Are automobiles a major cause of global warming?

stever

"Unprotected" or "uncontrolled" intersections make everyone slow down and pay attention. Calms traffic and reduces the number of accidents. It forces drivers to make eye contact with anyone else in the intersection, including pedestrians or bikers, and requires everyone to negotiate their passage through the intersection. You can't do that and text and yap on your cell.

gagrice

I'll give them credit that some intersections finally have a blinking yellow left

I had not seen those until this trip to the Midwest.

On 4way stops. They work fine where people are not brain dead and don't pay attention to who's turn it is. I would prefer yield signs on the less traveled cross street.

fintail

Uncontrolled intersections might make bikers behave better, too.

stever

Sure, since we're going to run the stop sign anyway. Be easier to take them down instead of changing all the laws to conform with Idaho's model bike laws where that's permitted by statute.

fintail

Unfortunately, for better (and more efficient/greener) driving, better driving training, standards and expectations are needed. Unfortunate because we're dumbing down, not smartening up.

fintail

Take them down, and then bikes can yield to cars when required at intersections, and vice versa - no more cutting in without fear.

Allowing an already abusive group to run signs won't work in the real world, but maybe in Idaho :shades:

stever

already abusive group to run signs

Are you referring to cell yakkers in their SUVs or those newly arrived "others" who don't meet your driving standards? :P

Better rethink trying to hold bikers to motor vehicle standards - they'll start taking the whole lane (as they already are entitled to do), wait for the light or traffic to clear, and then slow you down as they clear the intersection.

fintail

Nope, this time it is smarmy bikers of debatable riding skill who often endanger pedestrians and motorists alike.

My standards aren't too high - the one worlder coexist standard is a failure when it comes to driving. Thanks.

If Smarmy McBikerson, the overpaid underworked boomer public sector slacker who thinks he is in the Tour deFrance can blow through signs, no reason I shouldn't be able to stop and go on a stuck red. Less global warming via less needless idling, you know. No way to defend giving them all the rights and none of the responsibilities. I wonder how much pollution is created by the production and shipment of their often Chinese-made bikes and gear, too.

gagrice

Uncontrolled intersections might make bikers behave better, too.

No surprise so many are killed each year. They cut across in front of traffic diagonal. One slip and they are dead meat. I would ban them except on separate bike trails paid for by the bicycle industry and riders.

fintail

I have no problem with bikes on the road, if they share, take rights with responsibilities, and don't lecture about being "entitled". If I am in a car holding up others, I have to move over. A bike can do the same. But really, this is for the biker forum. I wonder if the outgassing by bicyclists creates any global warming :shades:

gagrice

I wonder if the outgassing by bicyclists creates any global warming

I would say there methane output is off the scale if they are VEGAN bikers. Should be taxed for excess GHG.

carnaught

I especially "like" the bikers who ride two to four abreast instead of (gulp) single-file in high traffic areas.

gagrice

Is our lower pollution causing worse storms?

Man-made particles lowered hurricane frequency: study

Higher levels of air pollution reduced the frequency of North Atlantic hurricanes and other tropical storms for most of the 20th century, a study said Sunday.

Adding to evidence for mankind's impact on the weather system, the probe found a link between these powerful storms and aerosols, the scientific term for specks of matter suspended in a gas.

Aerosols can occur in natural form -- as dusty volcanic plumes, clouds or fog -- but are also man-made, such as sooty particles from burning coal or oil.

Conversely, the study found that measures since the 1980s to tackle pollution and improve air quality reduced levels of aerosols -- and in turn ramped up hurricane activity.

"The clean-up of industrial aerosols in the last 20 years, while being beneficial for human health and linked to a recovery of African Sahel rains since the 1980s droughts, may have contributed to increases in Atlantic hurricane activity," Booth said by email.

