Petrol/Diesel cars

Does charging a battery only half way do any longer term problems to the lifetime of the battery? honestly genuine question.

 

Good point; it would be a massive start to carbon free wouldn't it?

 

Or from plants, let them do the capturing.

 

What about the "mess" though? nivver get anywhere with one o' them

 

I obviously don’t know the answer to this, but we have learned some very costly lessons in regards nuclear power.

I think the question is whether or not we now have enough information to make nuclear power safe in the future.

 

As we (SWMBO and I ) are retired and due to Covid spent most of teh year in lockdown (some of it restricted to our on commune I have only put just over 2k miles on the car in the past 12 months... Now assuming it has depreciated around 2 grand in that time, annual tax is around 300 euros and insurance around 550 euros (damn those erratic, accident prone Italian drivers) as well as servicing cost fuel, wear and tear and etc it work out at about 1.60 euro per km. A 30km round trip to the supermarket therefore is around 46 euros. Yikes!!! I am sure ordering a taxi would be cheaper than that. then there is the cost of swapping the car and buying new. If taxis were more available round here it would make sense to use then and hire a car only when really necessary or use the excellent trains here. It is that convenience of being able to get into the car at short notice that is hard to shake off. We own our car bought for cash so if we were paying finance interest it would work out even more expensive.

 

46 Euros on petrol just to go to the supermarket!? Yikes indeed

and they say we need to reduce our carbon emissions.

 

Surely with a move to driver less cars only the rich will actually own one and the rest of us will be on public transport or hire a driver less one like an uber?

 

That includes the other costs and depreciation. It’s an interesting calculation to try for yourself if you have not already done so.

If you are NOT a high mileage driver, you may be surprised at the cost per mile.

We recently calculated that a quick trip to the supermarket cost my Father £7.50.

 

Interestingly there isnt actually the natural resources to sustain EVs as a long term solution.

 

By definition, nuclear power can't be safe. Well, not unless we find a way to turn radiation into pure air.

If you consider already how much radioactive material is current buried or housed somewhere. And that these materials will be dangerous for 10s of thousands of years. Its an irony when you think nuclear power is considered a clean fuel. And thats just the standard by product of producing energy, not even disasters. I read that the destroyed reactor ay pripyat (chernobyl) had finally had a permanent structure built over it last year. The structure is hoped to last for 100 years. At which point that structure will have to be taken down (somehow) and then treated as nuclear waste and stored, before they then go onto build something else.

Humanity seems very good at solving an existing problem by making another one to be solved further down the line... by somebody else.

 

I suspect in very short time, car travel will change massively. If we're to tackle climate change we're going to have to consider the necessity of travel. And for travel that is truly required, how that is done and how efficient it is.

 

I live about a mile from the nearest supermarket, which I can walk in about 10 minutes. I usually do a big shop when I need some petrol, so killing two birds with one stone

 

Why would anyone want to own one? The not too distant future won’t even have a steering wheel. They will be summoned by an app to do your bidding. I would imagine large areas of car parking will be taken up with cars recharging and waiting for their next call. Gone will be the days where you have to ask the taxi driver if he’s been busy!

 

Just so it's "yours " I suppose.

 

You're averaging 51mpg, which is not too bad...I have a Honda Civic with the dtech engine....driven carefully I'm averaging 67mpg, and that's measured over 2000 miles....which sounds great until you think our 1980's Vauxhall diesels would average over 60 mpg without even trying hard.

 

Fair enough, but I was responding to specific nuclear reactor disasters.

The situation at Sellafield is largely due to mismanagement too isn’t it?

I agree with you about the disposal of spent fuel. Are we not getting better at that either? Genuine question.