Environmentally Friendlier Motoring

[lew]

True ink.......but I was 18 and young and youthful and..... ;D

Right back to the thread sorry again wy (maybe we should start a this is/was my car thread, making sure reg plates are blacked out) back again to subject matter.......on the top of this thread two sites for cars that run on H20 or not run anyway I'm going to have a butchers

[Wyvern]

I have ads for large sized jumpers...

Like I said, I don't mind where the thread goes. Keeping old cars on the road is a very green way of motoring. You can get your old Landy, Ink could revisit the Capri and I'll finally track down that old 8mpg Rolls-Royce and then we can take them to a Friends of the Earth rally and show them how green our cars are

[mayfan1]

Hello there everyone. First post, and of course I have to choose this topic because it's near and dear to my heart.

I'm trained as an environmental chemist, and I spend my days testing soil and water and other things for all sorts of things that will make you sick, and the environment is a pretty near and dear subject to me... something I've had to try to combine with my love of Top Gear as well!

There is SO MUCH garbage information out there on both sides of the spectrum that I really enjoy reading intelligent and well thought out articles on the subject. I personally drive a 12 year old Dodge that gets quite fantastic mileage (over 30mpg on the highway here in the States) and while I really love some of the other machines out there, I just can't justify getting rid of this one just yet.

I attend the Detroit Auto Show on occasion, and it's always fasincating what they come up with - maybe they'll even find one yet Jezza can stand.



Nice to meet you all, by the way!

[inky]

Hi mayfan1. We have our own enviromental expert ;D I bet not many boards can say that. Make sure you join in on the other threads

[mayfan1]

Awww well thank you, could you tell my superiors I am an expert and therefore deserve a far greater salary?

I do love TG, and will join in as much as I can and as time allows.

[lew]

mayfan.......welcome An environmental bod ;D.....well as ink says we now have one

[Mayfayre]

World's First Hybrid Motorcycle.

[lew]

Now that is erm.......different ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D god that must hurt ;D

[inky]

I just had to send that link to Dave, the mad motorbiking OAP. He'll love it ;D

[lew]

Well after dealing with the kids and dog puke.......this is so funny maybe a Jezza.... "look what I found on the internet" ;D though it's not rude enough ;D

[Wyvern]

Reviving this one because someone's made another interesting electric car...

I'm not bothered either way by the whole 'it's powered by wind' thing, because most people, if this ever becomes commercially viable, will plug it into the mains and power it with whatever comes out of the National Grid. On the very big plus side, they aren't planning to patent the work they're doing, instead making it open source so anyone can develop it for their own electric drivetrain.



I think the very best thing about it, though, is that at last someone has made an electric car that has its own sound. It sounds like a jet fighter! That's more like it, and better than adding fake engine noise.

Yet again, the donor car is a Lotus. Their lightweight cars make them ideal as a basis for this kind of experimentation, and indeed, they were the inspiration for the Tesla Roadster (the first ones actually being built in Norfolk).

Which begs the question: why don't Lotus build their own electric sports car?

[ulstermayniac]

Maybe because all the other ones don't quite stack up the the petrol variety? Who knows.

[Wyvern]

I would say the whole problem of efficient hydrogen production means that electric cars are probably a big part of the short term future, though - and if everyone else is building electric testbeds from Lotuses, surely if Lotus were to develop their own from scratch, it would be even better than some of the work people have done with them as a basis. Of course, it would be expensive to develop an electric drivetrain, but I am beginning to think that manufacturers who don't seriously look into alternatives to petrol and diesel are being a bit shortsighted.

I don't like it, but it's a fact I'm grudgingly having to accept; even if global warming turns out to be nothing to do with cars, aeroplanes or even cow flatulence, and even if it turns out it was all made up as part of an international conspiracy to make us all wear sandals, one of these days the oil is going to run out. We're going to need an alternative.

And just when it was beginning to look like electricity might be the only alternative after all, some scientists in Ohio have found a cheaper, more efficent means of producing hydrogen fuel - and they're not taking the pee...

[ulstermayniac]

I do agree with you, one day the oil will run out that is a given but I think that, yes, global warming or climate change, is the term I prefer, is happening, the only reason we can see it happening is because we have the technology to be able to monitor it now, lots of sophisticated computery type devices. Also, if the scientists look back at history, they will realise that climate change has been happening since day one of Earth. We have had an ice age and we are not in it now so the climate changed. The climate will continue to change as long as the Earth is 'alive' and to say that it is because of something that people/machines are doing I think is ridiculous.

Thanks for that link. Seems a bit odd. Also, if they do manage to achieve that, won't it smell terrible? Like running a car on chip pan fat, that must stink to hell!!

[Wyvern]

You're right on the subject of climate change being a natural process - technically, we are in the interglacial period of an ice age, according to geologists who know about these things. Change is inevitable, what is disturbing now is the rate at which it is happening. What I want to know is how much can be put down to human factors and how much of it would be happening whether we were here or not. I'm not for one minute suggesting that we should carry on regardless - it's important to value the resources we have - but I'm bothered by the unbalanced reporting on both sides of the argument. It's as irresponsible to say it's nothing to do with us as it is to say it's all our fault when for a typical lay person like me, there is simply no easily accessible, properly balanced information that takes into account all these factors.

And yes, cars run on chip fat or curry fat (I've seen that done, car smelled like a curry house) really are whiffy. However, the difference with extracting hydrogen from urea is that it just takes one element from the compound. Pure hydrogen from urine would be the same as pure hydrogen from water, so it shouldn't be a problem. And actually, some cars already use urea to reduce nitrogen oxide(s) emissions.

Of course, I'm sceptical because the technology is, as usual, unproven at large scale. However, if they can make it work, and possibly even improve the efficiency, it could be something pretty major - fuelling cars from an endless supply of waste material. I'm going to keep an eye on this one.

[ulstermayniac]

Yeah, good point. I do think that hydrogen is a better way forward than electric but it will probably be more expensive to develop.