Ban on small engines in California

[Ken I]

I know we have gone somewhat off topic but I feel I must toss in my 10c worth........

I too believe climate change is real – my problem is that I believe it is almost entirely natural – it has never been static – and I can’t believe that man is the cause or can control the climate with the magic molecule CO2 which is :-

Only 0.04% Of the atmosphere
Has 99.99% of it’s CO2 infra-Red absorption spectra already saturated
And man’s output is 4% of mother nature’s natural cycle. (All facts you can and should check.)

Multiply that out to 0.000000016 and you want to control the climate with that factor ? – pull the other leg it’s got bells on.

That’s excluding volcanos – which because of uncertainties might reduce that by a factor of up to 20 times less (we don’t know) - the most likely value is about five times.

"Anyone who goes around and says that CO2 is responsible for most of the global warming in the 20th century has not looked at the basic numbers."…Professor Patrick Michaels, Dept. of Environment Sciences, University of Virginia.

Calculations by van Wijngaarten and Happer across the many absorption frequencies by H2O, CO2, CH4 (methane) and N2O (nitrous oxides) yield exceptionally good agreement with satellite-based temperature measurements. They showed that absorption by CH4 and N2O are both completely negligible, regardless of the fictional calculations of “Global Warming Potential” (GWP.)

Prof. William Happer. Professor of Physics at Princeton University

The difference between the black and red line is the difference between current 400ppm CO2 and the “catastrophic” effect of “doubling” to 800ppm CO2

Hard to see a difference that is cause for any concern.

Review or download the paper at Cornell University :-

[2006.03098] Dependence of Earth's Thermal Radiation on Five Most Abundant Greenhouse Gases

Also an article published as International Journal of Modern Physics B, Vol. 23, No. 3 (2009) 275–364 , DOI No: 10.1142/S021797920904984X

[0707.1161] Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics

Cornell University – Falsification of the atmospheric greenhouse conjecture.

Both peer reviewed scientific papers based on repeatable empirical, experimental and observed data - not the fanciful multiple order "modeling" which is often touted as "Data" turning centuries of science on its head.

Certainly temperatures are well correlated to CO2 but then again so are flying saucer sightings – correlation without causation.

Before we go wrecking the global economy to ward off a largely imaginary problem you need to be sure of your facts.

Don’t believe me or anyone else – and particularly not the alarmism touting, scientifically ignorant mainstream media.

I have been studying this for over 15 years and remain solidly unconvinced in the validity of almost all of this farrago. My "notes" on this run to over 220000 words - which I have as a 17Mb MSword document file - if you would like a copy send me a PM.

I'm not a "denialist" but I am a skeptic - which should be the default mode for any scientist - not belief or fashionable grant seeking dogmas so prevalent amongst academics over this, the latest doomsday cult to inflict itself on mankind.

Regards, Ken

 

[SmithDoor]

When was the climate on Earth NOT changing? Geologists say at one time, the surface of the Earth was molten lava. Then the surface was all ice. So to me, the climate on Earth is ALWAYS changing. Stupid humans are changing Earth, just faster.
Grasshopper

It was cooler lava.
Today do to man we have hot lava.
There in no smog from forest fire.
Makes sense to green movement.

Most of pollution where live is from forest fires

Dave

 

[vederstein]

Two topics here:

1. The global warming/climate change discussion:

I've always been amused with the call "Save the Planet!"

The planet doesn't give a rat's ass about us. It's going to be around long long after we've evolved into many other species or died out completely.

World conflicts are usually over resources. If a population gets sufficient resources their want to take those resources from someone else greatly diminish. Access to cheap, abundant, reliable power allows a population to acquire many of the other items they lack (think desalination plants or electrolsys to create hydrogen to power portable equipment).

If the Greenies were serious about their cause, they would embrace nuclear power. It creates huge amount energy with tiny (but really nasty) quantities waste. Many will bring up that nuclear can be used to create bombs. Two facets to this. If enough power is created, the want to take other peoples stuff is diminished. With Thorium reactors, the fissionable material created is far from suitable for bombs.

