Ship of Fools: Pseudo environmentalism

Thread: Pseudo environmentalism Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :

...which I tried writing as one word, but the post was disallowed ??on the basis that it might contain German words?? - bizarre

However it should be written, it sucks.

A recent example: I was recently in a [certain chain store], our delightful antipodean answer to Wal-Mart, making some purchases. 'Would you like to buy a ten-cent bag for these things?', enquired the clerk. Oh great, I thought. That's right, these folk are being 'environmentally friendly' now, and 'reducing their carbon footprint' by charging like a wounded bull for flimsy plastic shopping bags. Sigh.

Well, I had some heavy stuff, a pushchair to manage, and a steep downhill to my car. So I paid for some bags. The clerk put two heavy ceramic mixing bowls in one bag (they barely fitted, you couldn't bring the bag handles together). 'Do you think that will hold?', I said, 'I'm worried the bag will break'. 'Oh, no', she said, 'there's no way that bag is strong enough for those bowls'. 'Do you think you could double-bag them?' I say. No. No siree. Not unless I have another ten cents (in cash, seeing as the transaction is complete by now).

What a bunch of muppets. If you are actually interested in being environmentally friendly*, Mr-Big-Chain-Store, instead of putting a 1000% markup on your shopping bags, try the following:

1.) Recycle your pallet wrap, instead of throwing it in a dumpster. There's a lot more of that around than shopping bags.**

2.) Better yet, seeing as many of your products are manufactured for you, insist that the pallets are strapped, rather than wrapped. And find a way to recycle the wooden pallets themselves, instead of chucking them out.**

3.) Stop selling cartloads and cartloads of cheap pointless unrecycleable plastic shite which you yourself generate the demand for.

4.) Don't purposely ruin stock which doesn't sell so that it can't be used by anyone else and can only be sent to the tip.**

*Which, by the way, I know you're not, which is what makes me so annoyed. You're just going through the motions as a marketing exercise, and making an eye-wateringly huge margin on plastic bags in the process.

**These are not baseless allegations. I had the very great privilege of a minimum-wage job with this company while at University, and they really don't recycle any packaging, nor sort into separate dumpsters, and they really do pay gimps like me to ruin de-stocked stuff so it can't be used.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Oh, and you over there in the Toyota Prius. Yes, you with the swanky hybrid car; you can stop looking down your nose at everyone else*. Burning the fuel inside the car's engine is far more efficient than burning it in a power station to generate electricity so that you can store it in your battery and feel smug about Saving the Planet. You're not. Get on yer bike.

* Unless all the electricity you're using to run the thing is generated by solar panels on the roof of your house.

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :

quote:
Jane R: Burning the fuel inside the car's engine is far more efficient than burning it in a power station to generate electricity so that you can store it in your battery and feel smug about Saving the Planet.

Really? That's a surprise to me.

@anoesis: you should have brought your own linen shopping bag.

Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :

quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
@anoesis: you should have brought your own linen shopping bag.

Well, quite. I do, when I'm doing my grocery shopping, if that helps. And if they're really that evil, I probably just shouldn't buy anything from them. The problem with that is, that if I want to hold my nose up and only shop at places with clean hands in an environmental sense, I will very soon starve to death, I think. Even in 'clean'*, 'green'*, New Zealand.

*Yeah. That is mostly marketing as well.

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

I paid NZD2.00 for a shopping bag at [shopping place in NZ] because I liked the colour which is bright fire-engine red. I didn't need it. I am a bad person. In my defense, I thought the cost was a little over what I would pay here.

But I do still use it daily.

Posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe (# 5521) on :

quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
'Would you like to buy a ten-cent bag for these things?', enquired the clerk.

How would you have carried your purchases away had you not purchased a bag?

What gets me is that plastic bags seem designed to hold three or four items at most. Thus, I seem never to be able to get out of the store without toting a dozen or so bags along.

I miss the days when supermarkets used paper bags. With careful packing, I used to be able to get a week's worth of groceries packed into two paper bags. (That's all I could fit in the milk carton I had bolted to the back of my motorcycle.) And I never double-bagged.

Back in those days, supermarkets also gave you the option of using cardboard cartons instead of paper bags. That way they recycled the boxes that their groceries came in, and you, of course, had the option of further recycling them when you got home.

Posted by Matt Black (# 2210) on :

[Smug git] I bring my own linen/ canvas bags and collect green clubcard points [Angel]

[/smug git]

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :

quote:
anoesis: The problem with that is, that if I want to hold my nose up and only shop at places with clean hands in an environmental sense, I will very soon starve to death, I think. Even in 'clean'*, 'green'*, New Zealand.

