HOW DO YOU SEE THE FUTURE OF leasure boating &fuel taxation due to climate change,from sailing

[Clash]

I'm genuinely amazed that I've had to take the time to type something so completely obvious.

Twice.

 

[westernman]

Twice.

It seems that it is not so obvious to at least some on here........

 

[Seastoke]

It’s obvious you sail , can I ask what have you done to lower your carbon footprint.

 

[Clash]

It’s obvious you sail , can I ask what have you done to lower your carbon footprint.

Bought smaller shoes.

 

[flaming]

It’s obvious you sail , can I ask what have you done to lower your carbon footprint.

Installed a 700KWp solar array and 500KWh battery to power my factory, reducing our grid demand by 65% in 2024, which is all the more impressive when you consider that our annual bill is still north of £100k. Also exported significant amounts back to the grid at weekends etc. Gone all EV for our personal vehicles, which are 90% + charged directly from that solar array. Plus all company vehicles are now EV. Provided incentives for our staff to lease EVs on salary sacrifice, including free charging from that solar array, which has resulted in 12 additional EVs so far, with more on order. All doing most of their charging direct from our solar farm.

But here's the thing. Lowering our carbon footprint was only really a fairly small part of the motivation for that. Most of the motivation for all of those things was either to save money or because the cars suit me better.
I'm not a hair shirt wearing, tree hugging, eco-nutter. I still eat meat, sometimes fly for business, take long haul hollidays every couple of years etc. I'm just trying to do a little bit, especially where it coincides with saving me money.

 

[ducked]

Ever hear of opportunity cost? That's the bottom line here. If you can generate more income (be it from food production or solar energy) from a piece of land, then that's what you'll do. And unless the value of bio-diesel sky-rockets for no apparent reason given the readily available alternatives, it's a non-runner. (not a "non-starter" btw)

Don't know why this seems so hard to understand. And it requires no emotions to do so.

And please come back and tell me that this isn't what I meant. I need to check telepathy coverage in my area.

I have no way of knowing what you meant, apart from the meaning of the words that you used.

But words, very fortunately, do have meaning, which means that telepathy is not required.

Consider for example, that your phrase " The land used for bio fuel in the EU could feed 120 million people daily" means (whatever you meant by it, and whether it is actually true or not) that this is happening, that it is reality, that this land is being used for bio fuel despite the alleged fact that it could feed 120 million people daily.

To assert that this is therefore a "non-runner", as you do, thus puts you in conflict with your own stated version of reality,

This must be quite stressful, because It doesn't make sense.

And because it doesnt make sense, and must be quite stressful, I must decline to discuss it any further with you.

 

[Clash]

I have no way of knowing what you meant, apart from the meaning of the words that you used.

But words, very fortunately, do have meaning, which means that telepathy is not required.

Consider for example, that your phrase " The land used for bio fuel in the EU could feed 120 million people daily" means (whatever you meant by it, and whether it is actually true or not) that this is happening, that it is reality, that this land is being used for bio fuel despite the alleged fact that it could feed 120 million people daily.

To assert that this is therefore a "non-runner", as you do, thus puts you in conflict with your own stated version of reality,

This must be quite stressful, because It doesn't make sense.

And because it doesnt make sense, and must be quite stressful, I must decline to discuss it any further with you.

This is hilarious. The phrase you think is such a gotcha is the headline to the article I linked. In which article (if you'd read it - which you clearly didn't) you'd have found the data that I referred to which proves that the continued use of this land for bio-fuel is uneconomic.

I suppose that's what you get when you don't actually read and comprehend what's written and instead refer to what you think is written.

But if it's too stressful for you, by all means run away.

 

[ducked]

This is hilarious. The phrase you think is such a gotcha is the headline to the article I linked. In which article (if you'd read it - which you clearly didn't) you'd have found the data that I referred to which proves that the continued use of this land for bio-fuel is uneconomic.

I suppose that's what you get when you don't actually read and comprehend what's written and instead refer to what you think is written.

But if it's too stressful for you, by all means run away.

You can flog a dead horse underwater, but you cant make it drink.

Enjoy your last word.

 

[bedouin]

"If" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence...

When you look at the amount of power needed to make the e fuels, and then the fact that an ICE engine is a pretty inefficient thing anyway, unless we have an abundance of power from some as yet unachievable tech, then it would be extremely wasteful to use synthetic fuels for transportation that could be electrified.

Your contention that "It is simply not feasible to convert all the world's road transport to battery power" is contentious. There may be some outliers where it is extremely difficult, but solutions exist for every type of road transport. Even massive mining trucks. And even converting 90% of the world's fleet, which is more than achievable, would have an enormous effect on the fuel market.

The irony of course is that the faster we move with the easy wins, passenger cars, light trucks etc, combined with really accelerating the switch to renewable power. The less pressure there will be to end all fossil fuels.

It is not really "if" - we know it is possible so the only question is whether it is the most appropriate (convenient/efficient) way - but at present there aren't many contenders.

