mattg

joined 1 year ago
[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 4 hours ago

From what I understand a lot of the UK rail network is reliant on old infrastructure, think Victorian era bridges/tunnels. These weren't designed with rail electrification in mind so may not have room for a train and an overhead line for example. While there may be solutions for each individual instance of this sort of problem, solving them involves addressing each of them individually and takes more time and money than electrification would in a vacuum.

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 43 points 1 month ago

With Jira everything is an issue

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 month ago

Just finished reading Human Nature on Tuesday. It was interesting to see where the episodes deviated from the book. The main plot points are the same but there are some interesting differences. Overall I enjoyed it.

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 4 months ago

I only have one at the moment. I bought a cheap Dell Wyse thin client from eBay, installed a light Linux distro on it and set it up as a Wyoming Satellite and as a snapcast client. That is connected to an old all in one mini HiFi for speakers. For the mic I just have a small omnidirectional USB mic plugged into the front. Biggest hassle setting it up was ALSA since snapcast and Wyoming were fighting over the devices

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 9 months ago

It's what Americans would call a band-aid

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 1 year ago

Hope I never have the misfortune of seeing one of these in person. It's ugly, but more importantly I can't see any way it won't be incredibly dangerous to all other road users.

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 year ago

First of all I understand why a lot of people are concerned about moving from ICE to EVs. It's a big change and there is still a long way to go before they become the majority of vehicles.

Having said that, plenty of people have already bought used EVs and it doesn't seem to be a major problem. Improvements in battery management systems and chemistry will further improve the life of EV batteries which will be on the used market by 2030. The price of new EVs is already starting to come down and that of used ones will follow. ICE cars are far more mechanically complex than EVs so you could argue there are more things that could go wrong buying a used ICE car than an EV but I do accept that batteries are an expensive part to replace.

Batteries can be repurposed for other applications where energy density is less important or they can be recycled.

Over the past year the grid was less than 40% fossil fuels and that will be less over time so most sounds like an exaggeration.

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I can only speak for myself but the upcoming ICE ban was a factor in my recent EV purchase. I intend to keep my car for a long time so as we move closer to the ban more and more cars will be EVs so I didn't want to be left behind.

The other aspects you mentioned were also factors. Particularly after a test drive and feeling the acceleration and quietness of the car.

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 7 points 1 year ago

I agree that a mix of energy sources is a good idea. Maybe a mix of wind, solar, hydro...

Batteries isn't an energy source, it's energy storage. We can generate electricity in many ways.

[–] mattg@lemmy.sdf.org 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Disclaimer: I've only had my EV for about a month and usually charge at work or home so haven't got that much experience with public charger etiquette.

I wouldn't think 4 hours a week is "hogging it" but I would think the etiquette somewhat depends what 4 hours you are there. If your 4 hours coincidence with the peak usage of the charger (maybe when people are checking in for example) that is different to 4 hours when nobody is there anyway.