Of course. You can only do what you can.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
[Smug git] I bring my own linen/ canvas bags and collect green clubcard points [/smug git]

Same here.

In France the supermarches don't give plastic bags. If you want a bag, you buy one or bring your own.

Mrs Sioni has made some small cloth bags that do all a plastic bag can do, oh, and get me funny looks when I use them: big hairy bloke carrying a quilting/patchwork bag looks odd.

Posted by Beethoven (# 114) on :

One of my gripes is the way all the supermarkets here offer 'a bag for life'* under the guise of environmentalism. But they will only exchange their own bags. So having lived in a place where one particular chain was the most convenient, I have a supply of their bags. Now living somewhere where a different supermarket suits me better, I either have to buy a whole heap more of these bags for life, or drive out of my way to the chain concerned to exchange them... Yes, I can see how that helps the environment. [Roll Eyes]

* You buy one reasonably heavy-duty carrier bag for 10p (or whatever); when it wears out, the supermarket will exchange it for free, and recycle the old one.

Posted by Inger (# 15285) on :

I've used my own very strong nylon bags for years - from long before all this became an issue. Mainly because I dislike plastic carrier bags; they are uncomfortable to carry, and I never really trust them to be strong enough.

Suggest to the shop that they copy M&Sp. They donate all the income from carrier bags to environmental causes. At the moment I think it's the Marine Conservation Society.

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

In my city, I often offer bags from different stores for packing small loads in (I have a heavy-duty knapsack for groceries). I don't give a hoot.

Interestingly enough, a new thing is happening. The coffee shops are offering a cup discount if you bring your own - even if it is a competitor's cup.

Whoppee. [Roll Eyes]

Actually if I am invited out to a coffee shop, I make my own at home - it tastes better to me. I then buy an overpriced snack at the shop. But that's a topic for another thread.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

Remember string bags ?

My Mum was using them 40 years ago.

I bought sausages today - they were wrapped four times [Roll Eyes]

Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :

quote:
Originally posted by PeteC:
Interestingly enough, a new thing is happening. The coffee shops are offering a cup discount if you bring your own - even if it is a competitor's cup.

Ah. I'm reminded of the woman in "Lark Rise to Candleford" (the book, not the TV series) who turned up along with the others to collect some free surplus milk, bring your own container. Over the months, the size of the container she brought increased gradually from a pint jug to a tin bath.

Posted by Pigwidgeon (# 10192) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
I miss the days when supermarkets used paper bags.

Over on this side of town they still have paper bags if you ask for them. I carry my own reuseable Trader Joe's bags no matter where I'm shopping, but if I've forgotten them or didn't bring enough of them in with me, I always ask for paper which can be reused and then recycled. The plastic ones deserve their own Hell thread.

Posted by Gee D (# 13815) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
Oh, and you over there in the Toyota Prius. Yes, you with the swanky hybrid car; you can stop looking down your nose at everyone else*. Burning the fuel inside the car's engine is far more efficient than burning it in a power station to generate electricity so that you can store it in your battery and feel smug about Saving the Planet. You're not. Get on yer bike.

* Unless all the electricity you're using to run the thing is generated by solar panels on the roof of your house.

Jane:

1. The Prius does not plug into the mains to recharge the batteries. They are charged either in the usual manner by the petrol engine, or by the motion of the car coasting down hills and so forth.

2. As others have said, it is far more efficient to generate power at a power station rather than by having an on-board motor do it. Thinks of a locomotive: an electric loco takes its power from the catenary or a third rail, and uses that to drive the traction motors. A diesel-electric loco generates the electricity which drives the traction motors with the on-board engine. The loco therefore has to carry and move the weight of the diesel motor in addition, a much less efficient process. In any event, the running of a static motor is much easier to control than that of one which moves for a variety of reasons.

You're right about Prius's for other reasons. The batteries are not exactly environmentally to make in the first instance or dispose of at the end of their life. The whole car uses advanced and expensive technology, which itself consumes substantial amounts of energy to create. It may come out ahed in the long run, but it is a very long run indeed.

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
Oh, and you over there in the Toyota Prius. Yes, you with the swanky hybrid car; you can stop looking down your nose at everyone else*. Burning the fuel inside the car's engine is far more efficient than burning it in a power station to generate electricity so that you can store it in your battery and feel smug about Saving the Planet. You're not. Get on yer bike.

* Unless all the electricity you're using to run the thing is generated by solar panels on the roof of your house.

