3 ms·

It's really easy to sit and demand evidence before regulating something. But consider that if we waited for hard evidence to accumulate before banning lead in g

by throwway120385 9mo ago

It's really easy to sit and demand evidence before regulating something. But consider that if we waited for hard evidence to accumulate before banning lead in gasoline, we likely never would have banned it because the hard evidence wouldn't exist. I also don't agree on the principle that regulations are "harmful" or "helpful." Rather, you have to define who the regulation harms, and who it helps. For example antitrust enforcement harms shareholders and some employees of very large firms, but it helps many employees and arguably improves the landscape for competition between many smaller firms. So whether a regulation is preferable comes down to values. In the case of leaded gas, it harms basically everybody, but it helps fuel companies, so it was an easy thing to change.

rayiner 9mo ago
We had research to support the EPA phase down of lead. Also, your assertion that lead “helps fuel companies” is fundamentally mistaken. Gasoline is a mass-produced commodity. Oil companies have single digit profit margins. These companies aren’t making Big Tech profit margins where they can absorb higher costs without passing them along to consumers. Cost savings from things like gasoline additives accrue to consumers at the gas pump.
- jhallenworld 9mo ago
  Lead helped fuel company profits because it was cheaper than the other anti-knock additives, like ethanol.
  - rayiner 9mo ago
    In an industry where everyone sells a completely fungible product such cost savings generally are passed on to consumers. Oil companies can profit in the short term due to fluctuations in the price of oil and things like that, but not from something like lead additives, which everyone had been using for decades.
    - zug_zug 9mo ago
      I think you're missing the point -- the point is that gasoline companies KNEW ABOUT alternative lead-free substitutes for anti-knock (such as ethanol) and chose lead because they perceived it was less profitable. [1] Specifically because ethanol wasn't patentable and TEL was, and ultimately it WAS patented. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/leaded-gas-poison-invented-180961368/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/leaded-gas-poison-...
      - cucumber3732842 9mo ago
        Ethanol has a propensity to suck up ambient moisture and is more demanding of rubbers and happily attacks aluminum. In an age of natural rubber components, poorly sealed fuel systems with steel tanks and aluminum carburetors pretty much anything other than ethanol is the "right choice". And once they ruled out ethanol they settled on lead because it was cheap/profitable. Obviously they chose wrong, they should've picked something more expensive but less terrible. These weren't cartoon villains with monocles twirling their mustaches. They were normal humans making pragmatic decisions based on the constraints they faced. Without knowing the details people cannot understand what future similar fact patterns may look like. That said, it should be no surprise to anyone that nobody wants to talk about "well we don't know how bad the harm of leaded exhaust is, we know it's not good, but it's diffuse and undefined so we'll round it to zero/negligible" type decision making, for that sort of unknown rounds to zero logic underpins in whole or part all manner of modern policy discourse.
        _DeadFred_ 9mo ago
        The kinda are/were https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Midgley_Jr https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Midgley_Jr.
        fuzzfactor 9mo ago
        >Ethanol has a propensity to suck up ambient moisture and is more demanding of rubbers and happily attacks aluminum. Actually, moisture problems are from using things like homemade alcohol or alcohol from unknown sources, where the likelihood of it already containing a sizable percentage of water has been a problem since the Model T days. And if that water has a bit of an aggressive pH, it can have an effect on aluminum components. This is just not a problem with gasoline-alcohol blends from reputable suppliers unless there is serious failure in the supply chain after that, where any fuel would have been contaminated by water regardless. The fuel-grade alcohol is tested before it is added, then the finished gasoline fully analyzed afterward. Neither moisture nor corrosion is a problem with fuel ethanol or methanol, and when you see convincing information to the contrary (like from a pro mechanic) it often originates from misguided sources, "old wives' tales" for which actual evidence existed without being well-understood. But sometimes the most professional are the ones who don't take any chances, whether "common knowledge" is factual or not, if it doesn't hurt, no big deal. Miscellaneous polymer compounds were the real question for cars that were not originally made for modern alcohol mixtures. Ethanol just doesn't absorb moisture into your fuel tank by itself, even from a very humid environment. Not any more than plain hydrocarbon fuel. In old ventilated fuel tanks, extreme temperature cycling under very humid conditions draws moist air