Time to look at the green issues effect on motorsport? - Page 2

ss_collins · 30 Oct 2006, 13:35 (Ref:1753577)

Yes we club racers should be using alternative fuels, bu the technology isn't quite there yet - hybrid single seaters - Formula Prius perhap to replace formula ford. Bio diesels in the VW cup complete with particulate filters.

But we still have a long way to go - eventually racing should become a fun way of advancing fuel technology.

Dan Friel · 30 Oct 2006, 13:46 (Ref:1753583)

Quote:

VW cup complete with particulate filters

I can't believe how the diesels in that series are allowed to run as they do - what mesasge does that send out!

Al Weyman · 30 Oct 2006, 14:06 (Ref:1753595)

Diesel is a dirty horrible fuel in my opinion and truck racing is the epitimy of all that can be wrong in motorsport with those huge chimneys belching out black soot and huge tyres leaving half their rubber on the tarmac, LPG is a far cleaner alternative, I may even look at converting one of my race cars but would probably get opposition from MSA or whoever and one problem area is refuelling although I do have a way around that

When I was having a new ECU for the LPG system fitted recently they converted a direct gas injection system on a Holden Monaro and they took it for a test with a laptop while I was there and I asked the guy any drop in performance and he reckoned none whatsoever. I would be happy to race my chevies with huge stickers proclaiming its Green credetials, anyone out there fancy backing me and setting it up:-)

bolide · 30 Oct 2006, 20:19 (Ref:1753826)

LPG is still oil-based, Al, so causes greenhouse gases whilst burning fossil fuels. Biodiesel (from Rapeseed, Palm Oil & etc) recycles carbon so there's no nett carbon gain apart from the growing/refining. The other similar green alternative is Ethanol (from Sugar Beet) which is the #1 fuel in Brazil

Of course neither is viable here because the Government has no interest at all in Green issues except where they enable taxation to be increased

Nick Froome

Al Weyman · 30 Oct 2006, 21:01 (Ref:1753849)

That is true of course but it still burns more completely and cleaner with less C02 emmissions, hey I have a certificate to prove it. Did you know your oil never gets dirty as well so more carbon savings. :-)

midgetman · 31 Oct 2006, 06:33 (Ref:1754094)

The problem with sugar beet (so the Greens have it) is that large swathes of Amazon rain forest have been cleared to make way for beet fields, meaning less trees to take in CO2!

We won't win until the Puritans have banned all cars/trains/aircraft. No electricity either of course, look at power stations. In the meantime "green taxes" are just that - TAXES! Why is it always the stick, why can't they work to produce alternative technology rather than punishing us for using what we've been encouraged to use by Government policy for 100 years!

f/x Grumpy old git climbing down off soap box

kelvin88 · 31 Oct 2006, 06:53 (Ref:1754104)

i think we are looking at it from the wrong angle. we should be designing better and more efficiant trees.

Al Weyman · 31 Oct 2006, 08:46 (Ref:1754163)

Also i thought all plants did the C02 to oxheygen bit not just trees so surely sugar beet when its growing is doing its bit as well, no. Seems a sensible solution to me and means we would have to rely less on the unstable arab and other states in the world that have been blessed, some say cursed with the natural resourse of oil. What would the MSA's stance on this be with their Road Pump Fuel policy?

Jim Spencer · 31 Oct 2006, 09:30 (Ref:1754221)

Well one very easy step would be to declare the sport Carbon Neutral.

And its not expensive either.

The BP scheme for road cars has a nice little Carbon Neutral calculator on its website, just worked out the cost for my competition car, (And was heavy on the annual mileage / fuel consumption / CO2 immesions) and it came out at £7.

So at a rough stab if the MSA added £1 or £2 as a Carbon levy on every event entry or a nominal amount on a licence application, it could then pay into a Carbon Neutral scheme one big lump sum that would massivly more than cover the sports CO2 immesions.
Could probably actually make a positive from it given enough PR spin.

While costs are a touchy subject its a minor toll on your pocket if it protects what we do from the "thall shalt not" brigade.

Bob Pearson · 31 Oct 2006, 10:10 (Ref:1754261)

I think I must be missing something here Jim, how does paying more money reduce carbon emmisssions ?

Al Weyman · 31 Oct 2006, 10:32 (Ref:1754285)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bob Pearson

I think I must be missing something here Jim, how does paying more money reduce carbon emmisssions ?

I dunno but the labour government seems to think it does by some of their proposals being banded about!

