Will putting a "hybrid" sticker on keep the greenies off your back?
05-20-2008, 07:57 AM
#31
JK Enthusiast
Yes, the earth is getting warmer, but it's not because of carbon gases. We don't know why it's getting warmer. We also don't know why it got warmer 600 years ago (and then cooled again). Or 10,000 years ago (and then cooled again). Or 50,000 years ago (and then cooled again). And so on. The planet changes over time, in cycles of hundreds or thousands of years. It's been going on for 5 billion years now, and will continue to go on for at least another 5 billion.
Global warming is a myth (or, more correctly, the supposed "cause" of global warming is a myth). The planet will continue to get warmer until it's done getting warmer, then it will start cooling again. There is plenty of research out there confirming this, but the sensationalist media ignores it because it's not interesting enough to get peoples attention (and get them to watch the news).
Last edited by undertow119; 05-20-2008 at 09:04 AM.
05-20-2008, 09:11 AM
#32
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I really like the sticker about using the gas the hybrids are saving... but I don't like the soda filled seats and pin stripping (made by car keys) that I imagine the sticker would bring.
05-20-2008, 12:36 PM
#33
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On the battery issue in most vehicles the components of a battery are reclaimable. I am not sure if the Prius batteries are but I would guess they are.
The bad part of this is even though we are comparing hybrids to gas guzzlers we are still in the apple to apple category when it comes to the impact on the environment. Both use gas, both take batteries, both need rubber tires, both are made from plastic and metal the list goes on. What we need is something that takes things to a whole new level either in construction components, fuel, or both.
The bad part of this is even though we are comparing hybrids to gas guzzlers we are still in the apple to apple category when it comes to the impact on the environment. Both use gas, both take batteries, both need rubber tires, both are made from plastic and metal the list goes on. What we need is something that takes things to a whole new level either in construction components, fuel, or both.
05-20-2008, 02:36 PM
#34
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Hidden cost of driving a Prius
Totaling all the energy expended, from design to junkyard, a Hummer may be a better bargain.
By James L. Martin
When it comes to protecting the environment, senior citizens should concentrate more on
the total energy consumed in building and operating a car than its fuel efficiency - no
matter how impressive the statistics appear on the window sticker at the showroom.
A prime example is Toyota's Prius, a compact hybrid that's beloved by ardent
environmentalists and that fetches premium prices because it gets nearly 50 miles-pergallon
in combined highway/city driving.
Yet, new data have emerged that show the Prius may not be quite as eco-friendly as first
assumed - if you pencil in the environmental negatives of producing it in the first place.
Like most hybrids, the Prius relies on two engines - one, a conventional 76-horsepower
gasoline power plant, and a second, battery-powered, that kicks in 67 more horses. Most
of the gas is consumed as the car goes from 0 to 30, according to alarmed Canadian
environmentalists, who say Toyota's touting of the car's green appeal leaves out a few
pertinent and disturbing facts.
The nickel for the battery, for instance, is mined in Sudbury, Ontario, and smelted at
nearby Nickel Centre, just north of the province's massive Georgian Bay.
Toyota buys about 1,000 tons of nickel from the facility each year, ships the nickel to
Wales for refining, then to China, where it's manufactured into nickel foam, and then
onto Toyota's battery plant in Japan.
That alone creates a globe-trotting trail of carbon emissions that ought to seriously
concern everyone involved in the fight against global warming. All told, the start-tofinish
journey travels more than 10,000 miles - mostly by container ship, but also by
diesel locomotive.
But it's not just the clouds of greenhouse gases generated by all that smelting, refining,
manufacturing and transporting that worries green activists. The 1,250-foot-tall
smokestack that spews huge puffs of sulphur dioxide at the Sudbury mine and smelter
operation has left a large swath of the surrounding area looking like a surrealistic scene
from the depths of hell.
On the perimeter of the area, skeletons of trees and bushes stand like ghostly sentinels
guarding a sprawling wasteland. Astronauts in training for NASA actually have practiced
driving moon buggies on the suburban Sudbury tract because it's considered a duplicate
of the Moon's landscape.
