Questions tagged [cars]
automobile, mainly used for transporting people For questions also about other types of vehicles or about transport in general use the [vehicle] or [transport] tags respectively.
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Is there a business model to do carpentry without a vehicle?
I'm currently a co-owner of a small renovations contractor in a small city (~50k) in northern Wisconsin. My equipment consists of a 7x14' trailer full of tools, large diesel truck, and minivan. All ...
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A converter from CHAdeMO cable to CCS connector for charging EV cars
A very similar question to this one. Is there any solution available to use CHAdeMO charging cable to power EV car equipped with CCS socket?
My knowledge gained so far says that there isn't anything ...
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CHAdeMO to Type 2 connector for charging EV cars
I'd like to refresh and potentially update my knowledge.
Is there anything like CHAdeMO charging cable to Type 2 car plug connector? or any other solution that would allow me to charge my Type 2 car ...
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How much energy would it save to park cars in the shade in summer?
tl;dr: Cars get hot in the sun and it takes a lot of energy to cool them off. But most car trips are short, so the cars may not even get cool during that time. If they were parked in the shade, they ...
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Why are heat pumps said to be more expensive than AC?
I'm interested in electric cars and a specific model I'm interested is not equipped with a heat pump.... but does have AC. The discussion across the internet usually cites cost as a reason they did ...
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Is it more ecological to take a diesel ferry or drive an EV the longer route?
I'm trying to figure out my daily dilemma: whether it's less polluting to take a diesel ferry that hops me over the river (roughly 160 m) or to drive my electric vehicle (EV) on a 15 km detour to take ...
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Does 1 container ship really pollute as much as 50,000,000 cars?
I remember seeing many news articles and posts on social media saying that a single container ship pollutes as much as 50 million cars. Is this true? How could that be possible?
https://tech.slashdot....
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How exactly do the impacts of lithium mining compare to oil extraction over a vehicle's lifetime?
There's been a lot of discussion about the impacts of lithium mining vs oil extraction (here for example). I'd like to quantify this.
How do the impacts of mining lithium for one electric vehicle (EV) ...
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Why do most car manufacturers prefer electric batteries over hydrogen fuel cells?
Is this due to cost, or infrastructure, or path dependency, or incentives?
I understand that batteries are more efficient (1) - but this does not take into account the quantity of rare materials ...
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Which countries, regions, or cities have set a date to ban the sale of gasoline and diesel vehicles?
This week, the UK announced that sale of gasoline and diesel cars will be banned by 2035. This new policy moves the date up by five years, and also includes hybrid vehicles. From 2035 on, only ...
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How to design a taxi rank to charge electric vehicles whilst waiting for fares?
This post deals with the design of a taxi rank and how to reduce the pollution created by idling and edging foroward. A few answers suggested that making the taxis switch to hybrids, or even better ...
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How to prevent pollution caused by a taxi rank? Is there a solution to the 'edging forward' cost of cars in a queue?
I am looking at ways in which a heavily polluting taxi rank near a train station could reduce its pollution footprint. My first thought was that the pollution was mostly down to idling and I am ...
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Preventing idling - ideas to keep warm in a car when the engine is off and it is cold outside
I have asked a few people whose cars are idling if they mind switching them off to reduce pollution. One response I get from quite a lot of people is that they need to keep the car running to enable ...
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EU Real Driving Emissions testing (RDE) - does it factor in real driver behaviour and the inefficient driving habits they often exhibit?
Drivers often floor it at the lights, a large number switch off their start/stop systems, they might idle for an hour to listen to the radio, exceed the speed limit and exhibit other inefficient ...
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Are there any unsustainable supply-chain issues unique to hydrogen fuel cell vehicles?
I was recently reading that lithium mining for electric vehicle batteries is wreaking havoc on deserts in Chile.
One proposed alternative to EVs in the search for a replacement for petroleum-fueled ...
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Does Start / Stop technology in cars have an impact on air quality and by how much?
I have repeatedly heard from various car enthusiasts that start stop technology has no benefit in improving air quality (or the tiniest smallest negligble benefit). Does it have an effect and how much?...
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To what extent do CO2 emissions from motor vehicles vary?
Do the CO2 emissions from petrol / gas vehicles vary depending on driving style? Are emissions a function of the engine type or the fuel efficiency?
If a motor car is rated at 105 g/km, but it is ...
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Mindset change in developing countries
I've travelled a bit in Africa, Middle East, and Asia.
What strikes me, in all of these places, is that often in the most poverty-striken areas, things that people look up to are big cars, and ...
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To what extent (if any) are electric vehicle batteries recyclable?
Are there any existing procedures for the recycling of electric vehicle car batteries, and if so what are they? In particular I'm interested in those used in the Volkswagen E-Golf, though general ...
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How is NOx mg/km from diesel cars and trucks related to µg/m3 in the air?