Locost47 · 31 Oct 2006, 10:51 (Ref:1754295)

Money paid into the carbon neutral scheme gets used to grow more plants & trees to 'soak up' the CO2 you're producing with your other fossil fuel-related activities. F1 is supposed to be carbon neutral alerady, on this basis.

I'm not so sure if that could really work on a global scale because agriculture already produce too much and a lot of it ends up being wasted (mainly because they're too worried about money to give it to the many starving people around the world, but that's a separate thread).

The approach i prefer is the carbon trading scheme which adds to the above by also rationing carbon per person or company and then allowing them to work within that limit as they see fit. With respect to motorsport, you could spend a big chunk of your ration by burning petrol at a rapid rate whilst on track but then instead of paying for extra trees to be planted (to reclaim some of the credits) you could accept that you've not got much credit left and just choose to cycle to work, or go on holiday in the UK rather than flying abroad, that kind of thing.

zac510 · 31 Oct 2006, 11:04 (Ref:1754305)

Al, certainly has been big over here lately due to Energy Saving Week and general mad BBC coverage.
However I am not sure that the laws are being designed to punish the rich. They probably are but are having the contrary effect. I read on the weekend of someone who lives in the Richmond/SUV furore area. They weren't bothered by the parking fee because it was the same amount they spend on having their hair dyed each month. Hardly a hindrance.

But I do think it is a good thing that the UK is aware and discussing these problems openly.

I'm a bit sceptical of those 'pay for your usage' kind of deals. Where does the money actually go? I'm sure it's like a charity where 70% (or x%) of it gets tied up in administration while the company or individual gets all the warm fuzzy feeling of being carbon neutral. I'm not really sure what percentage of carbon bank notes contain.

With regard to what motorsport can do - why don't all people who are entered into the DTRC (whichever series you are in Al) get together before the season, calculate their miles and/or fuel usage for the season. With a bit of PR you could have a few quotes like "I'll be racing for 1500km and using 200 litres of fuel in 2007, so I am planting 2 trees today." I think this could go a lot further than a bunch of guys handing over money.. A bit less 'out of sight, out of mind'.

Bob Pearson · 31 Oct 2006, 11:37 (Ref:1754328)

It all sounds a bit like protection money, or buying a clear concience. We can't go on like that indefinately, we will run out of space for growing crops when all fields have become forests.

zac510 · 31 Oct 2006, 11:45 (Ref:1754333)

Exactly. HSBC recently paid out some several hundred thousand pounds to make themselves 'carbon neutral' for one month. That oughta tree a whole county but it appears that it just bought them a bit of expensive marketing.

Wouldn't it have been better spent on some solar panels to try and make each branch self-sustainable and gain long-term savings?

steveng · 31 Oct 2006, 11:49 (Ref:1754336)

Two points:-
In the whole life of any car the amount of fuel it uses is nothing compared to the energy required to build it, think about it...Most cars start as a lump of iron ore in Australia, the industrial processes involved in making a steel car use enormous energy to turn ore into sheet metal.
I raced a Diesel Alfa 147 this year and it was wonderful, possibly the nicest racing car I have ever driven even if the pit crew kept calling "Taxi" every time I went past!

Locost47 · 31 Oct 2006, 12:10 (Ref:1754342)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bob Pearson

It all sounds a bit like protection money, or buying a clear concience. We can't go on like that indefinately, we will run out of space for growing crops when all fields have become forests.

If we carry on with the existing system the amount of carbon-based fuels available is finite but will get stretched out for ages by hiking up the price as it gets rarer, sending the financial world crazy with exponentially increasing oil prices.

Although you could probably argue that re-planting the vast areas of places like the Amazon which have been deforested could go a long way to balancing our carbon use, i agree that the carbon trading idea is not a viable long-term one. I think it is intended as just something to get us by until we figure out a better solution. Long term we have to shift from a carbon-based economy to a 'non-specific but renewable energy generation' economy, if you see what i mean. It would probably be a combination of nuclear fusion, solar, wind, tidal and geothermal power, but whatever it is there must be a break from the dependence on sources which will both run out and screw up the planet in the meantime.

Jim Spencer · 31 Oct 2006, 12:30 (Ref:1754355)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bob Pearson

It all sounds a bit like protection money, or buying a clear concience. We can't go on like that indefinately, we will run out of space for growing crops when all fields have become forests.

Ahh but that's different to what Al's first post was about, that's a different question?

Are we asking:-

How do we possibly get rid of flak from the Anti Pollution brigade.

Or

How does the Carbon Neutral scheme actually achieve anything worthwhile for the environment?