"The acid rain around Sudbury was so bad it destroyed all the plants, and the soil slid
down off the hillside," David Martin, Greenpeace's energy coordinator in Canada, told
the London Daily Mail.
"The solution they came up with was the Superstack. The idea was to dilute pollution, but
all it did was spread the fallout across northern Ontario," Martin told the British
newspaper, adding that Sudbury remains "a major environmental and health problem.
The environmental cost of producing that car battery is pretty high."
A "Dust to Dust" study by CNW Marketing Research of Bandon, Ore., shows the overall
eco-costs of automotive hybrids may be even higher.
Released last December, the study tabulated all data on the energy necessary to plan,
build, sell, drive and dispose of a vehicle from drawing board to junkyard, including such
items as plant-to-dealer fuel costs, distances driven, electricity usage per pound of
material in each vehicle, and hundreds of other variables.
To put the data into understandable terms for consumers, CNW translated it into a
"dollars per lifetime mile" figure, or the energy cost per mile driven. When looked at
from that perspective, the Prius and other hybrids quickly morphed from fuel-sippers into
energy-guzzlers.
The Prius registered an energy-cost average of $3.25 per mile driven over its expected
life span of 100,000 miles. Ironically, a Hummer, the brooding giant that has become the
bête noir of the green movement, did much better, with an energy-cost average of $1.95
over its expected life span of 300,000 miles. And its crash protection makes it far safer
than the tiny Prius.
Such information should be of major concern to senior citizens - especially those on a
fixed budget.
If seniors need a small gas-sipping car for city travel, however, the undisputed champion
is Toyota's own gasoline-powered subcompact, the Scion xB, whose energy cost
averaged a negligible 48 cents for each mile traveled over its lifetime.
Fully armed with all the facts, seniors may want to zip down to their nearest Toyota
dealer and trade in their Priuses for Scion xBs. That would be the equivalent of reducing
their energy footprint from a size 24D to about a size 5A. In the case of global warming,
one small step for man may turn out to be a giant leap for mankind.
Totaling all the energy expended, from design to junkyard, a Hummer may be a better bargain.
By James L. Martin
When it comes to protecting the environment, senior citizens should concentrate more on
the total energy consumed in building and operating a car than its fuel efficiency - no
matter how impressive the statistics appear on the window sticker at the showroom.
A prime example is Toyota's Prius, a compact hybrid that's beloved by ardent
environmentalists and that fetches premium prices because it gets nearly 50 miles-pergallon
in combined highway/city driving.
Yet, new data have emerged that show the Prius may not be quite as eco-friendly as first
assumed - if you pencil in the environmental negatives of producing it in the first place.
Like most hybrids, the Prius relies on two engines - one, a conventional 76-horsepower
gasoline power plant, and a second, battery-powered, that kicks in 67 more horses. Most
of the gas is consumed as the car goes from 0 to 30, according to alarmed Canadian
environmentalists, who say Toyota's touting of the car's green appeal leaves out a few
pertinent and disturbing facts.
The nickel for the battery, for instance, is mined in Sudbury, Ontario, and smelted at
nearby Nickel Centre, just north of the province's massive Georgian Bay.
Toyota buys about 1,000 tons of nickel from the facility each year, ships the nickel to
Wales for refining, then to China, where it's manufactured into nickel foam, and then
onto Toyota's battery plant in Japan.
That alone creates a globe-trotting trail of carbon emissions that ought to seriously
concern everyone involved in the fight against global warming. All told, the start-tofinish
journey travels more than 10,000 miles - mostly by container ship, but also by
diesel locomotive.
But it's not just the clouds of greenhouse gases generated by all that smelting, refining,
manufacturing and transporting that worries green activists. The 1,250-foot-tall
smokestack that spews huge puffs of sulphur dioxide at the Sudbury mine and smelter
operation has left a large swath of the surrounding area looking like a surrealistic scene
from the depths of hell.
On the perimeter of the area, skeletons of trees and bushes stand like ghostly sentinels
guarding a sprawling wasteland. Astronauts in training for NASA actually have practiced
driving moon buggies on the suburban Sudbury tract because it's considered a duplicate
of the Moon's landscape.