Oops, technical fail! As Gee D has pointed out, despite having other faults, the Prius can not be accused of running on coal-powered electricity because it charges the batteries from dynamic braking, not having a plug to connect to the electricity grid.

Regardless, if you need to use a car it is far more economical (in both running costs and total energy used over the life cycle) to drive a car with a simple turbo-diesel engine that does not have to carry around a boot full of lithium-ion batteries.

Hydrogen fuel cells are the future, not batteries. Look out for the GreenGT H2 experimental car running at Le Mans next year to see why.

[ 19. June 2012, 12:43: Message edited by: the giant cheeseburger ]

Posted by irish_lord99 (# 16250) on :

In New England we found that some grocery chains sell re-usable nylon bags for $2.00 apiece, and then give you a $.05 credit each time you use each one. Mrs. I_L99 bought four.

I love it, not so much for the 20 cents off each food run, but because we reuse the normal plactic bags and they were beginning to take over the kitchen! [Help]

Even using them as trash bags for all of our garbage cans, we still couldn't keep up with the inflow from grocery shopping etc.

Posted by PeteC (# 10422) on :

Grocery bags just sit in landfill, mostly non-biodegrading. Purpose-made garbage bags are, I think, often biodegradable. If they're not they should be!

Posted by ken (# 2460) on :

quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:

quote:
Jane R: Burning the fuel inside the car's engine is far more efficient than burning it in a power station to generate electricity so that you can store it in your battery and feel smug about Saving the Planet.
Really? That's a surprise to me.

It ought to surprise you because its comnpletely wrong. Power stations are far more efficient than cars. Size matters. A lot.

That does not mean of course that burning the fuel in a power station, then transmitting the electricity hundreds of miles to a city (with transmission losses, which are low at high voltage but can be quite hight at the end); then recharging a battery (60% to 99% efficiency depending on battery design); then running the motor off the battery (more efficient than an internal combustion engine but still some loss); is all put together more efficient than burning the same fuel in small motor (though that has considerably higher transmission costs because the fuelk has to be taken to a garage in a road tanker and then the car carries its owb unburned fuel around iwth it). I suspect that it probaby works out about the same.in most cases.

Electric cars in cities do have an environmental advantage over fuel-burning cars but its nothing to do with saving energy. Its to do with pollution. Big burners such as power stations are inherently cleaner and more efficient than little ones like cars. And you can put them out in the country far away from where most people live and drive. So its a great way to avoid smog and stuff like that. Same goes for hydrogen. Its cleaner than burning oil, but someone is going tobe buring the oil somewhere to make the hydrogen. And its got huge transmission costs - most of our older cities already have a gas transmission infrastructure, but installing it in somewhere that doesn't is hugely expensive.

If you want to save energy on cars. whether they burn their own fuel or use electricity, what you need is bigger vehicles with bigger motors because they are more efficient. Which of course means that you need to carry lots more people in one go to spread the fuel use around. It would help to run over specially designed low-friction roads as well.

Oh! We have them already! We call them "trains".

And however you travel the best way of saving energy doing it is to travel less. And the best way to make that happen id for eveyone to live closer to each other and to shops and entertainment and workplaces.

We have them already too - we call them "cities".

Higher density and more centralised cities, and more public transport, are far better ways to save enrgy than poncing around with fuel cells.

Posted by the long ranger (# 17109) on :

I believe the gap is closer than it should be due to the high environmental costs of the metals needed in the car batteries and the amount of dirty coal burned in power stations.

Coaches are, apparently, the most efficient way to travel, though I can't remember the type of trains they compared them with.

Posted by ken (# 2460) on :

Efficiency of buses vs. trains It depends on all sorts of things such as how many empty seats you carry and how you get to the station, so there is no easy answer.

(Of course the most fuel-efficient form of transport is ship - but that's not an option for most commuters!)

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
Oh, and you over there in the Toyota Prius. Yes, you with the swanky hybrid car; you can stop looking down your nose at everyone else*. Burning the fuel inside the car's engine is far more efficient than burning it in a power station to generate electricity so that you can store it in your battery and feel smug about Saving the Planet. You're not. Get on yer bike.

* Unless all the electricity you're using to run the thing is generated by solar panels on the roof of your house.

They've just started selling plug-in Priuses in the States. So most likely here the person with their nose in the air is driving an original variety, one quietly recharging on the road using gas burning at 45-50 miles per gallon.

ken:

quote:
And however you travel the best way of saving energy doing it is to travel less. And the best way to make that happen id for eveyone to live closer to each other and to shops and entertainment and workplaces.

We have them already too - we call them "cities".

London in fact. Or Detroit.

