#CleanPoweredCars #GasolinePoweredCars #California #cars #transportation
California wants to ban the sale of new cars solely fueled by gasoline by 2035.
Used gas-powered cars will be allowed, but no new ones can be sold, according to the plan.
Certainly, climate change is real, and California is among the places hardest hit.
But it begs the question: how many used gasoline-powered cars will still be on the road?
It also begs the question: how long will it actually take to eliminate all gas-powered cars? The big issues are having enough rapid-charging stations, and how governments will cope with the decreased revenue from the gasoline tax, according to David Wickert, transportation writer for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Georgia is poised to become a leader in the manufacture of electric cars and the batteries that fuel them.
Here’s a thought: what if someone could come up with a way to convert internal-combustion cars to electric, hybrid or hydrogen power?
But, first things are first. As previously stated, there have to be more rapid-charging stations before we go entirely non-combustion.
Then, we have to look at auto manufacturing. It appears the big car companies are moving quickly away from internal combustion engines. That’s a good sign.
Then, the price of the clean-powered cars has to come down. The recent bill passed by Congress offers assistance in purchasing clean-powered vehicles, but to qualify, the vehicles have to be priced in a certain range. In other words, there are no subsidies to buy expensive cars, even if they are clean-powered.
Getting back to a previous thought, what does one do with a perfectly good gasoline-powered car? The body may be good enough to last for years. Would you spend, say, a few thousand dollars, or perhaps a bit more, to change out the guts of your car so you can drive your “new” clean-powered car?
Many would, perhaps. But now, there is no technology to do that. One might predict that someone, somewhere is working on that technology.
This news reminds us that transitions are hard. We may all want to do the right thing — the world may command us to do the right thing.
But moving from one era to the next requires infrastructure changes, innovation and the courage to move to something different. It’s also requires government to re-imagine revenue streams, as Wickert points out. All of these things can take time.
California is trying to provide that transition time. Can the innovators pull it off within that time?
Transitions are also messy. For example, if your gas-powered car craps out on you between now and then, and you can’t live without a car, what do you do that will solve your practical problem now, yet comply with the future new rules?
The lesson here is that we should have been preparing for this transition long before we did.
Certainly, it’s easier said than done. Hindsight is always 20-20.
But just because we are starting the transition in earnest later than we should have been doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it.
The warming planet certainly isn’t waiting for us humans to act. It will keep warming, causing all sorts of disasters.
We just have to do the hard, messy things as we can. In fact, most of life’s journey involves hard, messy things. What’s convenient at the moment is not always the right thing for the future.
So, if you are not ready to ditch your gas-powered vehicle for something that runs much cleaner, your best bet is to hope you can buy enough time until the technology allows you to convert that vehicle, or the vehicle craps out on its own. Hopefully, you’ll be able to afford the change.
Peter
Tag Archives: David Wickert
WEARY TRUCKERS HAVE FEW PLACES TO REST
#truckers #trucking #RestForTruckers
Truck drivers are expected to rest after so many hours behind the wheel.
And in and around some big cities, where a big chunk of their deliveries and pickups take place, there are few places to park and take a break.
This causes drivers to waste time behind the wheel looking for a stopping place.
David Wickert, a reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, discussed this issue as it pertains to Atlanta in the Sept. 18, 2017, edition.
Driving a truck can be grueling. So, any wasted time behind the wheel exacerbates the problem.
“That’s trucks that are driving more than an hour for essentially no reason (looking for a place to rest),” Wickert quotes Daniel Studdard, the Atlanta Regional Commission’s freight planner.
So why not build more private truck stops? Local residents may balk, objecting to the noise and other nuisances linked to truck stops, Wickert writes.
Freight traffic in Atlanta is expected to rise 76 percent in coming decades, Wickert writes, so a solution to the problem is a necessity.
Or is it? Let’s examine the problem. As long as humans are driving trucks, rest periods will be required. But what if the trucks become driverless in the coming decades?
Anyone who drives for a living, be it a truck, bus, cab, ride-sharing vehicle etc., has to be concerned that their jobs could disappear over time.
The driverless vehicles have yet to be perfected – a fatal accident involving a driverless vehicle occurred recently — but there are lots of companies, Google among them, working on them.
First, it will be driverless cars. Then, who knows what vehicles will become driverless.
Remember, it’s the human drivers who have to rest, not the vehicles.
Who knows how long it will take for driverless trucks to be the most common delivery vehicles?
If you drive for a living now, and want to prepare for the day when your truck, or whatever you drive, will be driven by a computer, you should consider a Plan B – something that will give you an income when your windshield time goes away. There are many such income-producing vehicles out there. To check out one of the best, message me.
Meanwhile, there will be a temporary problem for human drivers around big cities. In Atlanta, Wickert quotes an ARC survey, eight counties around Atlanta have no private parking for truckers. Parking along the side of the highway is prohibited, not to mention unsafe. Some truckers have resorted to that, Wickert writes. Or, they park on private property without permission.
When Willy Seals, 70, parked his rig at a Home Depot parking lot, it was booted, Wickert writes. It cost Seals $250 to get the boot removed.
So Atlanta, and undoubtedly other metropolitan areas, is struggling with this problem. How temporary it will be will depend on the technology.
Meanwhile, not only will there be little rest for the weary, but also a lot of wasted road time and fuel, not to mention the increased possibility of accidents etc.
The drive to make driverless trucks, therefore, becomes a potential nightmare for all those fatigued drivers.
Peter