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The incredible thing is that they still allow private aviators to use leaded gas, primarily because it would cost the owners of obsolete aircraft a few thousand

The incredible thing is that they still allow private aviators to use leaded gas, primarily because it would cost the owners of obsolete aircraft a few thousands dollars to either refit their engines, or get supplemental type certificates for unleaded gas. These joyriding dipshits fly all over the place spraying lead over everybody.

rpmcb 13y ago
As a "joyriding dipshit," I can assure you we're not spraying you with lead. General Aviation is moving away from leaded fuel in general. In fact, Shell recently announced an unleaded alternative to AvGas that can be used in a normal engine without issue. No new equipment required. http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2013/December/3/shell-unleaded.aspx http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2013/December/3/...
- thrownaway2424 13y ago
  That's wonderful, but get back to me when the FAA (or the EPA) actually outlaws 100LL. Offering unleaded gas at airfields, even if that happens, won't solve the problem of people using leaded gas. Hell, there isn't even an FBO anywhere around where I live that offers an autogas pump. It's 100LL or JetA or nothing.
  - rpmcb 13y ago
    They are planning the transition right now. 2018 is the goal for phase-out. http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/faa-wants-all-aircraft-flying-unleaded-fuel-2018 http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/faa-wants-all-air...
chmars 13y ago
You certainly seem to hate general aviation! AV gas is being replaced step by step but since leaded gas has its advantages, the replacement process takes time – and there is no really convincing alternative. Anyway, the amount of lead is probably no significant factor in air pollution, there is simply not enough general aviator flying for that.
- thrownaway2424 13y ago
  I don't hate general aviation at all. But I do hate the segment of the AOPA who are basically an offshoot of the NRA, the 100LL-from-our-cold-dead-hands faction. It sounds like you are an aviator so you must be familiar with the people I am talking about. It's true that if you average the consumption of avgas over the service of the planet you get a pretty small number, but that's no consolation to the family at the end of the airfield who actually gets all of that stuff deposited in their back yard.
  - simpleketchup 13y ago
    I think you're probably a troll, but I'll bite anyway: I've been active in general aviation for years, and I've never met one these pro-lead strawmen you write about. Since you seem to have all the answers, can you put forward a rational solution to the problem (that isn't "Just throw away all the airplanes")?
    - mikeash 13y ago
      How was it handled with cars? At some point, leaded gasoline became unavailable for cars. And yet, cars from before are still around, apparently limited by maintenance and accidents rather than fuel. How was that handled?
      - ams6110 13y ago
        New cars were mandated to use unleaded fuel. As demand for leaded fuel dropped off, it became uneconomical for fuel retailers to keep a separate tank and pump for leaded fuel. There may have been (probably was) a hard cut-off date for sale of leaded motor vehicle fuel as well. The older cars that were originally designed for leaded fuel were either retrofitted with hardened valve seats that didn't require the lubrication of lead, were simply run on unleaded to their deaths, or in some cases (Mercedes-Benz comes to mind, though there may have been others) never needed lead to begin with.
        13y ago
MaggieL 13y ago
At $6/gal you can be sure we're not spraying a lot of it. -- signed: Joyriding Dipshit (jealousy is an ugly, ugly thing...)
Theodores 13y ago
Even more incredible is that our parents and grandparents willingly drove cars that spewed out lead into the atmosphere. They knew lead was a poison. Even the Romans knew lead was a poison so it wasn't like asbestos where suddenly a realisation was made. Yet everyone pretended it did not matter. Everyone did what everyone else did. Nobody thought to avoid driving past schools because they weren't sure about the ethics of covering kids in a cloud of lead (with NO2, CO, O3, PAH's and maybe some invisible micro particles thrown into the mix).
- thrownaway2424 13y ago
  I don't think it's that people pretended it didn't matter. They intentionally sited the pollution in neighborhoods full of Those Other People. Take, as an example, my town of Oakland, California. Are there freeways all over West Oakland? You bet. Are there freeways in Piedmont? Of course not. Rich people have historically been pretty careful to keep the freeways out of their neighborhoods. Airborne lead doesn't get very far from the freeway before it hits the ground. Your overall point is right, though, that mid-20th-century motorist pretty much behaved like an oblivious jerk for decades.
  - downandout 13y ago
    > "Rich people have historically been pretty careful to keep the freeways out of their neighborhoods." You're saying that had something to do with fear of lead poisoning?
    - GFK_of_xmaspast 13y ago
      There were and are lots of reasons for not wanting freeways in ones neighborhoods, the exhaust is only one of them.
    - watwut 13y ago
      More likely with general fear/dislike of air pollution combined with dislike of noise and high traffic itself. Living close to freeway is unpleasant, rich can afford something else, poor can not. Where it is not about about direct money, it is usually rich not poor who make decisions.
throwaway0010 13y ago
Getting rid of lead in gasoline is important because we consume a LOT of gasoline. We don't consume nearly so much Avgas -- it's about three orders of magnitude difference and as such it's a drastically smaller pollution source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#Consumption http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#Consumption If you're truly concerned about lead in the environment you'd be best served going after old structures with leaded paint -- not Avgas.
- ak217 13y ago
  Old structures with leaded paint don't routinely spray it in a fine mist of particulates from several thousand feet in the air, do they? Do I understand correctly that leaded paint is harmless until scratched or otherwise dispersed?
  - GFK_of_xmaspast 13y ago
    Lead paint can get pulverized and dispersed as dust as you open and close windows and doors and the like.
- mikeash 13y ago
  And yet avgas is still responsible for nearly half of lead emissions in the US now. That seems significant.
  - hueving 13y ago
    Only if the lead emissions as a whole are significant.
    - mikeash 13y ago
      True, but from what I can see, research indicates that it is.
  - throwaway0010 13y ago
    Only because lead paint is excluded from your statement by definition. It's already "emitted."