Also with Thorium, the waste (fission products) is safe in about 400 years. Thorium reactors create essentially no transuranic elements (elements heavier than uranium). The transuranics are what last 26,000 years and are created with the types of commercial reactors used today (uranium fueled).

The Chinese and Indians are actively working on commercial thorium power plants. The Western world is going to get left in the dust.

2. The California small engine ban.

Ok, California is phasing out small (less than 25 hp) equipment with internal combustion engines. Obviously they are expecting the existing fleet of equipment to be replaced with equipment powered by electricity (or grazing farm animals). California already has an electric supply problem and their electric grid is old, under capacity, and failing.

Is the state going to upgrade their electric grid to accommodate the power equipment and eventually millions of cars?

That is all

...Ved.

 

[dnalot]

The climate here in Washington State is changing as I write this. I just looked out my window to see the trees are losing their leaves.

Mark T

 

[William May]

The order bans the FURTHER SALE OF INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINES.
It DOES NOT affect engines currently in use, any used engine sales,
(including current vehicles) and the use of vehicles that are currently used. It also DOES NOT BAN TRUCKS OR CARS FROM OTHER STATES FROM ENTERING CALIFORNIA.

Pull your pants down, get your undies OUT of the big bundle they are in, and put your pants back on.

There has NEVER BEEN A SUCCESSFUL THORIUM REACTOR BUILT.
(They are NOT practical, and probably never will be.)

 

[SmithDoor]

This state is still using equipment from the 1930's.

California is only upgrading after some happen.
Today the upgrade is natural gas generators. What is the difference from a 7 hp and a 100,000 hp engine. Maybe if you can afford a 26hp generator that is ok

If power lines goes down the only thing left is is your 7hp generators to run your refrigerator and charging CPAC and or other medicine equipment

Dave

The photo below is the new green

Two topics here:

1. The global warming/climate change discussion:

I've always been amused with the call "Save the Planet!"

The planet doesn't give a rat's ass about us. It's going to be around long long after we've evolved into many other species or died out completely.

World conflicts are usually over resources. If a population gets sufficient resources their want to take those resources from someone else greatly diminish. Access to cheap, abundant, reliable power allows a population to acquire many of the other items they lack (think desalination plants or electrolsys to create hydrogen to power portable equipment).

If the Greenies were serious about their cause, they would embrace nuclear power. It creates huge amount energy with tiny (but really nasty) quantities waste. Many will bring up that nuclear can be used to create bombs. Two facets to this. If enough power is created, the want to take other peoples stuff is diminished. With Thorium reactors, the fissionable material created is far from suitable for bombs.

Also with Thorium, the waste (fission products) is safe in about 400 years. Thorium reactors create essentially no transuranic elements (elements heavier than uranium). The transuranics are what last 26,000 years and are created with the types of commercial reactors used today (uranium fueled).

The Chinese and Indians are actively working on commercial thorium power plants. The Western world is going to get left in the dust.

2. The California small engine ban.

Ok, California is phasing out small (less than 25 hp) equipment with internal combustion engines. Obviously they are expecting the existing fleet of equipment to be replaced with equipment powered by electricity (or grazing farm animals). California already has an electric supply problem and their electric grid is old, under capacity, and failing.

Is the state going to upgrade their electric grid to accommodate the power equipment and eventually millions of cars?

That is all

...Ved.

 

[lohring]

Re warming - Dilbert - Daily Strip Email

Lohring Miller

 

[Ken I]

Recharging the Australian way (Nullarbor)

You can't make this stuff up.
Regards, Ken

 

[SmithDoor]

Recharging the Australian way (Nullarbor)
View attachment 130260
You can't make this stuff up.
Regards, Ken

But car is on battery per green people that ok. The generator is over 25 hp and no pollution diesel too.

Dave

 

[vederstein]

There has NEVER BEEN A SUCCESSFUL THORIUM REACTOR BUILT.
(They are NOT practical, and probably never will be.)

This is true. Thorium technology is evolving and is very much still in development. In the '60s there was the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment (MSRE) in Tennessee which ran successfully for six years until funding was pulled and the project was cancelled. It was never filled with thorium to become a true thorium breeder reactor. I believe it at one point it was running on man made uranium 232, which is what thorium eventually trans-mutates to after being bombarded with neutrons.