Posted by Matt Black (# 2210) on :

Indeed, travelling by water is best, particularly if sail and oar powered. Just not very practicable...

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by PeteC:
Grocery bags just sit in landfill, mostly non-biodegrading. Purpose-made garbage bags are, I think, often biodegradable. If they're not they should be!

Nothing biodegrades in a landfill. They are nearly anaerobic, free from organisms which breakdown materials and lightproof.

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
Indeed, travelling by water is best, particularly if sail and oar powered. Just not very practicable... [/QB]

Depends on what is powering the person/s rowing.

Same goes for cycling.

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

For those in the country, there already exists transport which can be self-fueling. Indeed, it can fuel on the go and it's waste product from the fueling process helps produce more fuel.
Very green.

Pic of machine.

Posted by Matt Black (# 2210) on :

Beanz meanz fartz meanz methane emissionz?

Posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe (# 5521) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Its waste product from the fueling process helps produce more fuel. Very green.

No, very brown, I'd say. I for one would not want to return to the days when the streets were full of horse manure.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by ken:

And however you travel the best way of saving energy doing it is to travel less. And the best way to make that happen id for eveyone to live closer to each other and to shops and entertainment and workplaces.

We have them already too - we call them "cities".

Higher density and more centralised cities, and more public transport, are far better ways to save enrgy than poncing around with fuel cells.

I've always had my doubts about the energy efficiency of cities. While they are very convenient for people, especially if they live in them, rather than travelling for an hour to their place of work, everything has to be brought to the cities, and that must have a cost. Then there is the other cost, of taking all the trash out again. Has anyone done the sums for this?

Posted by Balaam (# 4543) on :

The Prius isn't perfect. And it doesn't use any less fuel than similar sized diesel cars, or some petrol ones. But it was a good first effort.

The big hybrid news from Toyota is the TS030 racing car. When the technology of the race track filters down to cars for shoppers and commuters then expect something which actually saves on fuel.

The Prius was a good first try, even if they didn't get it right first time.

Posted by Balaam (# 4543) on :

quote:
Same goes for cycling.

I probably spend more money on the extra food I eat when cycling than the cost of fuel to cover the same distance on one of these.

Posted by no_prophet (# 15560) on :

I reprising continually in my head "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem".

This one: Mother Nature's Fuel really gets me. Take a poluting substance, mix with ethanol because corn farmers can't get enough corn sugar into chicken noodle soup and ketchup, so they get subsidies to make alcohol to burn in cars. Then pretend it's green.

Right in there with filters for cigarettes which make them so much healthier.

[ 19. June 2012, 17:03: Message edited by: no_prophet ]

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Its waste product from the fueling process helps produce more fuel. Very green.
No, very brown, I'd say. I for one would not want to return to the days when the streets were full of horse manure.

It would bring the spats industry out of recession, though.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

[Hot and Hormonal]

I stand corrected on the Prius. But it still seems to me that until we have a sustainable solution to the twin problems of generating and storing electricity, we can't claim to have solved the energy crisis. However low the mileage of your hi-tech car may be, it's still burning some petrol.

As other people have said, the inhabitants of cities may use less energy on personal travel but all the stuff they use has to be transported to them and the waste they generate has to be taken away. They may be using less energy than someone who lives in the depths of the country and has a 50-mile round trip to the nearest shop, but all of us (in the developed world) are using far more energy than we should.

[ 19. June 2012, 19:16: Message edited by: Jane R ]

Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Its waste product from the fueling process helps produce more fuel. Very green.
No, very brown, I'd say. I for one would not want to return to the days when the streets were full of horse manure.

It's fine. You just allow poor orphans called Jo to sweep it all out of the way. Sorted!

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Balaam:

quote:
Same goes for cycling.
I probably spend more money on the extra food I eat when cycling than the cost of fuel to cover the same distance on one of these.

But it's much better for you [Smile]

Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :

Another example:

I received a flyer in my mailbox the other day (despite the prominent 'no circulars' sign displayed on it), from a local (nationwide) chain of burger stores. Said flyer was all about promoting their environmental credentials - they only used recycled paper for their boxes and bags, and because they are so sincerely concerned about 'our planet', all their printing is done with vegetable-based inks - including on this flyer, it proudly proclaimed...

Well, that's very nice, I'm sure. But if you are actually concerned about your impact on the environment, why are you producing and sending out paper-based spam in the first place? Particularly when the WHOLE POINT of the exercise appears to be to promote your environmental credentials! You could have just - not. But of course it is not about 'our planet', really, is it? It's about your image and the effect this has on your sales.