As the Two are very different questions, the first is external PR, the second is effectivly internal. I would think that unless you can put across a really obvious (to non motorsport probably anti motoring people) argument about what you're doing to be pro-active then a discussion about how it actually works is somewhat secondary.
Realistically motorsport is going to be seen as "Anti Green", a definative positive more PR wise would be a good call, and it would be handy if it was something that could be done easily right Now?
Buying some time up-front would be a simple(ish) move that could buy everybody a bit of time (probably a few years) while really clever long term solutions are dreamed up (electric speed event cars anybody?)

Al Weyman · 31 Oct 2006, 12:43 (Ref:1754367)

Quote:

Originally Posted by zac510

Al, certainly has been big over here lately due to Energy Saving Week and general mad BBC coverage.
However I am not sure that the laws are being designed to punish the rich. They probably are but are having the contrary effect. I read on the weekend of someone who lives in the Richmond/SUV furore area. They weren't bothered by the parking fee because it was the same amount they spend on having their hair dyed each month. Hardly a hindrance.

But I do think it is a good thing that the UK is aware and discussing these problems openly.

I'm a bit sceptical of those 'pay for your usage' kind of deals. Where does the money actually go? I'm sure it's like a charity where 70% (or x%) of it gets tied up in administration while the company or individual gets all the warm fuzzy feeling of being carbon neutral. I'm not really sure what percentage of carbon bank notes contain.

With regard to what motorsport can do - why don't all people who are entered into the DTRC (whichever series you are in Al) get together before the season, calculate their miles and/or fuel usage for the season. With a bit of PR you could have a few quotes like "I'll be racing for 1500km and using 200 litres of fuel in 2007, so I am planting 2 trees today." I think this could go a lot further than a bunch of guys handing over money.. A bit less 'out of sight, out of mind'.

Actually although I am not a regular DTRC'er as such (more into CTCRC Historics now) and coincidently Rob Birley who runs the show actually got some good publisity recently in the national press for doing just this and I believed raised a few hundred pounds which was donated to a tree planting project. Maybe Rob is setting a trend that would do us no harm to follow.

zac510 · 31 Oct 2006, 12:46 (Ref:1754369)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim Spencer

Realistically motorsport is going to be seen as "Anti Green", a definative positive more PR wise would be a good call, and it would be handy if it was something that could be done easily right Now?

What did you think of my tree-planting idea?
It might not absolve motorsport of pollution output, but it would tap into the current buzzword 'carbon offset' and appease those people who think it is the solution. Cynical, perhaps

edit: Al, I did not know that, thanks

JamesH · 31 Oct 2006, 13:31 (Ref:1754419)

Perhaps the big enclosing things we call circuits could be persuaded to fill the interior of the track with trees? And around the outside as well, which would help with noise pollution.

Always seems a shame when I race at Snet or Silverstone that is all so open. Could do with a few trees. Just make sure people cannot drive in to them!!

Cadwell looks great with all that greenary.

James

Al Weyman · 31 Oct 2006, 15:14 (Ref:1754496)

It will e covered in concrete buildings if the plans for the circuit go ahead!

Locost47 · 31 Oct 2006, 17:52 (Ref:1754584)

I've just been talking to a Man Who Knows about this sort of thing at work and he offered the disturbing thought that planting trees to soak up the CO2 is a fundamentally flawed proposition. He explained that the trees do indeed take the carbon from the CO2 in the air and turn it into more tree but then when they die they release it all again as they decompose. Worse still - when it gets released during decomposition a lot of it has become methane, which is much worse than CO2 as a greenhouse gas!

Bugger.

It seems the only way to truly remove the CO2 from the air is to grow the trees, cut them down and store them so they can't decompose. Hmmm, that sounds like a good idea. Maybe we could bury them deep within the Earth and leave them there for a few million years...

zac510 · 31 Oct 2006, 18:04 (Ref:1754590)

Actually it has been proposed that we push CO2 so far beneath the sea floor so that it remains liquified. Here's where I read about it.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/5255444.stm

Dan Friel · 31 Oct 2006, 19:34 (Ref:1754649)

Quote:

I've just been talking to a Man Who Knows about this sort of thing at work and he offered the disturbing thought that planting trees to soak up the CO2 is a fundamentally flawed proposition.

True, planting trees doesn't remove CO2. However, there are many schemes (such as the one promoted by BP) that remove CO2 is different ways.

Like others say, motorsport needs to be at the front of technology pushing to reduce emissions.