The authors said their study, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, is the first to demonstrate a link between aerosols and Atlantic tropical storms.

http://www.france24.com/en/20130623-man-made-particles-lowered-hurricane-frequen- cy-study

gagrice

CA’s legendary energy efficiency is statistical myth

Levinson concludes that the data undermine support for California energy efficiency standards as the cause of the state’s relatively lower energy usage. The data indicate California’s energy efficiency standards have not been effective, should not be tightened or adopted elsewhere, and cannot reduce “global warming or climate change.”

http://www.calwatchdog.com/2013/07/16/cas-legendary-energy-efficiency-is-statist- ical-myth/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=facebook

gagrice

Who is Obama fooling with CC BS?

texases

Anytime somebody calculates the actual benefit of reducing new car CO2 emissions, in terms of impact on global warming in degrees, it's TINY, and the costs are HUGE. But it makes folks feel better.

gagrice

Not to mention the latest Obama trip to Africa probably spewed more CO2 than the continent generates on its own. At least as much as a large city.

Mr_Shiftright

That's what a president is supposed to do, or would you have him fly economy without bodyguards or communications? EVERY PRESIDENT travels this way. Such criticism is classic straw man.

gagrice

I think you know that NO president and first lady before Obama has traveled with as large an entourage. No President before Obama made such a fuss about global warming or CO2 emissions. That to me is hypocrisy. Getting any kind of honest answer on which president was the most wasteful is difficult. If you are going to preach against wasting natural resources you should practice what you preach.

Obama’s lavish Africa vacation consists mostly of sightseeing and entourage of 1,000

Most of ‘Obama’s press‘ have ignored the Obama African vacation. Aside from it’s cost to the tax payers of between $60-100 million, it really has served no interest to America, other than wasting tax dollars for yet another Obama vacation.

http://www.fireandreamitchell.com/2013/06/30/obamas-lavish-africa-vacation-consi- sts-mostly-of-sightseeing-and-entourage-of-1000/

Mr_Shiftright

Consider the source of your "news". That website is some kind of illiterate raving. I'm certain you can do better than that when discussing issues are serious as global warming, please!

And speaking of the topic at hand...I can address some of the issues facing California.....

One big problem we are facing is acidification of the oceans. We are noticing the weakening of the shells on shellfish due to the fact that the oceans surrounding us are absorbing too much carbon dioxide. This has been going on since the Industrial Revolution and is reaching a critical state in some areas of the coastal ocean. Given how much is absorbed, this problem can't possibly improve in the near future, even without more emissions.

one cannot "potshot" the GW issue---it is complex...extremely complex ecosystem at work here, and to merely treat it as if it were not all inter-connected is to oversimplify the issue immensely.

The human race is rollin' BIG DICE right now. As with nuclear war, one cannot afford to be wrong.

gagrice

Overall we are in agreement especially when it comes to pollution of the Rivers, lakes and oceans. What I don't like about the slap bang CA approach is mandating changes that are not feasible and then screwing the tax payers and utility consumers to pay for their mistakes. Such as mandating Wind and Solar farms, then putting road blocks to implementing them. I as an electric customer should not be penalized for their incompetence. You should well know incompetence in your part of the state with the Bay Bridge fiasco. Or the EV mandate in the 1990s that was premature. Now again it is premature. The technology is not here yet. When it is then you mandate.

By the way. I would not eat anything anymore that comes out of the ocean. And I love seafood. I eat Tilapia raised on high class farms. No Chinese, indonesian, Vietnamese fish enters my body.

fintail

I was going to say, I wonder how much of that comes from China...

gagrice

About 75% of all tilapia sold in stores comes from China. A lot of the catfish as well. Costco owns aquaculture farms in Costa Rica. All the fresh tilapia (never frozen) comes from their farms. You can tell the difference. No muddy taste like too much of the frozen fish you get.

Americans ate 475 million pounds of tilapia last year, four times the amount a decade ago, making this once obscure African native the most popular farmed fish in the United States.

Last year, more than 52 million pounds of fresh tilapia were exported to the United States, mostly from Latin America, as well as 422 million more pounds of frozen tilapia, both whole and fillet, nearly all from China, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/02/science/earth/02tilapia.html?pagewanted=all&_r- =0

Mr_Shiftright

I think part of the problem is that not everything California tries actually works, but that the consequence of doing *nothing* is far worse than trying and failing half the time.

Like I said, it's my belief that we are in grave danger here, and unlike past obstacles, on this one failure is not an option.

Also I think the global ecological systems are incredibly complex and we certainly do not completely understand them--which means that there could be things going on that we haven't a clue about.