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
'Would you like to buy a ten-cent bag for these things?', enquired the clerk.
How would you have carried your purchases away had you not purchased a bag?

What gets me is that plastic bags seem designed to hold three or four items at most. Thus, I seem never to be able to get out of the store without toting a dozen or so bags along.

I am very happy with the 15c bags now offered at my supermarket after the government banned the flimsy free ones, because the 15c ones actually hold a lot more. A small price to pay for the occasions when I don't remember to bring my cloth ones.

Posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe (# 5521) on :

quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
But of course it is not about 'our planet', really, is it? It's about your image and the effect this has on your sales.

Somewhat related to this is the practice employed by most hotels now, namely to change sheets and towels only upon request or at the end of your stay instead of daily.

They say they're doing it to conserve water and protect the environment against detergent residue, but they're really doing it to cut costs and to speed up the time the chaimbermaid -- oops, I mean room attendant -- has to spend in your room, thus allowing her to clean more rooms on her shift than previously.

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Balaam:
The big hybrid news from Toyota is the TS030 racing car. When the technology of the race track filters down to cars for shoppers and commuters then expect something which actually saves on fuel.

The TS030 was a complete failure in all departments except for the "surviving being hit by a Ferrari with only a broken back" test, and even that is a dubious distinction because the thing shouldn't have flipped into the air in the first place. That the other car was knocked out by drivetrain components failing is far more embarrassing, the drivetrain being the only thing that makes a hybrid distinctive.

The real hybrid story from Le Mans was the Audi R18 e-tron Quattro - first in qualifying, first and second in the race. The successful use of a flywheel accumulator rather than heavy batteries was good as well, they actually brought something new to the party.

Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on :

I was told by someone who knows these things, that when every last bit of life is gone from this earth and the sun has become bloated and red, scattered all over the scorched earth of what was once earth will be hundreds of thousands of indestructible Prius batteries.

Posted by RooK (# 1852) on :

quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:
Hydrogen fuel cells are the future, not batteries. Look out for the GreenGT H2 experimental car running at Le Mans next year to see why.

Ah hydrogen, the amusing bullshit spun up hopefully by greedy energy companies to keep their expensive-but-profitable exclusive supply arrays. If you think batteries are going to have to be magical to get light/efficient enough, that's nothing compared to the eldritch horror of storing energy as hydrogen.

Pure electric is the future. Hybrid is the path to get there for longer-range needs now/near future. Anybody who says any different simply isn't paying attention.

Posted by Reuben (# 11361) on :

quote:

Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

Somewhat related to this is the practice employed by most hotels now, namely to change sheets and towels only upon request or at the end of your stay instead of daily.

They say they're doing it to conserve water and protect the environment against detergent residue, but they're really doing it to cut costs and to speed up the time the chaimbermaid -- oops, I mean room attendant -- has to spend in your room, thus allowing her to clean more rooms on her shift than previously.

Ah yes...
"As a green hotel chain and in the interests of conserving our precious environment we will try to manipulate you out of guilt to reuse your towels.
But please don't ask us if we have any other form of green initiatives such as water recycling, reduction in embodied energy, use of sustainable energy forms, carbon footprint reduction or thermal efficiencies for heating and cooling. Where's the buck in that?"

Posted by the long ranger (# 17109) on :

It is all a pile of old shite anyway - in years to come we'll all be recovering from the shock of a global economic meltdown, thinking in wonder back to the time when we could afford cars whilst we scrabble around in the dirt for food to eat. I doubt we'll spend more than a second remembering all this econonsense.

Posted by Mary LA (# 17040) on :

Don't be so sad, little horsie.

People have been scrabbling around in the dirt for food to eat for thousands of years because that's how plants grow.

Posted by Pyx_e (# 57) on :

Lidl linen bags are sewn by elves with love and awesomness. They are then showered in more awesomness and stored in kryptonite contaniers until mere mortals need them.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

The government agency I work for celebrated its 160th anniversary today (for economy's sake we shared it with the Diamond Jubilee).

In addition to the usual crappy pens, shopping bags, in unbleached linen were given away. They arrived in cardboard boxes. That OK folks?

Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :

Sounds good. But I presume your government agency doesn't exist solely to make a buck for shareholders. They may not need to do a great deal in the way of 'marketing', either. In which case, there is obviously a higher chance of an apparent decision to do something environmentally friendly being an actual decision to do something environmentally friendly.

I work for a University, which sits in a sort of quasi-governmental no-man's-land. I am very relieved to say that we don't create and send out marketing material for the express purpose of showing that this stock and its ink are environmentally friendly. All the same, some of the 'green' decisions that have been made over the years I've been here do annoy me.

