Outboards are incredibly polluting - WOW

[Reefmagnet]

I remember reading years ago that calculations concluded - using some well boated lake in the US as an example - that the surface should have a 4" (or maybe it was even even 8") layer of oil and fuel floating atop the surface after x amount of years of predominantly two stroke powered boats operating upon it. Of course this lake didn't suffer this malady because the emitted oil and fuel and other residues actually do evaporate and decompose relatively rapidly. The main problem with two strokes was having too many regularly operating in the same place at the same time creating not just smoke, but also slicks (due to their habit of discharging unburnt fuel and oil) with the latter subsequently pouring chemicals - toxic to the local marine life when in volume - into the water.


However, when used in small numbers for limited applications on a dinghy it would be hard to argue that they're any more polluting than a 4 x 300hp four stroke powered sport fisher on a one to one basis. And, considering the amount of stuff added to modern diesel engines to reduce harmful emissions, it could probably also be argued that mechanically injected cruising boat diesels of various ages and mechanical condition that go to great lengths to mix their combustion gasses with the adjacent body of water are likely to be ultimately far more harmful to the local environment than any small two stroke ever was.

[seandepagnier]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Nuclear is not a limited resource like petroleum is. The power density is staggering, many orders of magnitude more than hydrocarbons, and uranium is not rare. Furthermore -- ever heard of breeder reactors? Nuclear is practically a renewable resource, and anyway will last probably a million times longer than we need it, as we will eventually figure out fusion power which will make fission power obsolete.

Nuclear is a limited and precious resource.

It is not millions of years worth, but about 200 years at current rate. If you want to increase the use of nuclear power, it will run out much faster.

We don't fully understand the possibilities of uranium, and what we are doing with it is like burning the rain forest for charcoal. We need more research before risk wasting it.

We need "base load" it is a myth. Use a wide fluctuation in price based an availability and allow and accept some downtime (blackouts) to occur. Energy storage minimizes these effects, but even without it is tolerable.

We only need nuclear fission maybe until the end of this century, plus or minus depending on how the technology develops, and there is enough uranium for about a million years of the whole world's power at current rates of consumption. This is not an issue.

Source?

[seandepagnier]

Originally Posted by Reefmagnet

However, when used in small numbers for limited applications on a dinghy it would be hard to argue that they're any more polluting than a 4 x 300hp four stroke powered sport fisher on a one to one basis.

Haha. Why would you argue this? The argument is they are more polluting than an electric outboard which is not always true but potentially can be, or at least you can ensure it is by using solar panels to charge it.

[Reefmagnet]

Originally Posted by seandepagnier

Nuclear is a limited and precious resource.

It is not millions of years worth, but about 200 years at current rate. If you want to increase the use of nuclear power, it will run out much faster.

We don't fully understand the possibilities of uranium, and what we are doing with it is like burning the rain forest for charcoal. We need more research before risk wasting it.

We need "base load" it is a myth. Use a wide fluctuation in price based an availability and allow and accept some downtime (blackouts) to occur. Energy storage minimizes these effects, but even without it is tolerable.

Source?

Base load isn't a myth, but hydro storage is the solution where feasible.



Uranium can be extracted from sea water. Not quite ready for prime time at the moment, but it will be eventually.

https://www.nature.com/articles/nenergy201722

[Reefmagnet]

Originally Posted by seandepagnier

Haha. Why would you argue this? The argument is they are more polluting than an electric outboard which is not always true but potentially can be, or at least you can ensure it is by using solar panels to charge it.

Quick quiz.


How many watts of solar panel are required to provide the equivalent of a gallon of gas per day?

[thinwater]

Why do we immediately point at "the other guy?" If you are using resources, own it.


Live smaller. Don't keep up with your neighbors, it's immature... and common. Don't spend money on stuff just because you have it.


Yes, my kid will inherit a lot, and hopefully pass it on to her kid, to make life better, not bigger.

[Sailmonkey]

May I point out that those outboards are running at high idle.

Not in gear, no load. Any engine will get a little gnarly running like that. Put a load on them and they’d be a lot cleaner.

Still not as clean as an electric motor, but not as bad as this video makes it seem.

[Tellie]

I'll put up those two outboards up against a barnacle fouled prop and clogged exhaust elbow diesel any day.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by seandepagnier

Nuclear is a limited and precious resource.

It is not millions of years worth, but about 200 years at current rate. If you want to increase the use of nuclear power, it will run out much faster.