"The acid rain around Sudbury was so bad it destroyed all the plants, and the soil slid
down off the hillside," David Martin, Greenpeace's energy coordinator in Canada, told
the London Daily Mail.
"The solution they came up with was the Superstack. The idea was to dilute pollution, but
all it did was spread the fallout across northern Ontario," Martin told the British
newspaper, adding that Sudbury remains "a major environmental and health problem.
The environmental cost of producing that car battery is pretty high."
A "Dust to Dust" study by CNW Marketing Research of Bandon, Ore., shows the overall
eco-costs of automotive hybrids may be even higher.
Released last December, the study tabulated all data on the energy necessary to plan,
build, sell, drive and dispose of a vehicle from drawing board to junkyard, including such
items as plant-to-dealer fuel costs, distances driven, electricity usage per pound of
material in each vehicle, and hundreds of other variables.
To put the data into understandable terms for consumers, CNW translated it into a
"dollars per lifetime mile" figure, or the energy cost per mile driven. When looked at
from that perspective, the Prius and other hybrids quickly morphed from fuel-sippers into
energy-guzzlers.
The Prius registered an energy-cost average of $3.25 per mile driven over its expected
life span of 100,000 miles. Ironically, a Hummer, the brooding giant that has become the
bête noir of the green movement, did much better, with an energy-cost average of $1.95
over its expected life span of 300,000 miles. And its crash protection makes it far safer
than the tiny Prius.
Such information should be of major concern to senior citizens - especially those on a
fixed budget.
If seniors need a small gas-sipping car for city travel, however, the undisputed champion
is Toyota's own gasoline-powered subcompact, the Scion xB, whose energy cost
averaged a negligible 48 cents for each mile traveled over its lifetime.
Fully armed with all the facts, seniors may want to zip down to their nearest Toyota
dealer and trade in their Priuses for Scion xBs. That would be the equivalent of reducing
their energy footprint from a size 24D to about a size 5A. In the case of global warming,
one small step for man may turn out to be a giant leap for mankind.
05-20-2008, 03:16 PM
#35
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Global warming is another myth put forth by the environmentalist pinheads and propagated by the sensationalist media, duping the government into funding billions of dollars in research to "prove" that it exists.
Yes, the earth is getting warmer, but it's not because of carbon gases. We don't know why it's getting warmer. We also don't know why it got warmer 600 years ago (and then cooled again). Or 10,000 years ago (and then cooled again). Or 50,000 years ago (and then cooled again). And so on. The planet changes over time, in cycles of hundreds or thousands of years. It's been going on for 5 billion years now, and will continue to go on for at least another 5 billion.
Global warming is a myth (or, more correctly, the supposed "cause" of global warming is a myth). The planet will continue to get warmer until it's done getting warmer, then it will start cooling again. There is plenty of research out there confirming this, but the sensationalist media ignores it because it's not interesting enough to get peoples attention (and get them to watch the news).
Yes, the earth is getting warmer, but it's not because of carbon gases. We don't know why it's getting warmer. We also don't know why it got warmer 600 years ago (and then cooled again). Or 10,000 years ago (and then cooled again). Or 50,000 years ago (and then cooled again). And so on. The planet changes over time, in cycles of hundreds or thousands of years. It's been going on for 5 billion years now, and will continue to go on for at least another 5 billion.
Global warming is a myth (or, more correctly, the supposed "cause" of global warming is a myth). The planet will continue to get warmer until it's done getting warmer, then it will start cooling again. There is plenty of research out there confirming this, but the sensationalist media ignores it because it's not interesting enough to get peoples attention (and get them to watch the news).
You know...I agree with an eariler poster that it would be funny to place a hybrid sticker on the jeep but then he/she is right in that some yahoo would key it.
What we need are small nuclear power plants that would fuel the jeep for 40 years! Then we would take the spent fuel and shoot it to the moon (or Iraq?)
05-20-2008, 06:14 PM
#36
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i think corn ethanol is stupid, but the cane seems like more of the way to go than a prius in my book
05-20-2008, 07:12 PM
#37
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05-20-2008, 07:39 PM
#38
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I had a Honda in high school that got almost 45 MPGs. That same model in the 08 edition gets 28 MPGS just because of all the emission standards that it has to meet!!! It uses almost twice as much gas as my old beater, but it puts out less emisions. Makes no sense to me at all.
