Is it something in the air ? (Page 1/20)
MidEngineManiac SEP 22, 04:06 PM
Or is it the water ?

WTF did I just read ?????
rinselberg SEP 22, 04:45 PM
You read the Daily Caller.

There's an element of truth here (likely; I have not researched this new report from the Daily Caller, per se) that diesel emissions from trucks have a disproportionately higher negative impact on the health of California's lower income residents (compared to all its other residents), because lower income neighborhoods are correlated with adjacency to trucking routes, in a way that is statistically differentiated from more affluent neighborhoods.

But that's not the most compelling of the arguments that comprise the rationale for the California Air Resources Board or CARB's interest in a proposal to mandate the full electrification by 2035 of medium and heavy-duty trucks serving ports and rail yards.

It's part of a general push for the electrification of California's road vehicles, as a way for California to contribute to the "decarbonization" of human societies around the globe.

Serving ports and rail yards accounts for a "goodly number" of the road miles from the category of "medium and heavy-duty" trucks.

Look for a medium or heavy-duty truck on a California road, and the odds that it is going to or from a port or a rail yard are "robust".

It's an obvious first step along the road (pun intended) that leads to the full electrification of California's road vehicles.

Leave it to the Daily Caller to spin this as an example of "identity politics".
Wichita SEP 23, 05:14 AM
Hudini SEP 23, 09:01 AM

quote
Originally posted by rinselberg:

You read the Daily Caller.

<snip>

Leave it to the Daily Caller to spin this as an example of "identity politics".




No spin here, stop gaslighting

“Decades of racist and classist practices, including red-lining and siting decisions, have concentrated heavy-duty vehicle and freight activities in these communities, with concomitant disproportionate pollution burdens,” the regulators stated. “CARB has legal and moral obligations to lessen these burdens.”
rinselberg SEP 23, 12:22 PM
It's Intersectional Politics. It's at the intersection of Identity Politics (minorities, racism, racist zoning and siting decisions, red-lining) and Evidence-Based Decarbonization Methodologies.

I can think of basic systems engineering reasons for singling out the trucks that serve container ship ports and rail yards for a first wave of freight truck electrification.

Think of a truck that shuttles freight between a container ship port and a close by rail yard, in an intermodal freight transport context. It creates a relatively short stretch of roadway where overhead electrification for trucks, or fast battery recharging infrastructure gets a lot of decarbonizing "bang for the buck." It also lends itself to an efficient deployment of "green" hydrogen infrastructure, for trucks that are electrified with hydrogen-powered fuel cells instead of (or as an optional mode, along with) batteries.

It's not just theoretical. There's a demonstration project in Long Beach involving a contract with Siemens for overhead electrification infrastructure for trucks. It's like the old city trolleys but with modernized overhead electrification. The exact situation I describe. For trucks shuttling freight between a container ship port and a close by rail yard.

I have some posts about it in some other threads.

The Daily Caller should have called (pun intended) this out in their report.

[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 09-23-2022).]

rinselberg SEP 23, 02:37 PM
Intersectional Politics here: It's an Intersection of Just America and Smart America. Just (as in Justice) America, cognizant of the history of racism, racist zoning and highway routing decisions, and red-lining that has led to minority-majority neighborhoods that are disproportionately impacted by diesel emissions from freight trucks. Just America, imbued with a moral imperative to seek rectification through electrification (of trucks) on this issue. And Smart America, knowledgable about the effects of carbon emissions on the entire planet's climates (global warming) and understanding of the connection with the electrification of the currently diesel powered truck fleet.

Will there be buy-in on this issue from Real America and Free America?

"How America Fractured Into Four Parts"
George Packer for The Atlantic; July/August 2021.
https://www.theatlantic.com...our-americas/619012/
rinselberg SEP 23, 03:07 PM
Is it something in the air ?

That's how this thread was titularized, and yes, it is something in the air. It's the carbon soot and other unhealthy air pollutants from diesel-powered trucks, which has a disproportionate impact on the minority-majority neighborhoods that are adjacent to the roads and highways where the trucks that serve ports and rail yards operate, and it's the carbon dioxide from all diesel-powered trucks that impacts, via global warming, the entire planet, and not just these particular neighborhoods.

I like this thread.
MidEngineManiac SEP 23, 03:50 PM
There are reasons cities went away from overhead electric and switched to LPG busses. I'm old enough to remember riding the electric "trolleys" as a kid.

First, operations are limited to only the path/corridor directly beneath the lines. If that path is blocked for ANY reason, there is no going around. Traffic stops until the problem is resolved.

Second, it makes no sense and is an economic nightmare to maintain 2 parallel fleets of vehicles, one for the electrified routes and a second for the normal roads.

3rd. Power outage, brown-out, low power, downed lines, blown transformer ect (already a huge problem in CA) means you are going nowhere in them.

As for the trucks or their power source being "racist" . Liquid fuel or steel-and-plastic thinking bad thoughts for themselves must come out of the same factory as the guns that go on shooting sprees by themselves.
rinselberg SEP 23, 04:18 PM

quote
Originally posted by MidEngineManiac:

There are reasons cities went away from overhead electric and switched to LPG busses. I'm old enough to remember riding the electric "trolleys" as a kid.

First, operations are limited to only the path/corridor directly beneath the lines. If that path is blocked for ANY reason, there is no going around. Traffic stops until the problem is resolved.

Second, it makes no sense and is an economic nightmare to maintain 2 parallel fleets of vehicles, one for the electrified routes and a second for the normal roads.

3rd. Power outage, brown-out, low power, downed lines, blown transformer ect (already a huge problem in CA) means you are going nowhere in them.

As for the trucks or their power source being "racist" . Liquid fuel or steel-and-plastic thinking bad thoughts for themselves must come out of the same factory as the guns that go on shooting sprees by themselves.


These objections have "holes" that are big enough for a full-size tractor trailer truck to go through.

What Siemens has installed in Long Beach and other locations is a modernized version of the old overhead electric trolly lines. A truck can disconnect from the overhead line at speed, if need be. It can disconnect and keep running on its stored battery power. That "moots" your first and second points.

As far as the third one... the trucks that would use the overhead electrified trucking routes are mostly the same trucks all the time. These are shuttle routes for trucks that move freight between a container ship port and a nearby rail yard, or between a container ship port or rail yard and a close by warehouse.

Power outages? The trucks can run on the energy that's stored in their batteries, and when that runs out... if the power still hasn't been restored, it's not an insurmountable problem. Gasoline and diesel refueling facilities are not usable during power outages unless they have backup generators or batteries to power the pumps that pump the fuel.

No one is describing the trucks that are currently operating or their diesel engines as "racist". That's a distortion of what the Daily Caller reported. It's the history of racial discrimination in the form of discriminatory zoning and highway planning, and the discriminatory financial red-lining by banks against home buyers on their home loans that has been racist and "classist" (economic stratification by income level or "class").

That is history that cannot be denied. It's the history that has resulted in the disproportionate adjacency of minority-majority neighborhoods to the roads and highways that have the highest concentrations of diesel-powered truck traffic.

"The future is your friend."

[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 09-23-2022).]

Wichita SEP 23, 07:54 PM
This leftist simp momentarily set his arm on fire to protest the use of airplanes.



I guess he is suffering from climate anxiety, like the rest of them.

Oh well.

[This message has been edited by Wichita (edited 09-23-2022).]