The MSRE was cancelled about fifty years ago in favor of uranium breeder reactors. The U.S. wanted both energy and bombs. Breeders can do this. Thorium reactors cannot. Uranium breeders use liquid sodium as a heat transfer fluid and though some reactors have been built they've always had major maintenance issues. (Remember sodium loves to react with water and molten sodium is not transparent).

I'm not saying thorium reactors are fully developed. Far from it. But to say they aren't practical, we don't know yet. Nobody has designed and built a full scale LFTR (liquid fluoride thorium reactor) which uses fluoride salts as both the fuel and the heat transfer fluid. LFTR's are also intrinsically safe. If they overheat a freeze plug melts and the fuel is dumped into vats without a neutron moderator and fission stops.

In the late '40s and early '50s the U.S. had many uranium fueled reactors developing the technology. Most were located in Idaho. Hymen Rickover's team developed the nuclear powered Nautilus submarine which was christened (I think) in 1955. The reactor in the Nautilus became the template for nearly all Western commercial nuclear power stations: the light water reactor.

All technologies start at "there's never been one built." Eventually they are. Newcomen took about 10 years developing his engine before an accident showed him the way. Watt had the idea for the separate condenser, but he had to wait until the machining technology existed to make his ideas possible. Trevithick paved the way for high pressure steam engines which Watt thought were too dangerous. In the late 1800s, there was serious talk of dismantling the US patent office because they seriously thought everything was discovered. Babbage designed a computer 100 years before technology was able to catch up with his ideas.

In the 1960's the group running the MSRE realized that using fluoride salts in the reactor would have problematic corrosion issues. A metal alloy (I think Iconel) was developed to mitigate the corrosion issue.

Yes, there has never been a successful reactor built. To be honest about, the Western world never really tried. The Chinese and Indians are actively pursuing the technology. I still feel that the Western world is going to be left in dust once China has limitless power.

...Ved.

 

[Zeb]

My state doesn't even have boiler codes (for small steam engines ). Pretty soon you'll need several licenses to own a Sherline set in California when they realize firearms aren't actually made from 3D printers. There goes the small engine machining hobbyists.

A friend of mine successfully ran his gas generator for 30 minutes on coal (hydrogen and carbon monoxide). I think loosing fuel refineries altogether might bring back some interesting technology, but tinkerers shall continue to suffer from tinkeritis.

 

[Nerd1000]

Recharging the Australian way (Nullarbor)
View attachment 130260
You can't make this stuff up.
Regards, Ken

This isn't on the Nullarbor, it was a test run staged to determine the efficiency of charging an ev on diesel. Funnily enough, the results were no worse (in terms of CO2) than a conventional car. Full story here:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/thedri...-remote-locations-greener-than-you-think/amp/

 

[John Rus]

Let me set the record straight.

This has NOTHING to do with clean air. EVERYTHING has an environmental foot print. Everything. Just how do you want to go about it.

And the issue is not pollution as everyone wants to point out, nobody likes breathing smog. This is not the issue. The supposed issue is CO2, a inert gas that is harmless and not poisonous and plants use. We pump this stuff to make plants grow faster.

It's all politics, they have been preaching this dooms day stuff for 60 years. It's a broken record at this point. Every 10 or 15 years, the sky is falling. Yet nothing happens. All Gore said by the 20'teens polar bears would be extinct from the wild. Not only are they are around they are thriving and not even endangered. Thanks to conservation, which oddly enough is funded by legal hunting.....

There are shores that are at the same level for the last 100 years! No rising sea levels.

And I can go on and on. It's all about politics, making a big issue about something that galvanizes a group of people on one issue so they can get reelected. Nothing practical ever gets done. It just political games.

And electric cars are about as wasteful as it comes, only way they are even remotely viable is if/when we develop nuclear power as our primary power source. That's it, if you want to talk about which is better, gas and diesel are way better. It is a much more efficient use of natural resources. This is not an issue that can be compared to horse drawn buggies and the car. This about a down grade in every way as long as you are using fossil fuels as your power source.

