Mitsubishi Electric Car Just Landed.

[Peter89]

people keep forgetting buying a second hand car is better then buying a new car.

reusing cars is the best way to reduce pollution in general.

[Kujotk]

people keep forgetting buying a second hand car is better then buying a new car.

reusing cars is the best way to reduce pollution in general.

yup but then there would be no money put into research of new technologies if everyone keeps buying 2nd hand, that and then safety will not keep improving, economies would slow down significantly in countries where automotive industry is a significant amount of their GDP.

But you are right, on a purely "green" way of looking at it.

If OZ turned to nuclear power there would be no need for coal burning on such a large scale, the cost of electricity (after the nuclear plants are paid for) would be much much less than it will be if we keep chasing after coal reserves deeper and deeper underground and further and further away from the major cities.

Sure Nuclear can be dangerous, but they can also be built far away from anywhere of significant population in Australia, they don't need a huge number of people and equipment to maintain it, no greenhouse gasses, don't have to be built were coal reserves are. Sure you think of chinobal (don't know how to spell it) but that is one plant in the last 30 years. And i'm pretty sure Australias safety inspectors are allot better than some USSR guys. In sydney there is a medical nuclear reactor that is within sydney city limmits, if it did blow up then all of sydney and wollongong would be destroyed, the new one is opperating and the old one lived its life right to the end with no probs. Is there really a difference between a medical reactor and a power station reactor? The waste they produce is dangerous, but there is very little of it, every 3 months there is 1/3rd of a shipping container of waste. We have unused land so waste isn't an issue for us and with every passing day there are advancements in technology to make used nuclear fuel rods harmless.

Lets face it wind and solar are not at the top of our govs agenda so there is no point chasing that one any time soon (even though we have plenty of wind and sun)

just some food for thought

[mad082]

yup but then there would be no money put into research of new technologies if everyone keeps buying 2nd hand, that and then safety will not keep improving, economies would slow down significantly in countries where automotive industry is a significant amount of their GDP.

But you are right, on a purely "green" way of looking at it.

If OZ turned to nuclear power there would be no need for coal burning on such a large scale, the cost of electricity (after the nuclear plants are paid for) would be much much less than it will be if we keep chasing after coal reserves deeper and deeper underground and further and further away from the major cities.

Sure Nuclear can be dangerous, but they can also be built far away from anywhere of significant population in Australia, they don't need a huge number of people and equipment to maintain it, no greenhouse gasses, don't have to be built were coal reserves are. Sure you think of chinobal (don't know how to spell it) but that is one plant in the last 30 years. And i'm pretty sure Australias safety inspectors are allot better than some USSR guys. In sydney there is a medical nuclear reactor that is within sydney city limmits, if it did blow up then all of sydney and wollongong would be destroyed, the new one is opperating and the old one lived its life right to the end with no probs. Is there really a difference between a medical reactor and a power station reactor? The waste they produce is dangerous, but there is very little of it, every 3 months there is 1/3rd of a shipping container of waste. We have unused land so waste isn't an issue for us and with every passing day there are advancements in technology to make used nuclear fuel rods harmless.

Lets face it wind and solar are not at the top of our govs agenda so there is no point chasing that one any time soon (even though we have plenty of wind and sun)

just some food for thought

not quite. technology could be developed to retrofit old cars. a bit like LPG conversions.

[BASHO]

Got to love the rhetoric on the enviromental value of second hand cars ,- how many of us on here actualy have brand new cars I wonder---.

I for one know that between keeping my R34gTt and the missus's PT Cruiser on the road in good seviced order I'm Donald Ducked if I could afford a third,-- newby or anything else.

[Atomnaya]

My biggest concern is the batteries that these electric cars use to store power. Like the majority of things manufactured, those things things will fail and need to be discarded. It probably takes more resources to discard the battery safely than a regular car would.

[mad082]

My biggest concern is the batteries that these electric cars use to store power. Like the majority of things manufactured, those things things will fail and need to be discarded. It probably takes more resources to discard the battery safely than a regular car would.

don't forget that the amount of polution generated just creating the batteries is more than running a big v8 for a few years.

[Marcus89]

actually that's far from correct. by viable do you mean 'environmentally friendly'? or do you mean economically feasible? or politically expedient? the renewables you speak of are significantly more expensive in terms of $/mWh than is coal-fired electricity. As for EVER seeing our energy supplies completely sourced from renewables (presumably this excludes coal and nuclear - which generate over 90% of the worlds supply), you and I will be long dead before this happens. Why else did the Vic government renew the leases at Loy Yang for a further 35 years, meaning that they will likely be operating another 35 years.

And as far as hydrogen is concerned - it is a pipe dream right now. We all know how the story ends - no more oil (as exploration and supply costs would overtake consumer's willingness to pay the price, as alternatives come on stream). The question is - which way do countries / industries / manufacturers go in creating the next big thing. China clearly appears to be going electric (they don't suffer the view of some that every kWh must be wind-powered). America and Australia appear to be going E85.