In order to be more 'green', we now have toilets that flush in a very weak and reluctant manner (this supposedly saves water, but not if you have to flush it three times to get the job done), are encouraged to use pens and packing tape that don't work very well, because they are green, and are not allowed to have rubbish bins* because we are supposed to be following the three 'r's - reduce, re-use, recycle...

Meanwhile, senior staff continue to fly here there and everywhere to attend advisory board meetings and standing committees and so on, many of which could be done just as well by videoconference.**

*There is one bin on each floor, the idea being that if you have to walk 20 metres to throw anything away, you will re-use it instead?? Yeah.

**I am not suggesting that academics give up going to conferences and symposia, merely the seemingly endless round of bi-monthly or bi-annual committees and things.

Posted by Balaam (# 4543) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RooK:
Ah hydrogen, the amusing bullshit spun up hopefully by greedy energy companies to keep their expensive-but-profitable exclusive supply arrays. If you think batteries are going to have to be magical to get light/efficient enough, that's nothing compared to the eldritch horror of storing energy as hydrogen.

I've heard on a TV programme (which means it must be true [Biased]

) that it costs the same to produce hydrogen out of sea water as it does to produce petrol out of crude. It also takes a lot of energy to do this. The industry that made a lot of money persuading us that we needed to drive will find it easy to persuade us to buy hydrogen. If they say it has no carbon footprint because it produces only steam though is nothing but bovine excrement.

Posted by comet (# 10353) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RooK:

quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:
Hydrogen fuel cells are the future, not batteries. Look out for the GreenGT H2 experimental car running at Le Mans next year to see why.
Ah hydrogen, the amusing bullshit spun up hopefully by greedy energy companies to keep their expensive-but-profitable exclusive supply arrays. If you think batteries are going to have to be magical to get light/efficient enough, that's nothing compared to the eldritch horror of storing energy as hydrogen.

Pure electric is the future. Hybrid is the path to get there for longer-range needs now/near future. Anybody who says any different simply isn't paying attention.

thanks for this, RooK. I kind of thought so, but as I only took physics classes for fun in my spare time (shaddap, peanut gallery!) I don't really know enough to definitively say so. I assumed there was something about the hydrogen process I was missing.

considering you're part of that world, I will now switch my assumption to being that you know what you're talking about.

"I have this friend who really knows his shit...."

Posted by Justinian (# 5357) on :

quote:
Originally posted by comet:
thanks for this, RooK. I kind of thought so, but as I only took physics classes for fun in my spare time (shaddap, peanut gallery!) I don't really know enough to definitively say so. I assumed there was something about the hydrogen process I was missing.

considering you're part of that world, I will now switch my assumption to being that you know what you're talking about.

"I have this friend who really knows his shit...."

In layman's terms there are two basic problems with hydrogen.

1: It's strictly an energy storage method. You literally can get no more energy out by burning hydrogen than you put in to break up the water. You dig oil out of the ground - but all hydrogen is is a giant and complex battery that requires a power source from something (nuclear, coal, gas, wind, hydro solar - I don't care). But hydrogen simply

2: Hydrogen's an utter pain to store for several reasons.
2a: Hydrogen's energy density by volume is pathetic - even if you have your hydrogen stored as a liquid you still need three times the volume in your fuel tank that you'd need of petrol. If you want to use hydrogen gas, just give up now. Your car will end up looking like a blimp and still not go very far past the end of your drive. (The space shuttle uses liquid hydrogen because weight is more of an issue than volume).

2b: That liquid hydrogen didn't sound too bad? I mean quadrupuling the size of your tank isn't a serious problem? The thing is making liquid hydrogen is incredibly hard. You literally can't do it at room temperature. You have to be at thirteen atmospheres of presure and once you've got there you need to take the whole thing down to 33 degrees Kelvin (-240 Celsius or almost -400 Farenheight). By comparison this is significantly colder than liquid nitrogen.

2c: And solid hydrogen would be hideous for an engine - solid hydrogen won't transport to the engine easily. In addition to all the problems keeping it solid. It's back to throwing another lump of literally freezing cold coal into the engine.

2c: How about gaseous hydrogen? This is the only vaguely plausible option in there. But storing a gas is always fun - hydrogen molecules are small enough that it makes making things airtight look simple. You then need to up-engineer the entire engine to this standard. And doing some back of the envelope calculations (wiki seems to be down), Hydrogen has 2.5 times the energy density by mass of natural gas. But assuming natural gas = methane (the most favourable assumption for the gas), that same mass of hydrogen will take eight times the volume to store as the gas - or you need a volume 3.2 times the size you'd need of calor gas. How far do you think your car's going to go on camping gas? Cutting a long story short one cubic foot of hydrogen is worth about a hundredth of the same volume of petrol/gas.