rpmcb 13y ago

As a "joyriding dipshit," I can assure you we're not spraying you with lead. General Aviation is moving away from leaded fuel in general. In fact, Shell recently announced an unleaded alternative to AvGas that can be used in a normal engine without issue. No new equipment required. http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2013/December/3/shell-unleaded.aspx http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2013/December/3/...

thrownaway2424 13y ago
That's wonderful, but get back to me when the FAA (or the EPA) actually outlaws 100LL. Offering unleaded gas at airfields, even if that happens, won't solve the problem of people using leaded gas. Hell, there isn't even an FBO anywhere around where I live that offers an autogas pump. It's 100LL or JetA or nothing.
- rpmcb 13y ago
  They are planning the transition right now. 2018 is the goal for phase-out. http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/faa-wants-all-aircraft-flying-unleaded-fuel-2018 http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/faa-wants-all-air...

chmars 13y ago

You certainly seem to hate general aviation! AV gas is being replaced step by step but since leaded gas has its advantages, the replacement process takes time – and there is no really convincing alternative. Anyway, the amount of lead is probably no significant factor in air pollution, there is simply not enough general aviator flying for that.

thrownaway2424 13y ago
I don't hate general aviation at all. But I do hate the segment of the AOPA who are basically an offshoot of the NRA, the 100LL-from-our-cold-dead-hands faction. It sounds like you are an aviator so you must be familiar with the people I am talking about. It's true that if you average the consumption of avgas over the service of the planet you get a pretty small number, but that's no consolation to the family at the end of the airfield who actually gets all of that stuff deposited in their back yard.
- simpleketchup 13y ago
  I think you're probably a troll, but I'll bite anyway: I've been active in general aviation for years, and I've never met one these pro-lead strawmen you write about. Since you seem to have all the answers, can you put forward a rational solution to the problem (that isn't "Just throw away all the airplanes")?
  - mikeash 13y ago
    How was it handled with cars? At some point, leaded gasoline became unavailable for cars. And yet, cars from before are still around, apparently limited by maintenance and accidents rather than fuel. How was that handled?
    - ams6110 13y ago
      New cars were mandated to use unleaded fuel. As demand for leaded fuel dropped off, it became uneconomical for fuel retailers to keep a separate tank and pump for leaded fuel. There may have been (probably was) a hard cut-off date for sale of leaded motor vehicle fuel as well. The older cars that were originally designed for leaded fuel were either retrofitted with hardened valve seats that didn't require the lubrication of lead, were simply run on unleaded to their deaths, or in some cases (Mercedes-Benz comes to mind, though there may have been others) never needed lead to begin with.
      - 13y ago

MaggieL 13y ago

At $6/gal you can be sure we're not spraying a lot of it. -- signed: Joyriding Dipshit (jealousy is an ugly, ugly thing...)

Theodores 13y ago

Even more incredible is that our parents and grandparents willingly drove cars that spewed out lead into the atmosphere. They knew lead was a poison. Even the Romans knew lead was a poison so it wasn't like asbestos where suddenly a realisation was made. Yet everyone pretended it did not matter. Everyone did what everyone else did. Nobody thought to avoid driving past schools because they weren't sure about the ethics of covering kids in a cloud of lead (with NO2, CO, O3, PAH's and maybe some invisible micro particles thrown into the mix).

thrownaway2424 13y ago
I don't think it's that people pretended it didn't matter. They intentionally sited the pollution in neighborhoods full of Those Other People. Take, as an example, my town of Oakland, California. Are there freeways all over West Oakland? You bet. Are there freeways in Piedmont? Of course not. Rich people have historically been pretty careful to keep the freeways out of their neighborhoods. Airborne lead doesn't get very far from the freeway before it hits the ground. Your overall point is right, though, that mid-20th-century motorist pretty much behaved like an oblivious jerk for decades.
- downandout 13y ago
  > "Rich people have historically been pretty careful to keep the freeways out of their neighborhoods." You're saying that had something to do with fear of lead poisoning?
  - GFK_of_xmaspast 13y ago
    There were and are lots of reasons for not wanting freeways in ones neighborhoods, the exhaust is only one of them.
  - watwut 13y ago
    More likely with general fear/dislike of air pollution combined with dislike of noise and high traffic itself. Living close to freeway is unpleasant, rich can afford something else, poor can not. Where it is not about about direct money, it is usually rich not poor who make decisions.

throwaway0010 13y ago

Getting rid of lead in gasoline is important because we consume a LOT of gasoline. We don't consume nearly so much Avgas -- it's about three orders of magnitude difference and as such it's a drastically smaller pollution source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#Consumption http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#Consumption If you're truly concerned about lead in the environment you'd be best served going after old structures with leaded paint -- not Avgas.

ak217 13y ago
Old structures with leaded paint don't routinely spray it in a fine mist of particulates from several thousand feet in the air, do they? Do I understand correctly that leaded paint is harmless until scratched or otherwise dispersed?
- GFK_of_xmaspast 13y ago
  Lead paint can get pulverized and dispersed as dust as you open and close windows and doors and the like.
mikeash 13y ago
And yet avgas is still responsible for nearly half of lead emissions in the US now. That seems significant.
- hueving 13y ago
  Only if the lead emissions as a whole are significant.
  - mikeash 13y ago
    True, but from what I can see, research indicates that it is.
- throwaway0010 13y ago
  Only because lead paint is excluded from your statement by definition. It's already "emitted."