Anyway, this is all largely speculation - we'll see in the next week or so if that announcement re E85 comes out. In the meantime, I'm buying CSR!

What i mean by electric cars not being viable would be on an environmental scale when taking into account the amount of cars that will be running these vehicles especially with developing countries such as china and india who have massive populations in comparison to Australias. Now global warming is not guaranteed to be linked to pollution although there is alot of information that points to this being fact. So if every car in the world were to be electric and these were powered from coal and nuclear power (remember to take in a full life cycle analysis of both which makes nuclear and coal power just as bad as eachother albiet in different ways) then the environmental cost would become phenomenal.

Hydrogen is a very viable form of energy but a safe way of releasing the hydrogen to needs to be found. This car here seems to have a good idea: http://www.hydrogencarinfo.com/scorpionhydrogencar.html. Around 170km/10l is fairly good efficiency although an issue that needs to be taken into account is the creation of the fuel cells could cost far too much or be made of dangerous/hazardous materials which then would counter the benefits of the vehicle. No one type of alternative fuel can really be written of altogether and they all have their pro's and cons the real thing that is needed is the backing of big brand companies to get a particular type going and public support of the vehicle in the form of good sales and all of a sudden that will be the next big thing. Just have to wait and see.

[sneakey pete]

And where do you propose we get the hydrogen from? It'd have to be produced from water, which would take, guess what, electricity! just like the electric cars would anyway, in regards to pollution. In other words, if every car was to become hydrogen power, they'd actually all be powered from coal and nuclear too.

The good news, i don't think nuclear power is anywhere near as bad for the enviroment as you make it out to be, minus of course, any meltdowns.

[Marcus89]

And where do you propose we get the hydrogen from? It'd have to be produced from water, which would take, guess what, electricity! just like the electric cars would anyway, in regards to pollution. In other words, if every car was to become hydrogen power, they'd actually all be powered from coal and nuclear too.

The good news, i don't think nuclear power is anywhere near as bad for the enviroment as you make it out to be, minus of course, any meltdowns.

Basically the way i see it is for the best chance of a sustainable future is to start getting out power from a renewable resource in the first place then anything is viable. ATM things like desalination plants for water are not worthwhile due to the fact that we are still using fossil fuels.

Nuclear plants do not release many toxins when actually producing power but the by products have a half-life of up to 100 years and where are they gonna store all the nuclear waste. Who wants to have a nuclear waste dump in any kind of vicinity to them noone. So then they would need to carry the waste to a far off area to dispose of the waste which uses fuel which causes emissions (unless of course they are using a alternative fuel). Now after all the waste is dumped it can't just be left it is going to have to monitored often to make sure there is leaks and have checks to see levels of radioactivity left and it doesn't add up to being cheap.

[PranK]

I must admit, I haven't read every post in this thread, but I totally agree that hybrid cars enable the owner to take a typical 'out of sight, out of mind' approach. Much like landfill, who cares where the rubbish ends up, as long as its out of my house, right? If I am not pumping fuel into the car, then it *must* be cleaner?

Besides that, my biggest gripe with Hybrids is that nobody seems to think of the damage caused by creating and disposing of those batteries! Holy hell, can you imagine what is required to make that many deep cell batteries? Yikes!

Hybrids are ridiculous. We're looking at replacing our Forester soon, I think we'll almost definitely join the turbo diesel brigade.

Great post btw.

[Kujotk]

i'm pretty sure that disposing of hydrogen batteries from the amount of prius available today would most probabl;y far out weigh a nuclear plants total waste for atleast many many years, i'm not sure of the exact figures, but its obvious that these bateries are a bigger problem than trying to dispose of nuclear by products.

Not to mention we have massive amounts of desert that is uninhabited by people and even most animals in the middle of our country, at the moment we are sending our spent fuel rods overseas, we can always send our future spent rods to countries like uganda, no its not fair for them, but at the end of the day america will end up doing that anyway...

[Eugene2032]

Once they start becoming affordable like other vehicles, i will get one.

[ARTZ]

I must admit, I haven't read every post in this thread, but I totally agree that hybrid cars enable the owner to take a typical 'out of sight, out of mind' approach. Much like landfill, who cares where the rubbish ends up, as long as its out of my house, right? If I am not pumping fuel into the car, then it *must* be cleaner?

Besides that, my biggest gripe with Hybrids is that nobody seems to think of the damage caused by creating and disposing of those batteries! Holy hell, can you imagine what is required to make that many deep cell batteries? Yikes!

Hybrids are ridiculous. We're looking at replacing our Forester soon, I think we'll almost definitely join the turbo diesel brigade.

Great post btw.

totally true, When electric vehicles can be solar powered, GREAT ,,until then im glad hybrids have stupid names cause only stupid people buy them....

