What's the Point of Hybrid Cars If These Are Still Running?

[Elomin Sha]

My grand father a few months back asked me if I knew about the 15 most polluting ships in the world. I said no and I decided to get round to look them up. These 15 ships produce more pollution than all 750m cars. Why are people pushing us all to drive hybrids when these 15 ships wipe all that out in one go?

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/04 ... n-cars.php

[Agloriouscuppa]

My grand father a few months back asked me if I knew about the 15 most polluting ships in the world. I said no and I decided to get round to look them up. These 15 ships produce more pollution than all 750m cars. Why are people pushing us all to drive hybrids when these 15 ships wipe all that out in one go?

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/04 ... n-cars.php

hybrid cars are actually not very good for the environment if you account for their production, the materials for the batteries have to be mined shipped to Korea/Japan to be turned into batteries then sent to factories to be placed in cars which then have to be shipped to their destinations. So by buying a hybrid your impact is minimal at best.

As for shipping, I dont see why ships could not incorporate solar or wind power, especially since we now have solar panels which can absorb all kinds of light. Alas for any real action to take politicians would have to put aside petty differences and come to a consensus and that seems unlikely.

[Keab42]

Ships used wind power for centuries..

[Telaril]

I've never been able to find a citation direction for the hybrid car batteries environmental impact story. I'm not disbelieving it, but as soon as I heard about it I tried to research it and came up with nothing EITHER way.

I really wish they would release those new hyper-efficient diesel models here in the US. The diesel mini gets BETTER gas mileage than most hybrids and is adorable. I would buy one instantly if I could get it in this country.

As for why you do little things when there are so many big awful things out there... well there are two reasons. The first is that every little bit helps, every flood begins with a single raindrop, all that rubbish. The other reason is to try not to go insane from a sense of powerless. If I recycle everything and vote dem/green and drive a hybrid I can't reasonably be expected to do anything else, right? Oh god we're all going to die.

[Tim]

Yes, hybrid cars have environmental impacts from their production.

So do other kinds of cars.

[Alja-Markir]

I find it hard to believe there are only 750m cars in the world.

Also, with the ships is may be a matter of scale. How much cargo can they transport? How efficient is their pollution to utility ratio? It's not to say they shouldn't be made more efficient if possible, but it could be an interesting point of balance.

~Alja~

[Telaril]

Yes, hybrid cars have environmental impacts from their production.

So do other kinds of cars.

Well yes. The unverified story is that the environmental impact from building a hybrid car is so much greater than the environmental impact from building any other car that is completely cancels out any fuel you might save for the life of the car and, in fact, pollutes more than an ordinary car.

That's the claim I'm curious about.

[Theremin]

It sounds just a little bit too convinient to be true.

More like a smear than a fact.

[Alja-Markir]

Also, considering that cars can be on the road for ten, twenty, thirty years...

~Alja~

[madrak_the_red]

And ships for even longer...

But you make a fine point when you point out the subject of scale: the amount of stuff theses ships carry is truly massive, and to transport the same amount by smaller boats, or if you compare the emissions that 'hybrids' (I lose the term loosely for current hybrids are often not hybrids) would emit in transporting the same amount of material the same distances, I think one would find that they would be rather higher.
As for why the ships don't run on wind or solar:
these would take up space that could be filled with more cargo
not nearly fast enough
no electric motor could ever be charged fast enough to produce enough torque to power these things. wind would also have a hard time getting them moving.
It's the price we pay for a consumer lifestyle, and it isn't going to go away any time soon. So we might as well make the effort to clean up in places that we CAN, like road transport. The same argument of changing other things applies to air travel. We're gonna have to suck some things up, that's just how it goes.

[Lord Chrusher]

Cargo ships use massive, slow speed diesel engines. These engines are quite efficient and produce a relatively low level of green house gasses. However ship engines burn the cheapest but also the dirtiest fuel, fuel oil. Fuel oil usually has a high sulphur content along with other impurities. Marine diesels also lack filters to remove the large amount of particulate produced by incomplete combustion and produce large amounts of nitrogen oxide.

All these problems can be resolved by switching to more modern, cleaner burning diesels and using higher quality, low sulphur fuel. This switch has already been made or is under way for most diesels on land such as those in trucks and in diesel locomotives. This has been accomplished by national governments (and the European Union) imposing standards. Unfortunately the situation at sea is more difficult. Most ships are registered in third world countries (flags of convince) with relatively lax regulation and it is easy to switch registration to avoid onerous regulation.

[Ed.]

It sounds just a little bit too convinient to be true.

More like a smear than a fact.

more a twisting of the facts

Hybrid causes way more pollution in production i know that much its certainly worse than a car with equal MPG and some convention cars now have even better MPG.

My guess is they compared a hybrid with a conventional car that has only slightly worse fuel economy in which case the claim would be very true

[TomBrend]

Cargo ships use massive, slow speed diesel engines. These engines are quite efficient and produce a relatively low level of green house gasses. However ship engines burn the cheapest but also the dirtiest fuel, fuel oil. Fuel oil usually has a high sulphur content along with other impurities. Marine diesels also lack filters to remove the large amount of particulate produced by incomplete combustion and produce large amounts of nitrogen oxide.