And this is conveniently ignoring the MASSIVE logicstal problems faced trying to force a switch to all electric way to soon. It simply won't happen in the crazy short time they want.

One thing is to let electric vehicles and electric alternatives evolve and let market demand for them naturally come about. Something that won't take trillions of dollars we don't have. VS trying to force things to soon.

This is the issue in a nut shell.

And please read everything before you respond (You'd be surprised how many don't), else you are just starting controversy for nothing. And make sure you come up with hard facts and be thorough and logical. Because when you do, you will realize I'm right and there won't be a mud flinging contest.

If you don't, I'll refuse to reply to you. If you try to make me do all the footwork, I'll just say no. You won't belive it unless you do the homework anyway, research it for yourself and answer your own questions. Besides that I don't got the time to spoon feed everyone or argue with everyone.

These are the facts, try and disprove them for yourself. You ain't gonna change my mind on the matter so don't even bother trying.

 

[L98fiero]

I know we have gone somewhat off topic but I feel I must toss in my 10c worth........

I too believe climate change is real – my problem is that I believe it is almost entirely natural – it has never been static – and I can’t believe that man is the cause or can control the climate with the magic molecule CO2 which is :-

Only 0.04% Of the atmosphere
Has 99.99% of it’s CO2 infra-Red absorption spectra already saturated
And man’s output is 4% of mother nature’s natural cycle. (All facts you can and should check.)

Multiply that out to 0.000000016 and you want to control the climate with that factor ? – pull the other leg it’s got bells on.

That’s excluding volcanos – which because of uncertainties might reduce that by a factor of up to 20 times less (we don’t know) - the most likely value is about five times.

"Anyone who goes around and says that CO2 is responsible for most of the global warming in the 20th century has not looked at the basic numbers."…Professor Patrick Michaels, Dept. of Environment Sciences, University of Virginia.

Calculations by van Wijngaarten and Happer across the many absorption frequencies by H2O, CO2, CH4 (methane) and N2O (nitrous oxides) yield exceptionally good agreement with satellite-based temperature measurements. They showed that absorption by CH4 and N2O are both completely negligible, regardless of the fictional calculations of “Global Warming Potential” (GWP.)
View attachment 130257


Prof. William Happer. Professor of Physics at Princeton University

The difference between the black and red line is the difference between current 400ppm CO2 and the “catastrophic” effect of “doubling” to 800ppm CO2

Hard to see a difference that is cause for any concern.

Review or download the paper at Cornell University :-

[2006.03098] Dependence of Earth's Thermal Radiation on Five Most Abundant Greenhouse Gases

Also an article published as International Journal of Modern Physics B, Vol. 23, No. 3 (2009) 275–364 , DOI No: 10.1142/S021797920904984X

[0707.1161] Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics

Cornell University – Falsification of the atmospheric greenhouse conjecture.

Both peer reviewed scientific papers based on repeatable empirical, experimental and observed data - not the fanciful multiple order "modeling" which is often touted as "Data" turning centuries of science on its head.

Certainly temperatures are well correlated to CO2 but then again so are flying saucer sightings – correlation without causation.

Before we go wrecking the global economy to ward off a largely imaginary problem you need to be sure of your facts.

Don’t believe me or anyone else – and particularly not the alarmism touting, scientifically ignorant mainstream media.

I have been studying this for over 15 years and remain solidly unconvinced in the validity of almost all of this farrago. My "notes" on this run to over 220000 words - which I have as a 17Mb MSword document file - if you would like a copy send me a PM.

I'm not a "denialist" but I am a skeptic - which should be the default mode for any scientist - not belief or fashionable grant seeking dogmas so prevalent amongst academics over this, the latest doomsday cult to inflict itself on mankind.

Regards, Ken

And yet, after all that, climatologists, people that made a career out of assessing all the factors that go into and have gone into climate change in the past, not engineers and physicist, disagree with those few that say it's not a problem. My perspective is this, considering the consequences of being wrong, who do you believe, the 99.9999% that say it's a problem or the 0.0001% that say it isn't, would you bet an engineering design on the same criteria and what's the downside of not cleaning up?
BTW, this topic should be stopped by the moderators, it's somewhere between politics and religion, facts just don't seem to matter much and it will create hard feelings between factions, it always does.

