Bloomberg article Bad news
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2020-09-22/nikola-doesn-t-want-to-be-the-next-tesla-video
Bloomberg article about hydrogen fuel talks with BP
2020-09-23 Newsom Bans Fossil-fueled Vehicles In 2035
LA Times article. Says 15 other countries have already done the same thing.
2020-09-23 Newsom Bans Fossil-fueled Vehicles In 2035
Copied from LA Times article.
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Microsoft News
The LA Times
Newsom orders 2035 phaseout of gas-powered vehicles, calls for fracking ban
Phil Willon, Tony Barboza 31 mins ago
Emphasizing that California must stay at the forefront of the fight against climate change, Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday issued an executive order to restrict new car sales in the state to only zero-emission vehicles by 2035 and threw his support behind a ban on the controversial use of hydraulic fracturing by oil companies.
Under Newsom’s order, the California Air Resources Board would implement the phase-out of new gas-powered cars and light trucks and also require medium and heavy-duty trucks to be zero-emission by 2045 where possible. California would be the first state in the nation to mandate 100% zero-emission vehicles, though 15 countries already have committed to phasing out gas-powered cars.
Newsom did not take executive action to ban the controversial oil extraction method known as fracking but called on the state Legislature to do so, setting up what could be a contentious political fight when lawmakers reconvene in Sacramento next year.
Taken together, the two climate change efforts would accelerate the state’s already aggressive efforts to curtail carbon emissions and petroleum hazards and promise to exacerbate tensions with a Trump administration intent on bridling California’s liberal environmental agenda.
“This is the most impactful step our state can take to fight climate change,” Newsom said in a statement released Wednesday morning. “Our cars shouldn’t make wildfires worse — and create more days filled with smoky air. Cars shouldn’t melt glaciers or raise sea levels threatening our cherished beaches and coastlines.”
Newsom said that California’s action will help spur greater innovation for zero-emission vehicles and, by creating a huge market, will drive down the cost of those cars and trucks. More than 1.63 million new cars and trucks are expected to be sold in the state in 2020, according to the California New Car Dealers Assn.
Climate scientists and advocates say the world must stop production of gas- and diesel-powered vehicles by 2035 or earlier in order to keep global warming to tolerable levels. California and other governments across the world are seeking to achieve carbon neutrality by 2045, and it will take years for vehicles to turn over and be replaced by zero-emission models.
Newsom sharply criticized the Trump administration this month for ignoring the reality of climate change, saying that California’s deadly wildfires, some of the largest in state history, were grim reminders of what lies ahead for the nation if political leaders in Washington don’t take action. Rising temperatures have decimated forests across the West Coast, leaving behind swaths of dead trees to fuel catastrophic wildfires.
“This is a climate damn emergency,” Newsom said during a tour of the charred landscape around the Northern California town of Oroville. “This is real and it’s happening.”
While meeting with Newsom in Sacramento last week, Trump expressed skepticism about the scientific evidence of climate change saying: “It’ll start getting cooler. You just watch.”
The state has sued the Trump administration to block efforts by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to rescind a special federal waiver that permits California to set its own strict pollution controls to improve air quality, the foundation of the state’s aggressive efforts to combat climate change.
While pleased about Newsom’s action on zero-emission vehicles, environmental activists remain skeptical about his actions on fracking. In November, Newsom imposed a temporary moratorium on new hydraulic fracking permits, saying he wanted them to undergo independent scientific review. Since April, however, his administration has issued close to 50 new permits to Chevron and Aera Energy, frustrating environmentalists.
“Newsom is really good at making announcements that sound big but they actually aren’t. We can’t let the fact that he’s acting on cars eclipse the fact that he’s still protecting the oil industry,” said Kassie Siegel, director of the Climate Law Institute at the Center for Biological Diversity. “He is the governor of the state at the very center of the climate emergency right now, and he has the political environment here that allows him to think big. If he won’t take strong action that we so desperately need, who will?”
Siegel’s organization this week threatened to sue Newsom unless he halted all new permits for gas and oil wells in the state, saying the governor has failed to protect the health of vulnerable Californians from pollutants released by the state’s petroleum industry.
Since taking office, Newsom has faced pressure from politically influential environmental groups to ban new oil and gas drilling and completely phase out fossil fuel extraction in California, one of the nation’s top petroleum-producing states.
