 90% sweat if I biked to work. Would need a shower and change
  - vineyardmike 1y ago
    While I agree that it’s kinda unpleasant to get all sweaty before work, many larger corporations have offices (usually with gyms) have locker rooms and showers to support bikers. While I’m able to take transit, many of my coworkers do bike+shower at the office for commuting.
    - mosura 1y ago
      Is all that showering better or worse for the environment than using more appropriate transport in the first place?
      - asdff 1y ago
        The bike is in fact the more appropriate transport for moving a 200lb person than a 5000lb vehicle. Literally 95% of the energy being consumed is just to move the damned vehicle around, not to do anything productive with it.
        mosura 1y ago
        Your relative masses are obviously exaggerated. Showering uses hot water and you also must change clothes, which also require cleaning. If you are doing this twice per day in addition to someone using some other means of transportation there is a non trivial energy cost involved. If the car propulsion is non fossil fuel based then the car wins because you are using much less water.
        tialaramex 1y ago
        Showering does use hot water, but, it's maybe 20-30 litres, and you're heating up by what 25-30 K ? That's just not very much energy, and since we want heat we can go via a heat pump to do less work, whereas that's not an option for the car. I did some envelope guesses and I can't see how this can come out for the car.
        asdff 1y ago
        I shower once a day regardless. I combine my bike commute on the way in with train or bus depending on the route I feel like. No sweat that way. The ride back I will do on a bike and take a shower after. Gets the cardio requirement done at the same time as the commute so it's a two birds one stone thing.
      - etrautmann 1y ago
        Is showering worse than congestion and vehicle emissions? …no. This is not a good faith argument
  - asdff 1y ago
    What I do is bike to and from the train station on the way in, saves me a 15 min walk on either end and no sweat at all biking at easy pace for a few mins especially when its so cool in the morning. On the way back I will bike the whole way for the fitness benefit and shower when I get home as usual after work. Once you are in shape though, which happens surprisingly quickly with regular riding, you won't really sweat from ~30 mins easy pace rides. If you don't have a train or bus along the way, ebikes can also save you sweat. You don't even need to pedal at all.
jeffbee 1y ago
That doesn't seem right. Taking your own car, which you park at both ends of the trip, is clearly worse from a vehicle utilization and land use standpoint. A Waymo that takes a dozen trips a day and never parks on the street seems obviously superior.
- delfinom 1y ago
  I think the point is it's green washing. True sustainability is public transit, or biking or walking. This is just a line item got a company to blast as sustainability in marketing. This will let Waymo absorb some money from green washing slush funds.
  - fidotron 1y ago
    > True sustainability is public transit, or biking or walking. Surely it's whatever is most sustainable, which Waymo (or equivalent) very well could be.
    - pastage 1y ago
      What? How could it possibly be more sustainable, the self driving parts are more energy hungry than a normal ebike.
      - fidotron 1y ago
        But the energy can be renewable, so it isn't a problem.
  - jeffbee 1y ago
    It's better than the status quo, your standard for Scotsmen notwithstanding.
  - xnx 1y ago
    > True sustainability is public transit, or biking or walking Free your mind. Cost per passenger mile is atrocious for most US transit systems. All that cost equals carbon: concrete, steel, fuel, salaries, etc.
kylebenzle 1y ago
[dead]
IshKebab 1y ago
Driving your own petrol car is surely worse? What are you talking about...
xnx 1y ago
> the worst thing you can do environmentally in a city Worse than owning a large single family home that lowers density and pushes everyone further from their destinations?

asdff 1y ago

Especially when I'm guessing a lot of these "urban tech worker" commutes are mostly on surface streets or congested highways barely moving any faster. In my experience cycling to work I am actually faster on the bike than when I take the car. This is mostly due to filtering to the front of the intersection effectively eliminating any and all effects of rush hour traffic. Another huge factor is I can also park the bike directly in front of the door to the building, no having to walk from a designated parking or drop off zone.

cortesoft 1y ago
I would be 90% sweat if I biked to work. Would need a shower and change
- vineyardmike 1y ago
  While I agree that it’s kinda unpleasant to get all sweaty before work, many larger corporations have offices (usually with gyms) have locker rooms and showers to support bikers. While I’m able to take transit, many of my coworkers do bike+shower at the office for commuting.
  - mosura 1y ago
    Is all that showering better or worse for the environment than using more appropriate transport in the first place?
    - asdff 1y ago
      The bike is in fact the more appropriate transport for moving a 200lb person than a 5000lb vehicle. Literally 95% of the energy being consumed is just to move the damned vehicle around, not to do anything productive with it.
      - mosura 1y ago
        Your relative masses are obviously exaggerated. Showering uses hot water and you also must change clothes, which also require cleaning. If you are doing this twice per day in addition to someone using some other means of transportation there is a non trivial energy cost involved. If the car propulsion is non fossil fuel based then the car wins because you are using much less water.
        tialaramex 1y ago
        Showering does use hot water, but, it's maybe 20-30 litres, and you're heating up by what 25-30 K ? That's just not very much energy, and since we want heat we can go via a heat pump to do less work, whereas that's not an option for the car. I did some envelope guesses and I can't see how this can come out for the car.
        asdff 1y ago
        I shower once a day regardless. I combine my bike commute on the way in with train or bus depending on the route I feel like. No sweat that way. The ride back I will do on a bike and take a shower after. Gets the cardio requirement done at the same time as the commute so it's a two birds one stone thing.
    - etrautmann 1y ago
      Is showering worse than congestion and vehicle emissions? …no. This is not a good faith argument
- asdff 1y ago
  What I do is bike to and from the train station on the way in, saves me a 15 min walk on either end and no sweat at all biking at easy pace for a few mins especially when its so cool in the morning. On the way back I will bike the whole way for the fitness benefit and shower when I get home as usual after work. Once you are in shape though, which happens surprisingly quickly with regular riding, you won't really sweat from ~30 mins easy pace rides. If you don't have a train or bus along the way, ebikes can also save you sweat. You don't even need to pedal at all.

jeffbee 1y ago

That doesn't seem right. Taking your own car, which you park at both ends of the trip, is clearly worse from a vehicle utilization and land use standpoint. A Waymo that takes a dozen trips a day and never parks on the street seems obviously superior.

delfinom 1y ago
I think the point is it's green washing. True sustainability is public transit, or biking or walking. This is just a line item got a company to blast as sustainability in marketing. This will let Waymo absorb some money from green washing slush funds.
- fidotron 1y ago
  > True sustainability is public transit, or biking or walking. Surely it's whatever is most sustainable, which Waymo (or equivalent) very well could be.
  - pastage 1y ago
    What? How could it possibly be more sustainable, the self driving parts are more energy hungry than a normal ebike.
    - fidotron 1y ago
      But the energy can be renewable, so it isn't a problem.
- jeffbee 1y ago
  It's better than the status quo, your standard for Scotsmen notwithstanding.
- xnx 1y ago
  > True sustainability is public transit, or biking or walking Free your mind. Cost per passenger mile is atrocious for most US transit systems. All that cost equals carbon: concrete, steel, fuel, salaries, etc.

kylebenzle 1y ago

[dead]

IshKebab 1y ago

Driving your own petrol car is surely worse? What are you talking about...

xnx 1y ago

> the worst thing you can do environmentally in a city Worse than owning a large single family home that lowers density and pushes everyone further from their destinations?