Re: Digital Tools Help Users Save Energy, Study Finds

["Robert Green" <ROBERT_GREEN1963@xxxxxxxxx>]

"Lewis Gardner" <lgardner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:478b911d$0$26905$d94e5ade@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Robert Green wrote:
> > (and I KNOW you're old enough to remember the exhaust of a
> > high compression 1960's V-8!),
>
> All other factors being equal a higher compression engine would have
> lower emissions due to increased efficiency.

That's way beyond niggling.  All other factors weren't equal and still
aren't and I would bet money you know that.  My point, which you seem to be
deliberately trying to miss, remains intact.  In the time frame I mentioned,
the exhaust from a high compression, large bore V-8 couldn't be tolerated by
most humans I know.  Yet you can stand next to a much newer Jaguar V-12 and
if it's tuned properly, you'll neither hear nor smell the engine at idle.
You'll just feel the heat when standing near the hood.  That certainly
wasn't true of my old XKE.  You couldn't even run that with the garage door
open for very long before the fumes overcame you.  The point is obvious.  No
matter what Big Auto said, it turned out that car exhausts could be cleaned
up, and without making cars too expensive to purchase.  We need to apply
that same effort to cleaning up power plant exhausts.

> In another post Robert Green wrote:
>  > People who didn't want to play along could buy auxiliary
>  > generators that often have small bore, dirty engines.
>
> Bore size has NOTHING to to with the relative emissions of a internal
> combustion engine.

<sigh>  Is there anything in the phrase "small bore, dirty engines" that
implies causation?  Of course not.  We both know that small bore engines are
incredibly more likely to be source of pollution for any number of reasons.
Would you have been happier if I just said "dirty engines?"  I could see
your point if I somehow implied or stated that just being small bore means
dirty, but that's not what I said.  I simply described the size engine
likely to be found in generators people might use to defeat the proposed
remote thermostat law.  Since I'm sure you know what I was referring to,
I'll quote a source that can explain it in more detail:

http://www.egr.msu.edu/erl/Small%20Engine%20Emissions.html

"In very approximate terms, about 15 million cars and light trucks are sold
annually in the U.S., compared to about 35 million small engines. While each
automobile is typically operated between 100 and 1000 times longer than each
small engine, their emissions are 100 to 1000 times lower."

So yes, bore size doesn't *have* to mean "pollutes more" but in every study
I've ever read on the subject, that connection is as plain as the smog in
the morning sky.  Maybe you've got some sources that say otherwise?

The sad part is if these are the two trivialities you've zeroed in on, then
I think you missed the entire point of the messages you're picking at.  I'll
repeat:

Big Auto howled worse that Big Electric when told to clean up their act, but
they did it.  They did it mainly because their business survival depended on
it.  Why  Because the Japanese *could* and *did* build cleaner engines.  Had
Big Auto thought of a retrofit they could apply the way Big Electric is
trying to pass the buck with CFLs, I'm sure we would have all ended up with
them bolted to our cars.  Oh, wait - they did!  The hyper-expensive
catalytic converters were like the CFLs and for a while inhibited research
on better combustion techniques.

The CFL law is a charade designed to focus attention away from the real
problem:  cleaning up power plant smokestack emissions.  Worse, still, it
replaces (and perhaps adds to) mercury going up the stack with mercury
entering the groundwater.  Good deal for the polluters, not so good for
consumers.

--
Bobby G.