Environmentalism

[Kyuuketsuki]

@DLF:

Yes PETA takes it too far (way, way too far). I don't hate the fur trade ... how can I when I wear leather (I absolutely love leather!)? What I hate is the killing of endangered species for pretty much any reason and the killing of an animal (even domestic ones) for just vanity (for example I consider mink farming wrong inasmuch as they only use the fur which is an utter waste of a resource, but I consider that an improvement on killing endangered species).

I agree about stopping SUV's although I heard Arnie drives one that is pretty much environmentally friendly (as far as vehicles go) SUV ... but yes, in principle small cars are better. I have a Vauxhall (GM) Vectra estate which is quite large by UK standards and I drive to work in it ... in my defence we have 2 cars 1 for me to drive, 1 for my wife and we work in different places (geographically), hers is small (a new Fiesta) and I car share so I attempt to reduce env. costs (we have to have 1 bigger car for going on holiday and taking our daughter up to university in Sheffield, 225 miles away). Also, though I suppose it's easy to say, I would be one of the first in the queue to buy an electric car if it were more environmentally friendly and I would accept the hit if were slightly m,ore expensive (money) and not as good in performance terms (who cares if I can't do 90 on a motorway?)

Kyu

[leo-rcc]

You can do 90 on the motorway, in fact you can do pretty much everything with an electric car you can in any fuel driven car. An added bonus with electric cars is that you have maximum torque at any speed so you accelerate like a bat out of hell.

The main problem is range. There is a trade off between weight, volume and range. If you want to travel far, you need a lot of battery capacity and that means adding more weight to the car and sacrificing space to accomodate the extra batteries. At the moment the A123 systems look the most promising (http://www.a123systems.com) but they are still very expensive if you want to use them in a car.

I use these cells in a few of my robots, saving me a large amount of weight and they have a lot of power for such a small cell. When the technology improves, this is a real contender. DeWalt is using them in their 36V cordless powertool range.

[Tiberius]

I thought the main problem was refueling. Doesn't it take about an hour to refuel an electric car in order for it to travel 300 miles or so?

[leo-rcc]

I can do it in 25 minutes with the A123 batteries, but yes it takes some time. But like with my cars and helis and robots you can either swap batteries, or for instance charge where you park like a parking lot at work.

In order for electric cars to work on a large scale, you will need to get an infrastructure in place where you can do either option.

The batteries can be swapped out on a deposit base, where you only pay for the charging, and not the batteries themselves. Basically the same way I pay for my co2 and argon for welding. You dont pay for the bottle except for a deposit and they swap out the bottles when I need more gas. If I decide I don't want their gas anymore, I just return the bottle and get my deposit back.

Charging points will be a thing that needs to come from the companies that have the parking spaces and endorse electric cars, and if possible at home.

This is not something that will happen in 1 year or even 5 years, this will take time. In the mean time the progress on battery research is only improving, making safer and more high capacity fast charging batteries all the time.

And if during this time a better alternative comes along, I would endorse that too.

[leo-rcc]

It seems Portugal has started implementing it:

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/wheel...ctric-cars

Prime Minister Jose Socrates is seeking to make Portugal a European trendsetter in green transport. In June, he launched groundbreaking plans for a nationwide network of recharging stations that would allow battery driven electric automobiles to cruise the highways.

[dry land fish]

Kyu:
We need leather and leather isn't exactly fur. The fur farms in China are absolutely horrible. They are so inhumane. I watched a PETA investigation video on the net of a Chinese fur farm. chinese fur farm

[leo-rcc]

Thats an odd destinction, the fur is bad, but the skin we scrape the fur off before we use it is okay?

[dry land fish]

Thats an odd destinction, the fur is bad, but the skin we scrape the fur off before we use it is okay?

No. It depends on how it's done. There is a humane way of killing an animal. I can't think of any use for wolf hyde or raccoon hyde. We use hyde from cows because we slaughter the cows anyway for food. We don't eat most animals that we would use for fur. You don't kill an animal unless you want to eat it. That animal can provide other needful things but you don't harm any animal unless you first need it for food. Native Americans used animal hyde for clothing to keep them from being harmed by the elements. They used fur for those reasons too. They never wasted any part of any animal out of respect to that animal. Today we slaughter animals for fur because someone wants to pay a lot of money for it as a fashion piece. They take the rest of the animal and just throw it aside. That is what makes the fur trade so wrong. It's fueled by fashion.

[leo-rcc]

So how about rabbit fur? We eat rabbit.

[dry land fish]

So how about rabbit fur? We eat rabbit.

Do you really eat those things? I don't know anyone that eats rabbit any longer around here. I don't even know anyone who hunts rabbit any longer here. I guess if you are going to kill the animal to eat it...then if you want the skin of the animal then go for it. The whole idea is not to be wasteful and not to confuse a need to nurture yourself with the want of something expensive.