Not correct information. You are talking about "proven reserves" -- the same methodology according to which oil would have run out in 1968. In other words, not what exists in the earth but what is in just those mines we are digging now. And even according to "proven reserves", we've got 30,000 years using breeder reactors. See: https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...deposits-last/ If you besides that take uranium out of sea water, you've got about a million years worth.

Uranium is practically inexhaustible. It's vastly superior to other technologies we have today, but it's vastly inferior to fusion power, so nuclear fission is a critical now but transitory technology. We will never scratch the surface of the earth's uranium reserves; in a few decades uranium as a power source will be as quaint as whale oil for lighting.

Originally Posted by seandepagnier

We need "base load" it is a myth. Use a wide fluctuation in price based an availability and allow and accept some downtime (blackouts) to occur. Energy storage minimizes these effects, but even without it is tolerable.

Nonsense. Factories can't start and stop according to windiness of the weather, nor are households ok with that. How about the Internet and data centers? Just shut them down when the wind doesn't blow? Just because you live without power on your boat doesn't mean the modern world can work that way. Base load is key. Storage helps with intermittent sources like wind, but you still must have base load to support a modern industrial society.

Originally Posted by seandepagnier

Source?

https://www.powermag.com/fusion-ener...han-you-think/

End of the century is a pretty conservative estimate of when we will have large scale fusion power on the grid.

When that happens, we will stop worrying about energy altogether. Meanwhile wind and Small Modular Reactors will get us weaned off fossil fuels, and save the earth from the climate change disaster.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by myocean

See here how gasoline outboards pollute the pristine waters of your anchorage.

After 15 minutes of operation you see in these tanks the pollution from

a 2-stroke on the left,

a 4-stroke on the right and

an electric outboard in the middle.

I knew they are dirty but this is far worse than expected.
Don't buy these shitty things anymore if there is an alternative.
See a little video here.

The truth is that statistics lie and so do contrived videos like this one.

Show us three motors producing 5hp for one hour. Oops! There are only two which can do that. I can show you a motor which is much cleaner than the electric: It is a wind up motor with a big rubber band inside it. Once I've wound it up it produces no pollution, but it does not move a boat very far either.

We'd need some comparisons for motors which can do equivalent work and they must be practical, meaning that they can be refilled from a cruising boat in time for the next required shore trip.

I've been on a 90 day cruise on my sailboat, I went to shore in my dingy at least once a day, and had a few two hour long exploration trips. I could not do that with an electric dingy because there is no charging source on my boat to recharge the electric's battery (don't tell me to add 6 solar panels or a gen-set, that's not my use case). However I did start my trip with 6 gals of gasoline and bought three more at one fuel dock. For me the IC dingy motor works, the electric does not meet my needs. I'd be happy to use a sailing dingy, but storing a hard dingy onboard and sailing when there is often no wind, makes this unpractical for me. I pollute very little, and I don't feel guilty.

[geoleo]

Originally Posted by SailFastTri

Thanks for posting this. The impact of livestock is the single greatest factor for climate change, and fresh water consumption/pollution. The numbers are staggering.
We could also solve human hunger overnight and reduce deforestation if humans ate plants instead of animal products.

Guess the Masai and many other African tribes must now buy Teslas and live in them.lol

[geoleo]

Californny has banned all Landscape tools powered by IC motors

[geoleo]

Most hang gliders and such are 2 cycle engines

[Bowdrie]

Back in the '60s the magazine Popular Mechanics was saying that in only a few years homes would have refrigerator sized reactors in their basements which would provide heat/power.
I'll bet the evil utility companies put a stop to that like right now.
Anyway, I'm still waiting for the brown truck to drive up and unload an "Acme Nuclear Power Plant", that is, if Wile E. Coyote doesn't get it first.
'Course it probably didn't matter, we were all gonna die anyway because the ice age was coming and since the oil was going to run out we would all freeze to death, and if we somehow survived, we would all become cannibals because of overpopulation and no food since the ice age would destroy the crops.
Sometimes it was hard to digest all this info because it was harder to concentrate after getting out from beneath your school desk, knowing that the atomic bombs might come raining down at any moment.
Saving the Earth from small outboard motors must be the new reason to crawl under your desk.

[KayZee]

To live is to leave a mark.



The origins and purpose of the original post are suspect. Something, something and tea in china.


Kurt