 

[davidyat]

In 1965 in a college Physics lab, I learned electrolysis by separating water into Hydrogen and Oxygen with a car battery and a bucket of water. HHMMM, I wonder if I could run my car on water? The Hindenburg showed me that Hydrogen burns. I even bought a DIY instruction on how to build it but burned out during the build. And John above reminded me that politics and corporate money get in the way. And you cannot change things overnight. If you could run your car on water tomorrow, think about how many people would be out of work instantly? This would probably shock the world economy into a REAL depression. I'm told these days, extracting Hydrogen out of water is too costly. And I'm saying, when the last drop of fossil fuel is coming out of the ground, the oil companies will say the next day, "Look, we just discovered how to get Hydrogen out of water efficiently". And if you discover how to do it, the minute you apply for a patent, someone will be at your front door with a 10 million dollar check for the patent and put it on a back shelf. If you don't sell, Corporate money will tie you up in court until the day you die. Look back through human history and tell me when money DIDN'T run the world.

 

[SmithDoor]

This group can rebuild the engine and if no parts make them on spot.

Dave

 

[Nerd1000]

In 1965 in a college Physics lab, I learned electrolysis by separating water into Hydrogen and Oxygen with a car battery and a bucket of water. HHMMM, I wonder if I could run my car on water? The Hindenburg showed me that Hydrogen burns. I even bought a DIY instruction on how to build it but burned out during the build. And John above reminded me that politics and corporate money get in the way. And you cannot change things overnight. If you could run your car on water tomorrow, think about how many people would be out of work instantly? This would probably shock the world economy into a REAL depression. I'm told these days, extracting Hydrogen out of water is too costly. And I'm saying, when the last drop of fossil fuel is coming out of the ground, the oil companies will say the next day, "Look, we just discovered how to get Hydrogen out of water efficiently". And if you discover how to do it, the minute you apply for a patent, someone will be at your front door with a 10 million dollar check for the patent and put it on a back shelf. If you don't sell, Corporate money will tie you up in court until the day you die. Look back through human history and tell me when money DIDN'T run the world.

People are still working on hydrogen. Splitting it from water is only about 50% efficient, but that is totally fine if your energy source is free (like the wind or sun).

The main issue is the difficulty of storing and transporting the stuff. It's the lightest known gas, and is actually very low in density even when liquid (and getting it to be a liquid requires insanely low temperatures). Hydrogen fuel cell powered cars have so far stored it as a gas under extreme pressure, the tanks are made of carbon fiber with very thick walls. I can't imagine a tanker truck built this way, probably they'd have to store it as a liquid. Hydrogen is also notorious for its explosion hazard when it leaks, the range between upper and lower explosive limits is very wide, ignition energy is low and it can undergo a 'deflagration to detonation transition' when burning near irregularly shaped objects.

You can of course run a combustion engine on hydrogen, but it's a bit less efficient than a fuel cell. No CO2, but the high flame temperatures will create NOx pollutants so a SCR aftertreatment system would be needed like in a diesel.

 

[almega]

Tesla is now the best selling (not just electric car) car in California and in several other countries.

It would be good if you would check your facts (or provide citations) before you post. In 2020, there were 145,009 EV vehicles (not just Tesla but all EVs) sold in California while there were approximately 1.9 million new personal vehicles total that were registered in California.

 

[SmithDoor]

Let's see how electric car do when need a new battery pack.
The electric car maybe like electric forklifts in junk yard needing a battery's

Dave

It would be good if you would check your facts (or provide citations) before you post. In 2020, there were 145,009 EV vehicles (not just Tesla but all EVs) sold in California while there were approximately 1.9 million new personal vehicles total that were registered in California.

 

[djswain1]

Let's see how electric car do when need a new battery pack.
The electric car maybe like electric forklifts in junk yard needing a battery's

Dave

Certainly at today battery prices I suppose it depends on the cost of the replacement in the future when the batteries are dead or capacity drastically reduced. I imagine companies will pop up doing refurbed battery packs etc once the demand is high enough.