So. To sum up.

1: You're getting nothing out of hydrogen that a rechargable battery won't do.
2: You've hideous engineering problems - neither solid, liquid, nor gas are sensible to store or run an engine with.

I'm sure I missed plenty out. (RooK?). But those are two fundamental reasons the 'Hydrogen Economy' is a chimera.

Posted by RooK (# 1852) on :

The storing of gaseous H₂ is even worse than you might think. Because molecular hydrogen is so small that it actually can pass through the crystal lattice of solid steel. That's right - even a perfectly sealed tank will leak hydrogen gas at a non-trivial rate. When they make hydrogen tanks, they "saturate" them with hydrogen so that the interstitial spaces are pre-soaked with H₂ so that the loss rate is more linear to start off with. Of course, the ionic transfer causes embrittlement for most engineering metals, so you'll be needing new high-pressure tanks regularly anyway.

Just imagine it, all you paranoid types, how quietly gleeful energy companies must be at the thought of a fuel that people can't possibly keep on their own.

Honestly, portable nuclear is more likely than hydrogen. Say, have I ranted about thorium reactors lately?

Posted by QLib (# 43) on :

When you say rant.....?

You mean you're agin it? [Confused]

Posted by Yerevan (# 10383) on :

quote:
Ah yes...
"As a green hotel chain and in the interests of conserving our precious environment we will try to manipulate you out of guilt to reuse your towels.
But please don't ask us if we have any other form of green initiatives such as water recycling, reduction in embodied energy, use of sustainable energy forms, carbon footprint reduction or thermal efficiencies for heating and cooling. Where's the buck in that?"

Travelodge (UK chain of budget hotels) used to suggest linen re-use as 'Number thirty-four of the fifty things we do to save the planet' or something like that. I was sorely tempted to ask what the other forty-nine were.

[ 21. June 2012, 06:58: Message edited by: Yerevan ]

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Yerevan:

quote:
Ah yes...
"As a green hotel chain and in the interests of conserving our precious environment we will try to manipulate you out of guilt to reuse your towels.
But please don't ask us if we have any other form of green initiatives such as water recycling, reduction in embodied energy, use of sustainable energy forms, carbon footprint reduction or thermal efficiencies for heating and cooling. Where's the buck in that?"

Travelodge (UK chain of budget hotels) used to suggest linen re-use as 'Number thirty-four of the fifty things we do to save the planet' or something like that. I was sorely tempted to ask what the other forty-nine were.

I had a look on Travellodge's website and found their environment page.

Lots of worthy stuff, but nothing about leaving grubby sheets on your bed.

Posted by Beethoven (# 114) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
The government agency I work for celebrated its 160th anniversary today (for economy's sake we shared it with the Diamond Jubilee).

In addition to the usual crappy pens, shopping bags, in unbleached linen were given away. They arrived in cardboard boxes. That OK folks?

Sounds ideal to me. Plastic pens to go to landfill, accompanied by a 'green' bag. The perfect balance for a pseudo-environmentalist [Biased]

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Beethoven:

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
The government agency I work for celebrated its 160th anniversary today (for economy's sake we shared it with the Diamond Jubilee).

In addition to the usual crappy pens, shopping bags, in unbleached linen were given away. They arrived in cardboard boxes. That OK folks?
Sounds ideal to me. Plastic pens to go to landfill, accompanied by a 'green' bag. The perfect balance for a pseudo-environmentalist

I've just had a look at my pen. It says 'MATER-BI(TM) = 100% Biodegradable'. If you can trust that (it certainly looks and feels like plastic) then that explains the poor quality.

Posted by RooK (# 1852) on :

quote:
Originally posted by QLib:
When you say rant.....?

You mean you're agin it?

I meant rant that they're not implemented as the safe, reliable answer to energy problems for the last four fucking decades because they were not good for making nuclear weapons as a by-product. How is it that we're not more vigorously pursuing these instead of squabbling over bits of oil-and-blood-soaked sand?

[ 21. June 2012, 14:03: Message edited by: RooK ]

Posted by QLib (# 43) on :

Well, how many conspiracy theories can you balance on a point of a needle?

Or sheer bloody ignorance.