But the Democratic governor has pushed back, promising to take a more measured approach that addressed the effects on oil workers and California cities and counties that are economically dependent on the petroleum industry.
California has 1,175 active offshore wells and 60,643 active onshore wells. In 2019, the state produced just under 159 million barrels of oil, CalGEM records show. The state’s annual crude oil production has been consistently declining since 1985.
California oil industry representatives have argued that phasing out oil production in the state, which has some of the strictest environmental regulations in the world, would force more oil to be imported by train and tanker ship from countries that do not have the same environmental safeguards. According to the Western States Petroleum Assn., there are more than 26 million vehicles with internal-combustion engines in California.
Cars, trucks and other vehicles are the largest emitters of greenhouse gases in California, accounting for about 40% of the statewide total, and their emissions have been stubbornly creeping upward in recent years. Driving down transportation pollution remains the state’s biggest challenge in achieving its goal of slashing planet-warming emissions 40% below 1990 levels by 2030.
Under current regulations, California’s Air Resources Board requires automakers to sell electric, fuel cell and other zero-emission vehicles in increasing percentages through 2025. Electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles accounted for 7.6% new car registrations California in 2019.
In 2018, under then-Gov. Jerry Brown, the state set a goal to put 5 million zero-emission cars on the road by 2025. There were 670,000 zero-emission vehicles sold in California through the end of 2019, according to auto industry sales data.
In June, the Air Resources Board adopted the nation’s first sales mandate requiring heavy-duty truck manufacturers to sell increasing percentages of electric or fuel cell models until all new trucks sold in California are zero-emission by 2045.
But efforts to completely phase out gas-powered cars have not gained traction. Three years ago, Brown directed the state’s chief air quality regulator, Mary Nichols, to look into stepping up the state’s timetable. But so far, her agency has only floated the idea of banning gas-powered vehicles in congested areas of the state. And legislation lawmakers introduced in 2018 to require all cars registered in the state be zero-emission by 2040 didn’t move forward.
Some local governments have set their own zero-emission vehicle targets, which they are unlikely to achieve without the backing of tougher regulations. A “Green New Deal” plan by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, for example, aims to increase the percentage of zero-emission vehicles to 25% by 2025, 80% by 2035 and 100% by 2050.
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2020-09-22 Tesla Battery Day Was Very Interesting
The reports about the Tesla Battery Day are all over YouTube.
Another (below is my comment from it):
There was a lot of stuff that interested us geeks, but may have been boring for the average Joe. There were several parts that I found to be very profound. The overall message was that they have a solid grasp on what needs to be done to get to their goals. The challenges are what have to be overcome. Costs of materials, costs of development of “the machines that make the machines”, and the goals regarding minimizing the time to go from prototype to full production.
I think they mentioned something about speeding up production by reducing the number of larger cells. Also the single piece casting speeds up the building of the vehicle. I think this is a good idea. I wonder how these changes are going to affect the collision repair businesses? Time will tell. They also said something about using certain types of cells for certain vehicles for the optimum results. And overall cost savings for using the LFP cells for cars made in Shanghai.
Overall, Musk knows a lot about his business. Stockholders should see that as a sign that the company is a good investment.
This article in Mining.com seems to think Musk doesn’t know enough about mining lithium and nickel.
https://www.mining.com/mines-are-the-biggest-holes-in-teslas-25000-car-plans/
2020-09-22 H-P 6114 Power Supply
I have several HP 6114 power supplies and I’ve had to repair them. The electrolytic capacitors dry up and need to be replaced or a good capacitor added to them. But the cheap plastic case of the 611x power supplies will shatter into many small pieces if you try to open them up. The front and back rings break very easily, and the case itself easily breaks, too. If the rings break but the case is intact, you can use tape to hold it together. The pots get noisy and difficult to set at a given value. It’s nearly impossible to find replacements. The neon light on the front can be replaced by a LED, diode and resistor. Or else use a LED and resistor on the output.
If there are any other bad parts, the schematic is available. But the parts can be unique to HP. Some are very specialized, like the potted circuits. Others can be replaced with a standard part, but it may have to be specially selected for proper performance.
Nowadays you can buy a new analog power supply made in Asia for fifty dollars US plus shipping. And it can handle more current than the old HPs.