Diesels are the worst contributors to smog there is, so if you like our skys grey and not blue and not being able to see 6 feet in front of your face.. get a diesel...I drive through melbournes city tunnels daily and i cant breathe by the time i get to the end of the burnley tunnel some days, when stuck behind a couple of old trucks..As much as people say "but the new ones are cleaner" BS...they are only clean cause they are new, give em 20 years they will be smog buckets..But most people only care about there hip pocket not the planet ,thus making diesel popular ... IMO...Diesel

E85 could be great for australia cause we have masses of sugar cane crops.. but food should be grown to feed people not move fat people around?? Question is, if you had the choice of eating ,or fuelling your car, which would you choose??????

Hydrogen, Remember has only water as an emission, so really the fuel source is renewing itself..Although it may take some electrolysis to make it it in the first place it is in the long run a very plentiful source of fuel. And probably still cleaner than the other options.

Edited May 7, 2010 by Arthur T3

[sneakey pete]

We have nowhere near enough sugar crops to even think about powering, say, all of the vehicles in the country on it. hell, i'd be willing to bet we wouldn't even have enough to power all the cars in QLD.

[mad082]

totally true, When electric vehicles can be solar powered, GREAT ,,until then im glad hybrids have stupid names cause only stupid people buy them....

Diesels are the worst contributors to smog there is, so if you like our skys grey and not blue and not being able to see 6 feet in front of your face.. get a diesel...I drive through melbournes city tunnels daily and i cant breathe by the time i get to the end of the burnley tunnel some days, when stuck behind a couple of old trucks..As much as people say "but the new ones are cleaner" BS...they are only clean cause they are new, give em 20 years they will be smog buckets..But most people only care about there hip pocket not the planet ,thus making diesel popular ... IMO...Diesel

E85 could be great for australia cause we have masses of sugar cane crops.. but food should be grown to feed people not move fat people around?? Question is, if you had the choice of eating ,or fuelling your car, which would you choose??????

Hydrogen, Remember has only water as an emission, so really the fuel source is renewing itself..Although it may take some electrolysis to make it it in the first place it is in the long run a very plentiful source of fuel. And probably still cleaner than the other options.

that's not quite true. emission laws are constantly changing. cars from the early 80's and earlier wouldn't pass current emissions even if they were new. they wouldn't even come close. for starters they don't need cat converters. the emission laws changed in approx 1985 (guessing here) but it was the reason why holden used the nissan engine in the VL. hell even the NEO RB motors and SR motors won't pass the current emission test for brand new engines. that is why most of them got scrapped. so you will find that the new diesels are much less poluting than the old ones. but then you also can't compare an old truck to a new car as the emissions laws for trucks are totally different to cars. and diesel has a much higher visible polution, but that doesn't mean it is worse.

the other thing to consider is the actual pollutants in the diesel fumes to that of petrol. petrol has a higher CO2 level, but diesel has a higher NOx level.

[mad082]

oh and if all cars go hydrogen powered and are emitting on;y water vapour, i can see a problem with that too. major cities will become extremely humid in summer and also mould will become a major issue, especially in tunnels and inner city areas where there is limited breeze because of tall buildings, resulting in health issues from allergies, etc.

[ARTZ]

Id rather a bit of humidity than smog anyday...and there is always exit mould , though i doubt it would be that much of a problem....

New diesel technology is making them (like petrol engines) more efficient of course..But mostly lighter (though use of alloys)and smoother running, so they can go in smaller cars. Which they sell off as "New technologies"...just because they have a smog filter doesnt make them any better than the old ones...And what happens when people get lazy and dont service them, they will run like the crappy smog tractors they are..

Talking to a bloke topping up oil in his new jetta or audi,cant remember which, had 40,000kms on it a nd was using 1 litre of oil a week...Then spoke to another guy at a workshop had the same problem..

Way i figure it stop messing around ..leave diesel for the trucks , petrol for the cars and electric for the poofs...stop wasting money on useless go no-where old technology and invent something groundbreakingly new like cars that run on human excrement....or household rubbish.....

[KezR33]

Imagine an electric GTR launch!

[ARTZ]

im not saying electric isnt fast...it can be but .....

its for the gheys....just as diesel is for repressed homos...

Edited May 11, 2010 by Arthur T3

[Kujotk]

I don't see any problem with diesel cars, in the real developed world, they have been using it as a staple for decades.

As for the apparent Jetta that goes through a litre of oil a week, that sounds like a load of bull... if it's true then there is something wrong with THAT car, not diesel cars, i'm sure there are plenty of petrol engines that have that same prob...

and no i'm not a greeny and i dont own a diesel as a car, but i have a transit van in turbo disel and it goes more than enough... then the other cars are a 2.5l v6 turbo, a 3.2l v8 twin turbo, and a high reving 9000rpm 3.6l v8 so the carbon emissions I produce by myself off sets 400 prius's per minute lol