Posted by churchgeek (# 5557) on :

Around here (East Bay - e.g., Oakland, Berkeley, CA) they've been introducing buses that run on hydrogen. As far as I can tell, it's stored along the roof of the bus. I haven't ridden on one going uphill, so I can't speak for whether that's a factor at all. (Gasoline engines in buses have a horrible time going uphill. That's why in San Francisco, they have electric buses powered by overhead cables. When for some reason they have to substitute gasoline engine buses (repairs being made on the overhead cables?) they make me feel exhausted just riding on the poor things trying to get uphill!

quote:
Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:

quote:
Originally posted by ken:
We have them already too - we call them "cities".
London in fact. Or Detroit.

Your point being...?

Posted by RooK (# 1852) on :

It's true: if you have a vehicle the size of a bus, you can carry enough hydrogen for slow-speed rambling inside city limits. If it's a fuel cell vehicle, it's basically acting as a very clumsy battery for the electric motors. If it's being burned in an internal combustion engine, it'll go a bit faster/further, but will wheeze up those hills just as badly as the diesels¹ you were on.

The push for hydrogen was loudest in the late 90's and early 00's, when Ballard made their fuel cell breakthrough and a couple automakers² made limited-run hydrogen-burners. But, if you'll step into my paranoia-powered Way-Back Machine™, I'll take you back to the 1890's when the various mining concerns persuaded³ the nascent automotive industry to use their very very very cheap waste material (gasoline) instead of the obvious default - methanol.

¹ You probably haven't been on a gasoline-fueled bus, unless it was a "short bus" of the ilk used to haul developmentally disabled.

² Most notably: BMW and Honda. But a bunch of companies got in on the act, and some haven't stopped yet. I'm amused to imagine why.

³ Meaning: perfectly legal financial incentives mostly. Mostly.

Posted by ken (# 2460) on :

Diesel buses do fine in plenty of cities as hilly or hillier than San Francisco. There are plenty of good reasons for using trams getting power from overhead lines, but going up hills isn't one of them.

Posted by RooK (# 1852) on :

quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Diesel buses do fine in plenty of cities as hilly or hillier than San Francisco. There are plenty of good reasons for using trams getting power from overhead lines, but going up hills isn't one of them.

Are you arguing against the fact that electric motors typically have higher specific torque than diesel engines? Or are you witlessly defending the probably-wrong accusation of "wheezing" with the bland assertion of "[they] do fine"?

Master debater, you are.

Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RooK:
How is it that we're not more vigorously pursuing these instead of squabbling over bits of oil-and-blood-soaked sand?

Interesting! Here's a TEDx talk on the subject, and here's a UK lobby group headed by Baroness Worthington.

Posted by ken (# 2460) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RooK:
]Are you arguing against the fact that electric motors typically have higher specific torque than diesel engines? Or are you witlessly defending the probably-wrong accusation of "wheezing" with the bland assertion of "[they] do fine"?

I;m pointing out that if someone thinks that San Francisco is such a special place that ordinary buses won't work there then they are just plain wrong. Either that or whoever runs buses there has been sold some shite. Because there are a lot of hillier cities that manage to use buses effectively. Probably even in America.

Its a bit like the Americans and Canadians who post here and say that the reason they have no serious intercity passenger railways in the US east coast or southern Ontario is because the topography worse than in Europe. Obvioulsy they'e never heard of the fucking Alps.

Posted by Yorick (# 12169) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RooK:
Most notably: BMW

Apropos of nothing, but I thought you’d like this.

Posted by OliviaG (# 9881) on :

It's not the sheets they're talking about, it's the towels. In the olden days, all towels were changed every day, even the ones that hadn't been touched. The new system is if the towels are on the rack, leave them. If the towels are in the tub or sink, exchange them. Sheets are still changed 1 or 2 times a week. How often do you change your sheets at home?

My pseudoenvironmental piss-off is that more and more produce such as tomatoes, peppers, apples, etc. comes with individual stickers. This is because there are so many varieties now available to meet consumer demand: there's organic, there's locally sourced, there's the imported and domestic, there's 18 different kinds of apples, and so forth. So now rather than produce codes --- because there would be way too many, and there's no desire for an argument at the till over which apples those are --- we have to have a fucking sticker on each fucking apple. That's a lot of stickers.

It's a matter of changing the parameters of the discourse, as they say. As long as any form of environmentalism is considered a "consumer choice", we will have this sort of bullshit. The idea that we can shop our way to a sustainable economy is ridiculous. Either we do it from the ground up, cradle-to-grave, product life-cycle, repair rather than replace, modify how we distribute goods to economize on transport and packaging, stop using landfills, etc. FOR EVERYTHING WE USE or we're just hastening the inevitable. OliviaG

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