2020-09-22 RICO Suit: Portsmouth, OH Uranium Processing Plant For Toxic Releases
So many uninformed people advocate nuclear power, repeating the mantra “it’s the safest form of power.” Meanwhile, since the 1950s, the Portsmouth, Ohio “Ports” uranium processing plant has been releasing toxic radioactive wastes into the environment, “causing clusters of cancer” locally. This article tells of a whistleblower complaint and RICO lawsuit against the facility. The workers were exposed to the toxic radioactive chemicals; they turned off the alarms that warned of those elements in the workers’ environment. We may never know how many deaths may have been caused in the past, and how many more deaths may be caused by the contamination of the environment in the future.
2020-09-21 Hydrogen Fuel Cells V. Battery Electric Vehicles
My take in a comment >>
@mfhberg
Said, “[Hydrogen Fuel Cell vehicles] will die…” Right now, it looks like Toyota’s Mirai, Hyundai and Honda all have a sizeable stake in the HFC market future. These are not backyard grease monkeys, these are car companies that have done a lot research and development. Toyota has had FCVs on the road for two decades. There are 45 hydrogen fueling stations in California with more being built. So they’ve committed and the ball is rolling. Right now hydrogen is more expensive but it should get cheaper as sales volume increases. If batteries ever get to be as fast as refueling hydrogen vehicles then the hydrogen FCVs will have to be concerned. But heavy vehicles will still be hydrogen fuel because it’s much lighter than batteries.
But the future of both FCEVs and BEVs is very important because the transition to a fossil fuel free economy is mandatory. ICEs (internal combustion engines) will have to be run on fuel that is not fossil fuel. That could be ethanol, since there are already a significant number of cars on the roads that are Flex Fuel and can run on ‘E85’ or 85% ethanol. But there is not enough land to grow the crops to make a lot of ethanol, and the cost will be high. Another alternative will be to run the ICEs on hydrogen. That may be cost effective to convert existing ICEs. But the cost is higher to manufacture new ICEs to compete with BEVs, so eventually all vehicles will be electric for economic reasons. Somewhere it said that the ‘drivetrains’ of EVs have less than 2 dozen moving parts. Compare that to hundreds of parts in an ICE.
Time will tell.
2020-09-20 The StopHateForProfit.org Website
The stop hate for profit movement on Facebook that is still taking place.
https://www.stophateforprofit.org/
Quote: >>
Stop Hate for Profit is an ongoing campaign to hold social media companies accountable for hate on their platforms. Social media must prioritize people over profit, and they must do it now.
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Also this news article.
2020-09-19 BLM Does Not Matter To Blacks
Black Lives Matter does not matter to blacks. I’m not sure why there are so many ‘blacktivist’ protesters on the street. They carry signs that say things like “Silence is Compliance” or “White Silence is Violence!” Maybe they just want to be seen on the News. Most black homicides are caused by blacks killing blacks. Here are the shocking statistics in this short 5.6 min. YouTube video. I had to watch it a few times to let it sink in. It’s important that everyone understands that the real problem is not the police; the problem is the neighbors around you who are killing each other.
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@Coco G
Said, “…this election will [affect] the US like no other election.”
The 2016 election shaped the US like no other previous election. It allowed the Russkies to get a ‘businessman’ as president who admits that he was using the bankruptcy laws to his advantage. By simple observation this ‘businessman’ is in cahoots with the Russians. If the Russian Internet Research Agency hadn’t meddled with social media, he wouldn’t be president, so that was the election that “shaped the US” like no other.
When has there ever been a president who let a news network shape policy instead of the agencies of the government?? When was there ever a congressional political party that allowed an impeached president to meddle with its financial legislation regarding a foreign country (Ukraine)? When was there ever a president who had so many of his staff convicted and sent to jail? When has there been a president who caused so much embarrassment to his political party? There are so many more “abnormalities” that I could talk about.
It could be that the president gets reelected and both houses of Congress are controlled by the Democrats. Then Congress could impeach the president and convict him too. Then we would have Pence for president. That could be just as bad or worse.
2020-09-18 Kodak Sued US For Fogging Their Film – Radioactive Fallout
I knew about radioactive fallout from atomic bomb tests, but I didn’t know that it damaged Kodak film. What’s very dismaying is that the US government warned Kodak but they didn’t warn people about the dangerous fallout. Tens of thousands of thyroid cancers caused by radioactive iodine. Strontium in our bones causing cancer. That’s shameful. They should never have tested the atomic bombs in Nevada where the fallout fell over large areas of the US.
A 13.4 minute YouTube video.