I took the cats off of my pickup and modified a few other emission parts and almost doubled my gas mileage!! Went from 12 mpgs to 19 mpgs along with a lot more noticeable power (+ 40 hp and 60 ft-lbs according dyno results found on the web). I also found a few articles that explain very convincinly that my truck is now better for the enviroment. It might put out a little more carbon, but the engine is burning gas more efficiently and reducing my consumption. There is so much "damage", as the greenies like to say, done just getting gas to the pump that you using it doesnt even make a dent in whats allready done.
I love Mother Earth as much as anybody. Im from the midwest and now I live in Alaska. I hunt, fish, offroad, and I use to grow my own food and raise my own meat....I want to preserve what we have very badly, BUT this whole greenhouse crap is a croc of shit stewed up by companies like GE and liberal extremists like Clinton (female), Gore and Obama for tons of money and shady politics.
I took the cats off of my pickup and modified a few other emission parts and almost doubled my gas mileage!! Went from 12 mpgs to 19 mpgs along with a lot more noticeable power (+ 40 hp and 60 ft-lbs according dyno results found on the web). I also found a few articles that explain very convincinly that my truck is now better for the enviroment. It might put out a little more carbon, but the engine is burning gas more efficiently and reducing my consumption. There is so much "damage", as the greenies like to say, done just getting gas to the pump that you using it doesnt even make a dent in whats allready done.
I love Mother Earth as much as anybody. Im from the midwest and now I live in Alaska. I hunt, fish, offroad, and I use to grow my own food and raise my own meat....I want to preserve what we have very badly, BUT this whole greenhouse crap is a croc of shit stewed up by companies like GE and liberal extremists like Clinton (female), Gore and Obama for tons of money and shady politics.
05-20-2008, 07:59 PM
#39
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E85 is a croc of sh*t too!!
Im from Indiana, all we do is grow food, mostly corn. We have very little wooded areas left. But now that the demand for E85 has skyrocketed, the little wooded areas we had left are now gone. Farmers are chopping them down, taking out fence rows, ditches, CRP fields, and swamp land. The places that I use to hunt for monster white tall are now corn fields. The phesant that use to be everywhere are now gone.
Farmers quit growing beans, wheat, hay, feed for animals, and any other crop you could think of just to meet the corn demand. And who would blame them, they went from being poor farmers (believe me, I use to be one of them) to all of a sudden being rich. And that has caused the price of everything to inflate because now all of a sudden no one is growing soy or wheat or feed. I know quite a few animal farmers that were doing good last year, and are out of business this year because they cant afford to feed there cattle, pigs or chickens. That has caused the price of meat, milk and eggs to go through the roof.
I had a nice chunk of money sitting in the bank so that I could someday buy a nice little chunk of land out in the country and retire. But that piece of land I was gonna buy has literaly increased 10X in price in the last 2 years because of the demand for corn. And forget about the money I had saved for retirement thanks to the insane increase in inflation, Im gonna have to work for an additional 10 years if plan on living past 70.
So someone please tell me how E85 is gonna save the world, because it is destroying mine... and its not even efficient, what the f*ck!!!
Farmers quit growing beans, wheat, hay, feed for animals, and any other crop you could think of just to meet the corn demand. And who would blame them, they went from being poor farmers (believe me, I use to be one of them) to all of a sudden being rich. And that has caused the price of everything to inflate because now all of a sudden no one is growing soy or wheat or feed. I know quite a few animal farmers that were doing good last year, and are out of business this year because they cant afford to feed there cattle, pigs or chickens. That has caused the price of meat, milk and eggs to go through the roof.
I had a nice chunk of money sitting in the bank so that I could someday buy a nice little chunk of land out in the country and retire. But that piece of land I was gonna buy has literaly increased 10X in price in the last 2 years because of the demand for corn. And forget about the money I had saved for retirement thanks to the insane increase in inflation, Im gonna have to work for an additional 10 years if plan on living past 70.
So someone please tell me how E85 is gonna save the world, because it is destroying mine... and its not even efficient, what the f*ck!!!