Yeah, it might be "shot-gunning" but the last thing I want to see us doing is putting our heads in the sand.

gagrice

I think our leadership in CA is doing exactly that. Putting their heads in the sand. They are running off business at the rate of 5.4 per week. We have 35% of the population on Welfare. We are the most poverty stricken state in the Union at 23.9%. And horrible unemployment. Each one of the job killing mandates is responsible for another nail in our coffin. Clean air and water is important. Is it worth bankrupting the state over? As you agree our planet is a complex group of systems. Is saving a fish species worth wiping out the states agriculture base? If you can believe scientist 95% of all species are already extinct. So is saving the smelt worth 30% unemployment in the nations bread basket? Is having wind farms worth destroying raptors and the CA condors? All complex questions that rarely take the citizenry into consideration.

http://www.abcbirds.org/newsandreports/releases/130524.html

Mr_Shiftright

Oh dear, where do you get these "facts"?--someone is doing you a disservice. You must try a more reputable source of data.

The percentage of Californians on welfare is 3.8%.

Which I might add, is nothing to brag about, that's true.

But regardless, that is just an irrelevant straw man argument when talking about global warming issues.

People talk as if things in nature are not connected---as if one can choose...."well, it's either the spotted owl or jobs".

This is a false dichotomy to say the least.

If for instance all the honey bees are destroyed, we WILL begin to starve---or at least have to drastically change our diet to grains.

The tab is due. We've been freeloading on nature all these years, and now we have to give up something ourselves.

gagrice

The tab is due. We've been freeloading on nature all these years, and now we have to give up something ourselves.


Who says?? some fat cat professor making half a million a year off the rest of US? One of the I got mine screw the rest of you bunch.

There is NO scientific evidence that our planet will do anything but continue to do what it has done the last 25 billion years. It gets hot, it gets cold. And silly man thinks he can change it.

As for Welfare, Our local liberal rag says it was at 34% of the people in CA receiving welfare a year ago. I know it has gone up. We are one of 11 states that have More people on welfare than are working.

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/Jul/28/welfare-capital-of-the-us/

I guess I got my numbers wrong on the Poverty rate. We are the highest in the Nation only at 23.5%. I blame it on our lousy liberal government and their constant regulating businesses till they leave the state. I guess we will provide a pristine environment for the homeless and welfare class that outnumbers the working class in the state.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/14/california-poverty_n_2132920.html

scwmcan

Sorry Gary you have misread that article, it says that 34% of all welfare recipients in the US live in California, not that 34% of the population of California is on welfare ( of course it is still not a good number, but not quite the situation you are thinking it is). I am sure the reasons you suspect are valid, but your percentage is indeed off, or perhaps you just had a slip of the fingers and that is what you meant in the first place.

gagrice

That makes it an even higher percentage in CA. At last count 48 million are on food stamps. 34% of 48 million would be about 16 million. CA has 37 million people with 16 million on welfare which is roughly 43% of Californians receiving welfare. Some reports say over 100 million Americans receive some form of welfare. That does not include SS/MC. 34% of that would be nearly everyone in the state of CA. I don't believe that to be true. So if someone has a credible source stating the number in CA on welfare I would be happy to change my thinking. Until then, from what I see around me, I would say at least a third of all Californians are getting some sort of freebie from the tax payers.

All are exhaling CO2 and part of the GW problem.

Mr_Shiftright

It's easy enough for you to do the homework on this. These figures are readily available.

What on earth this has to do with global warming escapes me, but by all means, keep trying. :P

California has dictated automotive emissions policy throughout the United States, and set the standards, so if California is wrong, than most of America is wrong along with it, by definition.

If most of America is wrong about emissions control, then what is the right way?

Doing nothing is not an option IMO. That would be a tragic miscalculation.

The clock is ticking here, and we are running out of time.

houdini1

How about quoting some of your liberal rag sources?

On second thought, don't bother. Most of the "facts" being bandied about are just someone's opinion, and not worth the paper they are written on. Each of us has a duty to do their own research and come to their own conclusions...and be willing to change those conclusions if the facts demand it.