All these problems can be resolved by switching to more modern, cleaner burning diesels and using higher quality, low sulphur fuel. This switch has already been made or is under way for most diesels on land such as those in trucks and in diesel locomotives. This has been accomplished by national governments (and the European Union) imposing standards. Unfortunately the situation at sea is more difficult. Most ships are registered in third world countries (flags of convince) with relatively lax regulation and it is easy to switch registration to avoid onerous regulation.

Or diesel gensets and PODS!

Pods are cool... but really expensive and relatively fragile.

[Dubious_wolf]

Well I'll tell you why we drive hybrids. Let's say I drive a hybrid. It gets better gas milage, better milage means I don't need a lot of fuel, less fuel means more money, more money = more hookers and blow. Simple equation really.

[TomBrend]

Except you'll pay 50% more for your car, which is less money than you'd spend on gas for quite a while.

[Metcarfre]

...Unless the government gives you a rebate for some reason.

[sdhonda]

Well I'll tell you why we drive hybrids. Let's say I drive a hybrid. It gets better gas milage, better milage means I don't need a lot of fuel, less fuel means more money, more money = more hookers and blow. Simple equation really.

I like your thinking.

[Sieg Reyu]

I find it hard to believe there are only 750m cars in the world.

Also, with the ships is may be a matter of scale. How much cargo can they transport? How efficient is their pollution to utility ratio? It's not to say they shouldn't be made more efficient if possible, but it could be an interesting point of balance.

~Alja~

Maybe it means literally only cars. Not trucks SUVs and Vans. In that case the number seems more likely.

[Lord Chrusher]

Cargo ships use massive, slow speed diesel engines. These engines are quite efficient and produce a relatively low level of green house gasses. However ship engines burn the cheapest but also the dirtiest fuel, fuel oil. Fuel oil usually has a high sulphur content along with other impurities. Marine diesels also lack filters to remove the large amount of particulate produced by incomplete combustion and produce large amounts of nitrogen oxide.

All these problems can be resolved by switching to more modern, cleaner burning diesels and using higher quality, low sulphur fuel. This switch has already been made or is under way for most diesels on land such as those in trucks and in diesel locomotives. This has been accomplished by national governments (and the European Union) imposing standards. Unfortunately the situation at sea is more difficult. Most ships are registered in third world countries (flags of convince) with relatively lax regulation and it is easy to switch registration to avoid onerous regulation.

Or diesel gensets and PODS!

Pods are cool... but really expensive and relatively fragile.

Deep sea ships spend weeks going in a straight line at consent speed. There is no point using diesel electric propulsion in a cargo ship. A slow speed diesel can be directly connected to the propeller so no gear box is required. You would lose power both in the generator and in the electric motor. Why use a more expensive, less efficient propulsion system. Shipping companies are cheap, dirty bastards.

[Alja-Markir]

Want to destroy the global ecomony? Sabotage freight shipping. The whole shebang'll come crashing to a halt.

~Alja~

[Lord Chrusher]

You could seriously mess up the global economy by laying some World War I era naval mines in a few harbours such as Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Rotterdam, Los Angeles and Vancouver.

[Elomin Sha]

HEY! Have you been looking at my world domination plans Crusher?

[Ed.]

Well I'll tell you why we drive hybrids. Let's say I drive a hybrid. It gets better gas milage, better milage means I don't need a lot of fuel, less fuel means more money, more money = more hookers and blow. Simple equation really.

Why not get a super efficient diesel then more money saved.

[TomBrend]

Cargo ships use massive, slow speed diesel engines. These engines are quite efficient and produce a relatively low level of green house gasses. However ship engines burn the cheapest but also the dirtiest fuel, fuel oil. Fuel oil usually has a high sulphur content along with other impurities. Marine diesels also lack filters to remove the large amount of particulate produced by incomplete combustion and produce large amounts of nitrogen oxide.

All these problems can be resolved by switching to more modern, cleaner burning diesels and using higher quality, low sulphur fuel. This switch has already been made or is under way for most diesels on land such as those in trucks and in diesel locomotives. This has been accomplished by national governments (and the European Union) imposing standards. Unfortunately the situation at sea is more difficult. Most ships are registered in third world countries (flags of convince) with relatively lax regulation and it is easy to switch registration to avoid onerous regulation.

Or diesel gensets and PODS!

Pods are cool... but really expensive and relatively fragile.

Deep sea ships spend weeks going in a straight line at consent speed. There is no point using diesel electric propulsion in a cargo ship. A slow speed diesel can be directly connected to the propeller so no gear box is required. You would lose power both in the generator and in the electric motor. Why use a more expensive, less efficient propulsion system. Shipping companies are cheap, dirty bastards.

You ever seen someone try to dock a cargo ship? It's worth it to put pods on them, IMO. They're putting pods on cruise ships, tugs, coastal cargo ships, large pleasure vessels, and supply vessels. I don't think anyone has put one on a large cargo ship yet.

They're actually pretty efficient, the generator can be designed to be very efficient at one specific speed and torque and awful at the rest, then always run at that speed and torque. I would agree that it's more expensive to run than a plain large diesel, but the insurance savings almost balance it out.

[Master Gunner]

You could seriously mess up the global economy by laying some World War I era naval mines in a few harbours such as Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Rotterdam, Los Angeles and Vancouver.

While I can't do that (yet), I am presently in a position to seriously hamper the transport of French Fries throughout North America.

The shipping industry is far more complex than most people realize, which just makes it all the easier to break .