Have you looked at the figures? There are more than 1.6 billion vehicles on the road and only a few million BEVs there is no way they can all be replaced by 2050 - in fact I am pretty confident that come 2050 more than 50% of the vehicles on the road will still be ICEs.

Tell me where the resources will come from to convert 90% of the fleet to BEV? How much (e.g.) Cobalt will be needed and where will that come from?

Who is going to cover the cost of installation of charging points across Africa?

BEVs are not the only answer - or even the main answer - to global warming

 

[westernman]

It is not really "if" - we know it is possible so the only question is whether it is the most appropriate (convenient/efficient) way - but at present there aren't many contenders.

Have you looked at the figures? There are more than 1.6 billion vehicles on the road and only a few million BEVs there is no way they can all be replaced by 2050 - in fact I am pretty confident that come 2050 more than 50% of the vehicles on the road will still be ICEs.

Tell me where the resources will come from to convert 90% of the fleet to BEV? How much (e.g.) Cobalt will be needed and where will that come from?

Who is going to cover the cost of installation of charging points across Africa?

BEVs are not the only answer - or even the main answer - to global warming

BEVs are the answer, may be the main answer to cleaning up the air in our cities.

 

[Clash]

It is not really "if" - we know it is possible so the only question is whether it is the most appropriate (convenient/efficient) way - but at present there aren't many contenders.

Have you looked at the figures? There are more than 1.6 billion vehicles on the road and only a few million BEVs there is no way they can all be replaced by 2050 - in fact I am pretty confident that come 2050 more than 50% of the vehicles on the road will still be ICEs.

Tell me where the resources will come from to convert 90% of the fleet to BEV? How much (e.g.) Cobalt will be needed and where will that come from?

Who is going to cover the cost of installation of charging points across Africa?

BEVs are not the only answer - or even the main answer - to global warming

Sounds like your answer is to do nothing.

It's certainly not to promote what is currently the only readily available answer to smog-ridden cities and particulate pollution.

Why exactly are you so anti-BEV?

 

[flaming]

It is not really "if" - we know it is possible so the only question is whether it is the most appropriate (convenient/efficient) way - but at present there aren't many contenders.

Have you looked at the figures? There are more than 1.6 billion vehicles on the road and only a few million BEVs there is no way they can all be replaced by 2050 - in fact I am pretty confident that come 2050 more than 50% of the vehicles on the road will still be ICEs.

Tell me where the resources will come from to convert 90% of the fleet to BEV? How much (e.g.) Cobalt will be needed and where will that come from?

Who is going to cover the cost of installation of charging points across Africa?

BEVs are not the only answer - or even the main answer - to global warming

Interesting that you use Cobalt as an example, when it is also used in refining oil...

However, the key point that is often missed by EV sceptics is that the current battery and motor tech is not the end point. Things like Sodium batteries and motors without permanent magnets are in development, and the manufacturers are pretty motivated to develop out rare earth as much as possible, simply for cost reasons, and thus you can be pretty sure that when the majority of the world's car fleet is EV, the batteries and motors will be pretty different from what they are now.

Plus of course, unlike the oil going into the ICE engines, the contents of the battery and motor are not consumed, and will be able to be recycled at end of life. So even if some rare earth materials are not able to be designed out, we do not need an endless supply.

Think you're wrong on the 2050 thing though. For sure it won't be 100%, but I'm reasonably sure it will be at least 50%. For example China is already on the verge of 50% EV sales. Even if they stopped there and sold 50% ICE, 50% EV until 2050, simply considering that almost no cars on the road today will still be going in 2050 and you see that they'd be 50% EV fleet by 2050. Of course that isn't going to happen, and they also have a 2035 end of ICE target, which they seem well on course to meet. Given an average age at scrappage of cars in China of about 13 years, you can easily see that China will have an almost entirely EV fleet well before 2050, just with regular fleet replacement. And that's a lot of cars....
Same applies to any country where ICE sales are due to stop more than the average age at scrappage before 2050. Which includes the EU, UK, most of Asia. Which is a LOT of cars...

Sure some countries won't be over 50% by 2050, most notably the states assuming the current trajectory, but enough countries will be almost entirely EV that globally I'm sure we'll be over 50%.

 

[bedouin]

Interesting that you use Cobalt as an example, when it is also used in refining oil...

However, the key point that is often missed by EV sceptics is that the current battery and motor tech is not the end point.

Ah yes - the constant refrain of the EVangelist - EVs will be perfect in 3 years time. I've been hearing that for the past 15 years at least.

And at the same time they tend to deny that any other technology development is possible.

There is no way Batteries will be the dominant power source for transport by 2050 - yes they have a role to play but only as a part of a portfolio of technology

 

[westernman]

Ah yes - the constant refrain of the EVangelist - EVs will be perfect in 3 years time. I've been hearing that for the past 15 years at least.

And at the same time they tend to deny that any other technology development is possible.

