Re:Decades of diesel use in Europe have created a public hea...
by tomxor on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @08:06AM
(#21202357)
> probably a racist cyclist even emits PM2.5 though nothing like a diesel truck. So this isn't a problem we can entirely solve
Oh man i hate those racist cyclists :P
Re:Decades of diesel use in Europe have created a public hea...
by tialaramex on Thursday October 10, 2019 @08:53AM
(#21213829)
Hmm, maybe an auto-correct error or maybe while editing I thought I'd written "racing cycling" and corrected to "racing cyclist" but actually I'd written "racing cyclist" and the change gave us this error.
So yes, whether racist or not, and indeed even if using some less conventional wheeled transport like a skateboard or shopping trolley - all fast wheeled travel creates PM2.5 pollution and we just have to suck it up. I presume maglev doesn't do this, but maglev isn't exactly at the top of the list of cheap inner city transit options.
Re:Decades of diesel use in Europe have created a public hea...
by tomxor on Thursday October 10, 2019 @04:45PM
(#21218976)
I've done this many times, where it's not actually autocorrect directly in error... it's me choosing the incorrect suggestion from autocorrect because the correct suggestion is absent _and_ i've not looked carefully enough. Probably so common because we tend to identify words by shape, so if the shape matches we pick it.
Re:Decades of diesel use in Europe have created a public hea...
by masswerk on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @07:49AM
(#21202250)
Also, during a transition period, before particle filters came generally in use, a few manufacturers burned the exhausts at high temperatures in order to reduce particle size and to pass tests. These nano particles become irreversibly embedded in lung and heart tissue and even pass the blood/brain barrier. Where I live, the percentage of diesel engines was pushed over 50% by a "green" engines campaign during these critical years. We're going to find out, what this may mean in terms of long term health implications.
Re:Decades of diesel use in Europe have created a public hea...
by vkou on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @11:21AM
(#21204048)
It's also worth noting that the reason to prefer diesel over gasoline is fuel efficiency. Diesel engines are more efficient than gasoline ones. Engines that run hotter are also more efficient - but the hotter your engine runs, the more NOx it produces.
Catalytic converter a pull most of the NOx out of a gasoline engine's exhaust, but don't work on diesels. Urea traps are an alternative, but an expensive one.
Re:Decades of diesel use in Europe have created a public hea...
by briffle on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @11:53AM
(#21204365)
Modern Diesels have some other tech to help lower the NOx levels (like EGR and SCR systems) but the main problems are that older cars didn't have such systems, plus, for many years, VW lied and faked data, partly to avoid having to implement SCR (saving thousands per car, and the re-engineering) and partly to say the cars were cleaner than they were.
Moden SCR systems (they inject DEF, aka, urea, into the exhaust) do a really good job getting rid of NOx.
NO2 output is higher for a modern diesel engine, and NO2 is poisonous. Not like "Oh my god I think I breathed some NO2 now I need to go to hospital" poisonous, but it's bad for you and wasn't there anyway. If Europe had decided it hated diesel and petrol remained more popular (as in the US) there'd be lower NO2 emissions in London.
PM2.5 (tiny particles) is higher for diesel. Again, breathing in a tiny particle that will then permanently get stuck in your lungs, damaging them in a minute but essentially irreversible way, is not going to send you to ER immediately, but it keeps happening and cumulatively, especially over a population, that means deaths.
As the article also points out PM2.5 doesn't even go away if you got rid of internal combustion engines. Just rolling at speed causes tiny pieces of the surfaces that come into contact to break off, probably a racist cyclist even emits PM2.5 though nothing like a diesel truck. So this isn't a problem we can entirely solve, but things like ULEZ aim to make it better, the argument is largely that they aren't enough (and apparently for this journalist, won't ever be enough).