Petrol prices

[expat]

(05-05-2010 11:27 PM)Della Wrote:  I think your logic is flawed Chester. A bus may be 3 times as long as a car but the engine in a lot bigger. Also it is diesel and therefore pollutes far more, particularly with nitrogen which stays around ground level and is bad for people with asthma. 3 cars could potentially hold 5 people each, so even by your logic, a bus would need to have 15 people to be preferable to cars.

I have suggested solutions to public transport - scrap buses and replace with taxis that run around bus routes for a reduced price. Oddly, shortly after I suggested this on here, this was implemented in rural locations around Basingstoke, possibly co-incidence, who knows. For even greater efficiency, bus journeys could need to be booked in advance (by phone, text, email etc to make accessible to all) and if there are not enough bookings, the taxi doesn't run and those who have booked are contacted and informed.

Plently of gas driven buses around.

You seem to be forgetting the pollution caused by the production of a 'car for everyone'.

[non-stick]

There are also plenty of "gas" driven threads on this forum

[Della]

(05-05-2010 11:52 PM)expat Wrote:  You seem to be forgetting the pollution caused by the production of a 'car for everyone'.

That is a good point. I suspect that cars would fare very badly compared to buses on that score but favourable compared to trains. In more general terms, we often focus on one point (e.g. disposal) when considering environmental issues whereas the environmental impact of production is usually the greatest. I recently upgraded my heating boiler to a new 'environmentally friendly' model using significantly less gas and polluting less than the old model but I dread to think of the environmental impact of changing a working boiler for a new one.

[Chester]

(05-05-2010 11:27 PM)Della Wrote:  I think your logic is flawed Chester. A bus may be 3 times as long as a car but the engine in a lot bigger. Also it is diesel and therefore pollutes far more, particularly with nitrogen which stays around ground level and is bad for people with asthma. 3 cars could potentially hold 5 people each, so even by your logic, a bus would need to have 15 people to be preferable to cars.

Nothing wrong with nitrogen - it's chemically inert and makes up 80% of the atmosphere.

Your logic only makes sense if drivers fill their cars with people - they don't.

[non-stick]

(07-05-2010 02:36 PM)Chester Wrote:  

(05-05-2010 11:27 PM)Della Wrote:  I think your logic is flawed Chester. A bus may be 3 times as long as a car but the engine in a lot bigger. Also it is diesel and therefore pollutes far more, particularly with nitrogen which stays around ground level and is bad for people with asthma. 3 cars could potentially hold 5 people each, so even by your logic, a bus would need to have 15 people to be preferable to cars.

Nothing wrong with nitrogen - it's chemically inert and makes up 80% of the atmosphere.

Your logic only makes sense if drivers fill their cars with people - they don't.

remember when clarkson stood in a field by the motorway putting a quid in every time a car went by with more than one occupant - didn't cost him much.

[Della]

(07-05-2010 02:36 PM)Chester Wrote:  Nothing wrong with nitrogen - it's chemically inert and makes up 80% of the atmosphere.

Your logic only makes sense if drivers fill their cars with people - they don't.

OK, I phrased it badly. Counting the number of people in a car isn't a fair measure. A fair comparison would be the pollution caused by a bus carrying 3 people or whatever the average number is to the average number of cars carrying the same number of people, say compare the emissions between a bus and 3 cars. As buses spend so much time running round almost empty, I think cars will prove better for the environment.

I don't know the chemistry behind it but I do know that exposure to emissions from diesel engines is considered a hazard in the workplace by the HSE; exposure to emissions from petrol engines is not. Asthmatics are severely affected by emissions from diesels engines. I would love to see them banned or at least banned from town centres to improve air quality for all.

[Chester]

(08-05-2010 04:56 PM)Della Wrote:  

(07-05-2010 02:36 PM)Chester Wrote:  Nothing wrong with nitrogen - it's chemically inert and makes up 80% of the atmosphere.

Your logic only makes sense if drivers fill their cars with people - they don't.

OK, I phrased it badly. Counting the number of people in a car isn't a fair measure. A fair comparison would be the pollution caused by a bus carrying 3 people or whatever the average number is to the average number of cars carrying the same number of people, say compare the emissions between a bus and 3 cars. As buses spend so much time running round almost empty, I think cars will prove better for the environment.

I don't know the chemistry behind it but I do know that exposure to emissions from diesel engines is considered a hazard in the workplace by the HSE; exposure to emissions from petrol engines is not. Asthmatics are severely affected by emissions from diesels engines. I would love to see them banned or at least banned from town centres to improve air quality for all.

Or better still let's hae the buses fuller.