There is no way Batteries will be the dominant power source for transport by 2050 - yes they have a role to play but only as a part of a portfolio of technology

They will be dominant for road transport. Busses, Taxis, Trucks, Cars.

But not for airplanes and ships.
And not for pleasure boats except may be for canal boats.

 

[Clash]

Ah yes - the constant refrain of the EVangelist - EVs will be perfect in 3 years time. I've been hearing that for the past 15 years at least.

And at the same time they tend to deny that any other technology development is possible.

There is no way Batteries will be the dominant power source for transport by 2050 - yes they have a role to play but only as a part of a portfolio of technology

This is just waffle. Of the "people are saying" variety so beloved of the big orange buffoon.

Edit: 15 years ago was 2010. In 2010, there was virtually only one mass market BEV on the market; the Nissan Leaf. The Tesla was in its infancy and very low numbers. And if people told you that the battery technology would get better, they were right. The Leaf's battery chemistry was sh1t, it had no thermal management and lost SoH at an alarming rate. But there was already better battery technology in the Tesla, so the people saying that were correct. And battery tech has continued to improve.

So you might have been hearing but you clearly weren't listening.

Oh! and EVangelist. What are you? 12?

 

[bedouin]

They will be dominant for road transport. Busses, Taxis, Trucks, Cars.

But not for airplanes and ships.
And not for pleasure boats except may be for canal boats.

The point is that if you have a good solution for airplanes and ships then why not use it elsewhere?

If we go to a generation environment where a lot of the capacity is intermittent then we need the ability to store the excess generation of the good times. There are a limited number of hills up which we can pump water, and only so many flywheels we can set spinning.

Likewise if you want to cover the Sahara with solar generation you will need a way to store and distribute that energy.

It is very hard to see how we get anywhere near net zero without such a technology

 

[westernman]

The point is that if you have a good solution for airplanes and ships then why not use it elsewhere?

We don't.

For planes it will be either bio-kerosene (most likely), or hydrogen which requires considerably more energy to generate than you get back out.

For shipping, ammonia might be a future fuel. There are already ships running on it, but oil dregs (bunker fuel) is still the cheapest solution by far.

 

[bedouin]

We don't.

For planes it will be either bio-kerosene (most likely), or hydrogen which requires considerably more energy to generate than you get back out.

For shipping, ammonia might be a future fuel. There are already ships running on it, but oil dregs (bunker fuel) is still the cheapest solution by far.

But we will.

The demand is there for both ships and planes, and the principles of the technology have been proved, so it is only a matter of which technology proves cheaper and more scalable. I am hoping that artificial photosynthesis proves to be the way forward as that seems to be the easiest to scale without requiring large amounts of land to be dedicated to growing crops.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

The simple reality for boats is that demand for fuel for leisure marine is simply nothing like enough to support a fuel industry on its own. It needs to piggyback on whatever else is using fuel. Obviously right now that's road fuel.

Accepting that road transportation is moving away from fossil fuels, then you have to look to what is going to replace it. At the moment battery electric is winning that race, and there will come a point where market saturation is such that any other solution will face a real uphill battle to get acceptance. And in any case, BEV has a number of user advantages over liquid fuels that once people get used to they will wonder why they would go back to a liquid fuel, even if the pollution issues were not there.
I think it seems very likely that by 2050 the fossil fuel industry will have shrunk dramatically, to the point where supplying marinas with diesel will be a tricky ask as the entire supply chain relies on volume. Without the road transport volume, the economics of the industry simply don't stack up. Certainly not to supply diesel to a marina pump at anything approaching an affordable cost.

So in that case if we say "yes, but battery EV tech isn't going to work on planing motor boats" then we have to look not only for something else that isn't fossil fuels to do the job, but also has a significant other use case to piggy back on. So what other industries do is going to be key.

So if you can’t make a planing powerboat work with battery tech, maybe consider re thinking the hull form. Artemis already have, but it’s not the only easily driven hull form. Cat and tri power boatscare already out there, I think they’ll increase in popularity alongside battery electric drives. Clearly the gold standard for speed will be foils, but multis make a decent compromise.

 

[ducked]

The point is that if you have a good solution for airplanes and ships then why not use it elsewhere?

If we go to a generation environment where a lot of the capacity is intermittent then we need the ability to store the excess generation of the good times. There are a limited number of hills up which we can pump water, and only so many flywheels we can set spinning.

Likewise if you want to cover the Sahara with solar generation you will need a way to store and distribute that energy.

It is very hard to see how we get anywhere near net zero without such a technology

I understand the sums a few years ago looked quite good for converting a lot of Norway's existing HEP to pumped storage, if they could be cajoled into being Europes battery box, and big enough jump leads could be run under the North Sea. Dunno what the current status is though.

Why are there "only so many flywheels we can set spinning."?

Of course thats true now, and I dunno if flywheels are necessarily a good solution, but I dont remember hearing of any Fundamental Flywheel limit, which all those spinning celestial bodies have reached.