into the tank when the fuel shrinks or is consumed. Kilos of cold fuel and cold metal can continue to condense moisture from the air, when the dew point is greater than the temperature of the tank. After a while you can get grams or ounces of water rolling around in the bottom of the tank. This could build up and stall out the vehicle or keep it from starting. If it was only an ounce or two of water at the bottom of the tank full of all hydrocarbons, it would actually help to add a gallon of plain (good) alcohol to help dissolve the separated water into the gasoline so it can pass through harmlessly like it always has since gasoline has always had trace amounts of water anyway. Condensation is about as clean as rainwater so it's nothing the engine hasn't seen. When most mechanics see something like this it has already gotten way out of hand, and there have been waves of anti-alcohol propaganda disseminated through time which reinforce the superstitious component. Another problem from the '80's was when you do first start using alcohol-containing gasoline in an older car, it can break up varnish that has built up in the tank for years which never would come off until some alcohol came along. This could be a few grams, end up clogging the fuel filter, and the car stalls out no different than from water in the fuel line. Direct cause-and-effect relationship undeniably due to the use of alcohol, with many independent observations. Not a water problem, but who's keeping score. Just not any more of a problem in the 21st century, similar conditions are so rarely encountered now.
  - jabl 9mo ago
    That's true, and without any legislation or such prohibiting lead they would most likely have continued to use it as anyone who would have phased out lead would have been at a competitive disadvantage. But once it was banned, everybody was again on an even playing field, and as OP explained fuel is a commodity so the higher cost just flowed through to the end user prices, refinery margins stayed about where they were.
  - wolvoleo 8mo ago
    It was more that it was patentable unlike ethanol :(
- empyrrhicist 9mo ago
  Until the price of gas starts to remotely reflect the medium to long term costs of climate change I basically always celebrate anything that increases gas or carbon-based energy prices. Like, it sucks... but there's lots of data that consumers respond to these prices in their choices. The way I think about it, the entirety of global civilization is massively, massively subsidizing carbon emission.
  - DiggyJohnson 9mo ago
    Do you know of any research or calculations of what that number ought to be?
    - Cerium 9mo ago
      If you wanted to pay for direct air capture of CO2 to directly "undo" your climate effect of driving, the cost would currently be about $6 per gallon. Price comes from [1], found [2] looking for a second opinion on current direct air capture cost. [1] https://theclimatecapitalist.com/articles/gas-should-cost-13-59-a-gallon https://theclimatecapitalist.com/articles/gas-should-cost-13... [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/phildeluna/2024/11/29/will-direct-air-capture-ever-cost-less-than-100-per-ton-of-co/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/phildeluna/2024/11/29/will-dire...
      - adrianN 9mo ago
        I wonder whether those methods scale at those prices to the theoretical demand of undoing burning gasoline. I doubt it.
      - wolvoleo 8mo ago
        Direct air capture is just not feasible at a world scale. And the whole circus around it, manufacturing (and extracting the natural resources for that) of all the machinery for it, clearing land to place it (and all the NIMBY circus), all the energy generation for it, the transmission lines, the maintenance, the burying of the captured carbon. It's all going to lead to lots of pollution and CO2 emissions even if the things are powered by 100% green energy. It's just a pipe dream of the people looking for a quick fix so we can continue doing what we've been doing. But we'll just need so hellish many of them to make a dent in global CO2 levels in time to prevent the worst effects of climate change. It's just impossible. The only way to really fix things is not emitting the stuff in the first place but most people prefer putting their fingers in their ears.
- throwway120385 9mo ago
  tetra-ethyl lead helped significantly increase octane, allowing a lower-cost fuel to be used in gasoline engines.
Hikikomori 9mo ago
>It's really easy to sit and demand evidence before regulating something. But consider that if we waited for hard evidence to accumulate before banning lead in gasoline, we likely never would have banned it because the hard evidence wouldn't exist. We already knew lead was toxic before we started putting it in gasoline. Even the guy that invented it got sick from exposure and people died from exposure in their plants in the first years of operation. The problem is that we somehow require evidence that something is unsafe but don't require any evidence that its safe in the first place.
colechristensen 9mo ago
So we should legislate evidence free based on the vibes of whichever tribe is currently in power? We're doomed.
- permo-w 8mo ago
  You think that that's not been the case for the entirety of human history?

