California Needs Low Carbon Fuels to Replace Polluting Petroleum Fuels
SACRAMENTO, Calif., April 22 (AScribe Newswire) — The American Lung Association in California strongly supports the California Air Resources Board’s (CARB) proposal to adopt the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from transportation fuels by 10 percent by 2020 and urges the board to adopt the standard without delay at its April 23 hearing.
Transportation is the largest source of global warming emissions in California, responsible for approximately 38 percent of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions. This precedent-setting standard will help the state kick its petroleum addiction and move to a cleaner, more sustainable transportation system.
This is a first-ever regulation addressing the global warming impact of transportation fuels. The regulation will be the model for similar efforts at the state and federal levels.
California’s LCFS is part of the three-tiered strategy to reduce greenhouse gases from transportation that includes: pursuing cleaner fuels (such as hydrogen), cleaner vehicle technologies (such as hybrid electric vehicles, battery electric vehicles and fuel cells), and reducing driving. This innovative measure will advance development and use of low carbon fuels that may include advanced biofuels, electricity and fuel cells.
"The American Lung Association in California is counting on the LCFS to take the state a giant step forward toward reaching the state’s global warming reduction targets in AB 32, legislation that set the nation’s first statewide cap on global warming pollution," said Trisha Murakawa, board chair, American Lung Association in California. "We support the California Air Resources Board’s leadership in developing the LCFS rule and believe this groundbreaking rule is a key step in the fight against global warming pollution and over-dependence on polluting petroleum fuels."
CARB estimates that the LCFS will provide 10 percent of the total greenhouse gas reductions needed to reach AB 32 goals and almost one quarter of the reductions needed from the transportation sector under AB 32.
The American Lung Association strongly urges CARB to adopt the staff recommendation to include "indirect land use effects" in the standard, ensuring the final standard accounts for global warming gases released from land conversion to produce fuels (such as clearing forests to grow crops for fuel). The American Lung Association also urges the board to ensure the standard promotes the cleanest, ultra-low carbon fuels, and provides for careful review of air quality and local community impact as new fuels and infrastructure are introduced.
"If CARB does not account for the greenhouse gases released through land conversion, the standard could end up increasing global warming gases from transportation fuels and having the opposite effect from what is intended," said Murakawa.
The American Lung Association in California has a long history of fighting for cleaner fuels and cleaner vehicles to advance progress toward meeting state and federal air quality goals and to achieve important public health improvements. A study released by the American Lung Association in California last year (Road to a Cleaner Future, March, 2008) found that the total cost to public health and society of the existing petroleum fueled motor vehicle fleet is more than $10 billion in 2010.
Carbon dioxide emissions, a key pollutant resulting from burning fuels, significantly contribute to global warming.
UK To Subsidise Electric Car Purchases, is that Enough?
The government has announced plans to give buyers of electric cars up to £5,000 towards their purchase, incentivising people to buy the pricey vehicles. It forms part of a £250m funding drive to bring the cars to the UK, including test-drive programs and the setting up of charging points.
Gordon Brown said last year that he wants all British vehicles to be hybrid or electric by 2020, and the announcement comes as various major car manufacturers outline their plans for electric cars. Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn was talking up his company’s prospects yesterday : ”Somebody’s got to invest massively and bring to the market zero emission cars, and we think we can do it”, he said, before slagging off GM’s Chevy Volt for being, at $40,000, way too expensive. Chrysler is developing the Dodge Circuit , an electric sports car, to be the first of five electric or hybrid models to be out by 2012 (that’s if it can negotiate a deal with Fiat to manufacture them). Mitsubishi have recently been showing off the i-Miev , a tiny car that looks like a cheerful robotic hamster storing food in its cheeks, and plans to launch it in 2010. Then there’s the adorably happy little gentleman pictured above , the Peapod, who can only go at 25mph and is designed as a “neighbourhood” vehicle, but which is so goshdarned cute I could just eat it all up.
This month’s Fortune magazine features Warren Buffett alongside the Chinese electric car company he’s invested in, BYD . Don’t underestimate the power of the Oracle - his slavish followers will be on the BYD waiting list before you know it. It only costs $22,000, and looks like a Saab if you squint hard enough, but does have its limitations - its 60-mile range is only good if you’re pootling along at 30mph, while lack of demand in China might be a stumbling block to expansion.
Vauxhall have announced the Ampera , which looks totally evil, the sort of thing the Terminator would take his kids to football practice in. Encouragingly though, it could be built at Ellesmere Port, helping the UK, as Boris Johnson potentially sees it , to be the “electric car capital of Europe”. Ah, and therein lies the rub.
£250m is a drop in the ocean in terms of the investment in infrastructure needed for electric cars to be feasible UK-wide. George Osbourne has described the plans as “fantasy” , highlighting the lack of preparation for charging points and no mention of a grid to deal with the extra electricity demands created by a nation of electric car drivers. And as John Sauven, chief exec of Greenpeace, told the Telegraph: “electric cars are only as green as the electricity they run on”. Read more
How to Use an Electric Vehicle Conversion Kit
Gas prices keep rising and the value of electric powered vehicles is becoming evident. An electric conversion kit costs about the same as a dozen full tanks of gasoline. Not only are electric conversion kits environmentally safe, they are good for your physical health. Any exercise you get from starting your electric bike to parking and walking to your destination is healthy. Read on to learn how to use an electric bicycle conversion kit.
Step1 Search to find a fair price for your electric bicycle conversion kit. An environmentally friendly life does not need to cost a fortune.
Step2 Get what you need all at one time. Even with a conversion kit, you will need to buy some other parts. Ask your salesperson what extras you will need.
Step3 Take off the original front wheel of the bike and prepare to attach the electric bicycle conversion kit, which includes a front wheel not made of alloy.
Step4 Extend the arm from the drive system to interlock with the handle bar. This extension prevents rotation of the drive assembly, serves as a handle to push the bike when needed and supports the speed control lever.
Step5 Expand the toggle clamps and secure the motor apparatus to the bicycle fork.
Step6 Hang the quick release clamp to your bicycle handlebar.
Step7 Feel the mechanical brake work through your current front brake to stop the electric wheel on the front of your converted bicycle.
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Electric Car Conversion Manual
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