In my opinion (just as good as anybody's) most of the things you are espousing do much more harm than good. History will not treat our current crop of global warming ravings kindly.

fintail

Of course, if you read the data, you'll see a lot of red states lead the nation in poverty. The top 10 being: CA, AZ, FL, GA, AR, LA, HI, AL, MS, SC. A lot of union hating areas there, most of which are far from the "liberal" boogeyman who is always out to get us.

If CA is such a hellhole, move. You can find cleaner air and a lower cost of living elsewhere. But there will be other trade-offs too.

I wonder how many years worth of automotive emissions will be exhaled by the next volcanic event.

houdini1

Ca. and Hi. are red states?

gagrice

According the the Left wing Media too many people has EVERYTHING to do with GW. And the methods used in CA to stop GW have killed jobs and forced people into poverty and then onto welfare.

I am not against clean air. Which has very little to do with the GW war on CO2. Claiming CO2 as a pollutant is laughable. Without it we would all be dead. Or the plants would all be dead and we would follow. If in fact CO2 was the true GW cause, I would think CA would have mandated diesel cars that put out far less CO2 per mile than gasoline cars. Just the opposite happened as CARB had a war on diesel engines for quite a long time. If the Eco nuts running CA wanted to stop GW they would build more coal fired electric generators. It is a known fact that SoX is a component of coal fired generators. It is also known to block the sun's rays and cooling the planet. We can likely thank Chindia for providing SoX and slowing the warming trend. Which is likely a normal change in the scope of our planet.

So yes California's misguided war on GW has destroyed millions of lives and put tremendous burdens on the few of US left paying the bills. With a little luck I will be able to get out of here before I am left to blow out the candles.

gagrice

Ah but CA is the leading state of POVERTY. Caused by its Blue/Green hue. CA needs more Union hating as the state is totally under the control of the Public Employee Unions. Leaving CA is not quite that easy. When family are concerned and property to dispose of. If I was living in an apartment, it would be a piece of cake to unplug the computer and shout SayOnara.

You can ask someone that lives in Kona about breathing VOG much of the year. It makes Los Angeles of the 1960s seem like clean air. No way to get away from it but leave that side of the Island.

fintail

I said a lot, not all. The majority of the top 10 are.

fintail

Probably a big part of it is the open door welcome everyone immigration standard supported by the bleeding heart idiot generation of 1968 and younger people who have been brainwashed by them.

I am sure you have ample money to deal with any property losses, and sometimes you have to live for yourself rather than for others. If it is so bad there, you'd be gone. It might be bad, but there must be enough good to keep you around

People still move to CA, and not just illegals and welfare queens - so there must be a positive,right?

Mr_Shiftright

" Academies of science around the world agree that climate change is real and caused largely by burning fossil fuels. So do many professional scientific organizations. Polls of scientists point to the same conclusion and so, now, does a review of the scientific literature. It shows that 97 percent of the time, scientists who express a view say that human activity is warming the planet."

Volunteers from the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University combed through 12,000 studies from around the world. In about a third of the cases, the authors took a position about climate change. In that group, only 2 percent of those papers rejected the idea that human activities cause climate change. This is published in the journal "Environmental Research Letters".

I think the debate on GW is pretty much over at this point, but of course, anyone is welcome to beat the head horse until his arm gets tired. :P

houdini1

Most of these "scientists" would say and do anything to keep their free ride going that is paid for by taxpayers. If a scientist disagrees, he is immediately cut off from those gov. grants.

"The debate is over" is a common refrain of liberals who only wish the debate was over...but the debates are just getting started. The climate debate is not over, the Benghazi debate is not over, the IRS debate is not over, the "fast and furious" debate is not over. One scandal after another.

Mr_Shiftright

Yeah, it's pretty much over. Beating on GW is like beating on Evolution--it's not the battle you want to fight anymore.

Science will just move on without you I think.

Or you could certainly focus on legitimate concerns on how monies are spent to combat Global Warming, as gagrice has pointed out--that makes more sense than denying it exists which I think is now an untenable position.

houdini1

The money being wasted is my main concern. People can espouse all the crackpot theories they want as long as they don't ask me to pay for it. All that tax payer money can be better spent elsewhere.