rayiner 9mo ago

We had research to support the EPA phase down of lead. Also, your assertion that lead “helps fuel companies” is fundamentally mistaken. Gasoline is a mass-produced commodity. Oil companies have single digit profit margins. These companies aren’t making Big Tech profit margins where they can absorb higher costs without passing them along to consumers. Cost savings from things like gasoline additives accrue to consumers at the gas pump.

jhallenworld 9mo ago
Lead helped fuel company profits because it was cheaper than the other anti-knock additives, like ethanol.
- rayiner 9mo ago
  In an industry where everyone sells a completely fungible product such cost savings generally are passed on to consumers. Oil companies can profit in the short term due to fluctuations in the price of oil and things like that, but not from something like lead additives, which everyone had been using for decades.
  - zug_zug 9mo ago
    I think you're missing the point -- the point is that gasoline companies KNEW ABOUT alternative lead-free substitutes for anti-knock (such as ethanol) and chose lead because they perceived it was less profitable. [1] Specifically because ethanol wasn't patentable and TEL was, and ultimately it WAS patented. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/leaded-gas-poison-invented-180961368/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/leaded-gas-poison-...
    - cucumber3732842 9mo ago
      Ethanol has a propensity to suck up ambient moisture and is more demanding of rubbers and happily attacks aluminum. In an age of natural rubber components, poorly sealed fuel systems with steel tanks and aluminum carburetors pretty much anything other than ethanol is the "right choice". And once they ruled out ethanol they settled on lead because it was cheap/profitable. Obviously they chose wrong, they should've picked something more expensive but less terrible. These weren't cartoon villains with monocles twirling their mustaches. They were normal humans making pragmatic decisions based on the constraints they faced. Without knowing the details people cannot understand what future similar fact patterns may look like. That said, it should be no surprise to anyone that nobody wants to talk about "well we don't know how bad the harm of leaded exhaust is, we know it's not good, but it's diffuse and undefined so we'll round it to zero/negligible" type decision making, for that sort of unknown rounds to zero logic underpins in whole or part all manner of modern policy discourse.
      - _DeadFred_ 9mo ago
        The kinda are/were https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Midgley_Jr https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Midgley_Jr.
      - fuzzfactor 9mo ago
        >Ethanol has a propensity to suck up ambient moisture and is more demanding of rubbers and happily attacks aluminum. Actually, moisture problems are from using things like homemade alcohol or alcohol from unknown sources, where the likelihood of it already containing a sizable percentage of water has been a problem since the Model T days. And if that water has a bit of an aggressive pH, it can have an effect on aluminum components. This is just not a problem with gasoline-alcohol blends from reputable suppliers unless there is serious failure in the supply chain after that, where any fuel would have been contaminated by water regardless. The fuel-grade alcohol is tested before it is added, then the finished gasoline fully analyzed afterward. Neither moisture nor corrosion is a problem with fuel ethanol or methanol, and when you see convincing information to the contrary (like from a pro mechanic) it often originates from misguided sources, "old wives' tales" for which actual evidence existed without being well-understood. But sometimes the most professional are the ones who don't take any chances, whether "common knowledge" is factual or not, if it doesn't hurt, no big deal. Miscellaneous polymer compounds were the real question for cars that were not originally made for modern alcohol mixtures. Ethanol just doesn't absorb moisture into your fuel tank by itself, even from a very humid environment. Not any more than plain hydrocarbon fuel. In old ventilated fuel tanks, extreme temperature cycling under very humid conditions draws moist air into the tank when the fuel shrinks or is consumed. Kilos of cold fuel and cold metal can continue to condense moisture from the air, when the dew point is greater than the temperature of the tank. After a while you can get grams or ounces of water rolling around in the bottom of the tank. This could build up and stall out the vehicle or keep it from starting. If it was only an ounce or two of water at the bottom of the tank full of all hydrocarbons, it would actually help to