Not that I love ICE cars or anything but isn't the big health impact from heavy vehicles like delivery trucks and, more importantly, from the rubber particles caused by car tires? A problem that in general worsens with BEVs since they're, on average, heavier? I'm sure smell will improve significantly, but breathing tire and road dust is the main health concern as I've understood it. Most other pollutants get rather effectively caught in the catalytic converter, aside from CO2 but that isn't unhealthy per se. CO in small doses out doors also isn't a big issue. NOx bad for nature but likely of low harm to humans. Etc. Someone please correct me if I'm misinformed.
this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2023
387 points (98.5% liked)
World News
39199 readers
2618 users here now
A community for discussing events around the World
Rules:
-
Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
- Post news articles only
- Video links are NOT articles and will be removed.
- Title must match the article headline
- Not United States Internal News
- Recent (Past 30 Days)
- Screenshots/links to other social media sites (Twitter/X/Facebook/Youtube/reddit, etc.) are explicitly forbidden, as are link shorteners.
-
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
-
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed. Sources that have a Low or Very Low factual reporting rating or MBFC Credibility Rating may be removed.
-
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
-
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF 10/19
-
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
-
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
-
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
Lemmy World Partners
News !news@lemmy.world
Politics !politics@lemmy.world
World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world
Recommendations
For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/
- Consider including the article’s mediabiasfactcheck.com/ link
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
There are many issues with ICE cars, and it wouldn't surprise if one of the main motivations behind the ban is to lessen dependence on fossil fuels.
This is a fairly low risk step to see if deliveries and short range transport will switch into EV. It also lowers a lot of air pollution and noise, it looks suitably progressive and is easily reversible if shit goes wrong.
For sure, good optics even though I argue that this basically means poorer people aren't allowed to drive in the city only people rich enough to buy the right via a (relatively) expensive BEV. Sure the Renault Zoey exist and similar but on the whole BEVs are significantly more expensive.
As for noise this might be true at the low speeds of the city center but keep in mind that on high ways BEVs make more noise than ICE vehicles due to the aforementioned increased mass, on average. High speeds it's tyre friction and air friction which is the noise driver and not engine sounds.
Good thing this is for a dozen city blocks at the center of an organically grown city then.
Walkable in about 15 minutes, and no highways.
and no highways.
Well, the E4 years through parts of the city like a sad scar in Essingeleden, so that's not quite true.
Unless you're talking about the zone where ICE cars will be banned, in which case - yes indeed. I believe one of the exits of Klaratunneln is located inside the zone, but that's not quite a highway, just highway-adjecent.
I think your concerns are valid, but on the whole electric vehicles have the potential to improve more than ICE vehicles https://www.rac.co.uk/drive/electric-cars/running/do-electric-vehicles-produce-more-tyre-and-brake-pollution-than-petrol-and/
The extra mass of current EVs probably (note I don't know for sure) doesn't cancel out their other benefits, and as battery tech (and tyre tech I guess) improves they'll get better.
Sure, I'm not saying they're somehow worse than ICE vehicles, they're demonstrably not. But particulate matter is the big health issue and not gases, and more and more studies is highlighting that tires are very big on particulate matter. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/feb/23/health-impact-tyre-particles-increasing-concern-air-pollution
Note that all these studies are VERY recent considering how long we've been running vehicles with rubber based tyres. I also strongly dislike how the report you linked only focused in properly on brakes, which I know full well are vastly superior on hybrid and BEVs due to regenerative breaking and the restarted use of drum-style breaks. And more or less dismisses the tyre aspect, which is extremely irresponsible in my opinion. Granted though that it's arguing from a "Are BEVs worse than ICE vehicles?" so I can excuse some of it.
Completely agree with you, it's a problem and it'll get worse until there's new regulation on it, but hey at least the cities will be quieter as we cough up rubber and dust.
I think the issue might be visibility.
Naively, it feels like most of the issue is from a small number of extra sooty vehicles. But that belief is probably just because of how visible it is. The brake/Tyree dust isn’t visible because it is more spread out.
Carbrains when they see this: hold my Stockholm syndrome.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Stockholm has announced plans to become the first big capital city to ban petrol and diesel cars from its centre, in an effort to slash pollution and reduce noise.
From 2025, 20 blocks of Stockholm’s inner city area, spanning its finance and main shopping districts, will be restricted to electric vehicle traffic only.
Announcing the plan, Lars Stromgren, the city’s vice-mayor for transport, said: “Nowadays, the air in Stockholm causes babies to have lung conditions and the elderly to die prematurely.
Paris, Athens and Madrid have only banned diesel cars, and London has a charging scheme that covers the most polluting combustion engines.
“Many cities have implemented low-emission zones where high-emission cars are allowed to drive if they pay a charge,” Stromgren was quoted as saying by Air Quality News.
“We have chosen an area where large numbers of cyclists and pedestrians are exposed to unhealthy air on a daily basis.
The original article contains 402 words, the summary contains 151 words. Saved 62%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
So the only vehicles zipping around the pedestrians will be the silent ones? Oh, great!
/s
Seriously, tho, why not just ban all vehicles? Invest in public transit and bike sharing programs.