The sun drives 99.9 percent of our climate, and it operates on a natural cycle. When it is hot and dry in one place,it is cold and wet in another place. Nothing we do can do about it but gripe.

Any affect that man has on climate is so small it just does not matter.

Mr_Shiftright

The world's scientists don't agree with that position.

gagrice

I am not ready to get a divorce so I can have my way. I would probably move somewhere that has a real winter. That way I could button up the place and head to the Florida Keys or Belize or Costa Rica for the winter months. When you live in CA and have a one acre+ of garden. Many tropical plants, you cannot just leave it. We have to pay someone to stay at the house and water for us whenever we take a vacation.

That also irritates me as the state keeps mandating energy policy that raises the price of everything we need. No wonder we are a poverty stricken state. I doubt if the other 9 states have as many people in poverty combined as we do. We are close to 9 million people living below the US poverty level. A quick side trip off the Interstate tells the story of the 3rd World CA has become.

houdini1

They are paid not to.

gagrice

If a scientist disagrees, he is immediately cut off from those gov. grants.

That is the Liberal way of getting a consensus on anything. Get rid of anyone that disagrees. If you are a professor in most of our universities and say you believe in creation you run the risk of being fired. Yet the top DNA scientist in the World has gone from an atheist to a creationist based on his DNA findings. To say any scientific discussion is over and done is a closed minded view and bound to be shot down. Much like the flat earth believers were.

Dr. Francis Collins Obama appointee as director of National Institutes of Health. Does not buy the theory that evolution shoots down Creation.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/03/collins.commentary/

fintail

You need to sit her down and have a talk then :shades: - if you want that lifestyle, you get to pay for it. If a similar lifestyle can be had elsewhere, move. Does she mind the CA problems as much as you do? Or does she take the good with the bad?

Is the poverty a product of environmental regulation, or some of the sometimes idiotic population growth ideals that the ruling people have established? A trip outside of the affluent cities everywhere in the US will show some not wholly first world conditions.

houdini1

That is the Liberal way of getting a consensus on anything. Get rid of anyone that disagrees.

Isn't that also what the [non-permissible content removed] did? In the end it didn't work out too well for them.

gagrice

It is as much her as me. She just has a lot of family here in San Diego. The only place I could probably get her to move would be Hilo. We both love that place and the COL is well within our means. Then there is the energy factor. When you get to be 70 you don't have the get up and go that you had at 50.

I think the fact that California is considered the worst place in the USA to do business is a combination of foolish regulations and the worst taxes in the country. That has a lot to do with the high unemployment. Then you add the fact that the weather is conducive to sleeping in a tent or park bench and it is like a leech magnet. Having a food bank at about every Church is a draw as well.

Most people with money own residences in other states and just keep their CA home as a vacation place. I would bet 90% of Hollywood own homes in Las Vegas and claim them as primary residence.

fintail

But people keep on moving there, again, not just "takers", but productive people? There has to be a positive somewhere. Is the weather really that good? All of the dumb rules and eco-weenies and taxes, yet there's no brain-drain yet. Maybe the air being cleaner than it was 40 years ago helps.

No doubt there's a residence scam at play for some, too. I wonder what the Silicon Valley lottery winners do.

Mr_Shiftright

Another "false balance" there. Creationism is a perfectly fine belief system, but it does not belong in a science debate. It should be in a comparative religion debate. As for Prof. Collins, you didn't read the whole article. he says: ' Yes, evolution by descent from a common ancestor is clearly true. If there was any lingering doubt about the evidence from the fossil record, the study of DNA provides the strongest possible proof of our relatedness to all other living things."

bingo! Game over, thank you Dr. C! Mr. Darwin's book is ORIGIN of species.....not origin of life.

so we are now in agreement on that matter---great! :P

I think once the coastal cities start flooding out (some have already started) that there will be very few GW deniers to be heard; however the causes of GW will be legitimately debated in a scientific sense. Conspiracy theories are not science either and don't belong in the GW debate. Conspiracy is the weakest of all arguments, because they can never be proven--in fact, no conspiracy "theory" (a theory based purely on conjecture, speculation) has EVER been proven in all recorded history.

but WHATEVER--the point is that GW will have an enormous effect on car design, and it already is---and I think the effect will be quite beneficial!