add a gallon of plain (good) alcohol to help dissolve the separated water into the gasoline so it can pass through harmlessly like it always has since gasoline has always had trace amounts of water anyway. Condensation is about as clean as rainwater so it's nothing the engine hasn't seen. When most mechanics see something like this it has already gotten way out of hand, and there have been waves of anti-alcohol propaganda disseminated through time which reinforce the superstitious component. Another problem from the '80's was when you do first start using alcohol-containing gasoline in an older car, it can break up varnish that has built up in the tank for years which never would come off until some alcohol came along. This could be a few grams, end up clogging the fuel filter, and the car stalls out no different than from water in the fuel line. Direct cause-and-effect relationship undeniably due to the use of alcohol, with many independent observations. Not a water problem, but who's keeping score. Just not any more of a problem in the 21st century, similar conditions are so rarely encountered now.
- jabl 9mo ago
  That's true, and without any legislation or such prohibiting lead they would most likely have continued to use it as anyone who would have phased out lead would have been at a competitive disadvantage. But once it was banned, everybody was again on an even playing field, and as OP explained fuel is a commodity so the higher cost just flowed through to the end user prices, refinery margins stayed about where they were.
- wolvoleo 8mo ago
  It was more that it was patentable unlike ethanol :(
empyrrhicist 9mo ago
Until the price of gas starts to remotely reflect the medium to long term costs of climate change I basically always celebrate anything that increases gas or carbon-based energy prices. Like, it sucks... but there's lots of data that consumers respond to these prices in their choices. The way I think about it, the entirety of global civilization is massively, massively subsidizing carbon emission.
- DiggyJohnson 9mo ago
  Do you know of any research or calculations of what that number ought to be?
  - Cerium 9mo ago
    If you wanted to pay for direct air capture of CO2 to directly "undo" your climate effect of driving, the cost would currently be about $6 per gallon. Price comes from [1], found [2] looking for a second opinion on current direct air capture cost. [1] https://theclimatecapitalist.com/articles/gas-should-cost-13-59-a-gallon https://theclimatecapitalist.com/articles/gas-should-cost-13... [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/phildeluna/2024/11/29/will-direct-air-capture-ever-cost-less-than-100-per-ton-of-co/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/phildeluna/2024/11/29/will-dire...
    - adrianN 9mo ago
      I wonder whether those methods scale at those prices to the theoretical demand of undoing burning gasoline. I doubt it.
    - wolvoleo 8mo ago
      Direct air capture is just not feasible at a world scale. And the whole circus around it, manufacturing (and extracting the natural resources for that) of all the machinery for it, clearing land to place it (and all the NIMBY circus), all the energy generation for it, the transmission lines, the maintenance, the burying of the captured carbon. It's all going to lead to lots of pollution and CO2 emissions even if the things are powered by 100% green energy. It's just a pipe dream of the people looking for a quick fix so we can continue doing what we've been doing. But we'll just need so hellish many of them to make a dent in global CO2 levels in time to prevent the worst effects of climate change. It's just impossible. The only way to really fix things is not emitting the stuff in the first place but most people prefer putting their fingers in their ears.
throwway120385 9mo ago
tetra-ethyl lead helped significantly increase octane, allowing a lower-cost fuel to be used in gasoline engines.

Hikikomori 9mo ago

>It's really easy to sit and demand evidence before regulating something. But consider that if we waited for hard evidence to accumulate before banning lead in gasoline, we likely never would have banned it because the hard evidence wouldn't exist. We already knew lead was toxic before we started putting it in gasoline. Even the guy that invented it got sick from exposure and people died from exposure in their plants in the first years of operation. The problem is that we somehow require evidence that something is unsafe but don't require any evidence that its safe in the first place.

colechristensen 9mo ago

So we should legislate evidence free based on the vibes of whichever tribe is currently in power? We're doomed.

permo-w 8mo ago
You think that that's not been the case for the entirety of human history?