There are two different limits for NOx / NO2 in Europe:
1) 80 milligrams NOx per km that a diesel car or truck drives:
Euro 6 .
(In some cities you can't drive a diesel that emits more than that.)
2)...
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Carbon footprint of CNG vs. Diesel as a vehicle fuel
What is the benefit, in terms of carbon footprint, of replacing a diesel fueled vehicle with an identical one with a CNG engine?
I'm not convinced I can simply take the carbon intensities of these ...
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What are the carbon emissions from the manufacture of the hybrid components of a Prius?
For simplicity, I will assume that the manufacture of a Prius is essentially the same process as that of a non-hybrid ICE, plus the extra environmental impact required for the hybrid components (...
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Does putting an automatic car in neutral when stopped help save petrol?
In Australia, most cars are automatic, and most people stay on "drive" while braking when stopped at a red light (i.e. if they weren't breaking, the car would drive forward).
I was wondering if ...
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The more miles a car drives, the more economical battery packs become?
I was reading here: Here’s How Electric Cars Will Cause the Next Oil Crisis, that the more miles an EV drives, the more economical battery packs become. I don't understand this assertion. I see ...
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How to prevent older Diesel cars from emitting NOx, dust and smell?
I'm considering on buying an older car but I haven't decided if it should be gasoline or diesel powered.
I would like to choose a diesel, but I'm considering the negatives:
smoke
smell
NOx emisions
...
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What measures could be taken to decrease the air pollution in a big city?
I live in Madrid, where like in most big cities there is a high level of air pollution, especially due to the traffic. The levels of pollution reached the maximum allowable level a couple of months ...
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Why is the private car still more popular over other forms of transport in the USA? [closed]
I have heard that up to two thirds of all the oil we consume in the U.S. is burned in car engines. If you added the section of the infrastructure that directly supports transportation via internal ...
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How efficient are tiny cars compared to others?
I may be purchasing a new vehicle soon (still doing the whole cost-reward calculations). When looking for a new vehicle fuel efficiency was important to me, both for savings considering how much I ...
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Fuel efficiency when decelerating on a hill
Another efficiency question from me out of curiosity.
Let's say that I am driving at a decent efficiency rate (say 40 MPG) and am coming up on a hill, with no cars immediately behind me or traffic ...
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Why are electrical cars encouraged but is electrical heating discouraged?
Electrical cars are very much promoted for a sustainable future, because they do not rely (directly) on fossil fuels. In the meantime, most of the electricity is produced with fossil fuels, such that ...
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How feasible would a gas-powered electric-engine based car be?
Would an electric motorized vehicle work if there was a small gas-powered generator to power it instead of batteries?
EDIT: The original Chevy Volt was going to have a gas generator to charge the ...
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Impact on environment: a million horses vs a million cars
Would commuting on a horse be more eco-friendly? What if there were millions of people did that? Would millions of horses be better than millions of cars?
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Can alloy wheels (for a car) pay for themselves through fuel savings?
Magnesium alloy wheels (aka mag wheels) are desirable to car enthusiasts due to an increase in performance, but with reduced weight there would also be a fuel saving.
Obviously prices and fuel ...
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Less energy consumption when we stop using fossil fuels?
What's the best way to find out how much less energy we would use if we would quit fossil fuel usage altogether?
What would be the percentage entailed?
I know it's easy to find out with electrical ...
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Curbing non-exhaust (non-tailpipe) transport emissions of particulates
Small particulate matter (PM10, PM2.5) is a nasty pollutant that is prevalent in a lot of cities.
Some of these emissions come from exhausts (tailpipes); regulation has spurred on technological ...
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documented research on best practice for encouraging behaviour change towards more sustainable transport?
Cars have large overheads in terms of energy, materials, physical space requirements, accident casualties, and local & global pollution. But, particularly in anglophone countries, few ...
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What is the environmental impact of replacing a vehicle?
I'm currently driving a Suzuki SX4 2008. It gets (supposedly) 30 MPG (9.4 l/100km) on highways, though I suspect it's much lower now because of the beating I have given the poor car and lack of ...
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Does it matter where I charge my device?
I have a number of small devices that can be charged in my car (using a charger that plugs into the car's electrical system and is powered by the car's gasoline engine) or my home (using electricity ...
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What has a lesser carbon footprint? Continue to drive my current car until it is no longer useful or to buy a new car?
I have 2003 Honda Accord. It gets ~20 MPG CITY (8.5 km/liter). I'm trying to figure out if it is more sustainable in the long run to:
continue to drive the Accord until it dies (it's still in great ...
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How efficient is it to use an electric car as storage for the energetic overload generated during sun hours (peaks) by solar panels?
I guess that the question is quite self-explanatory. I am hoping to invest in a solar panel soon, but I am a little worried about it getting inefficient once government subsidies run out and the ...
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Is there a formula for weighing ethical vs sustainable considerations when making a purchase decision?
Due to an accident our family needs to replace our car of 10 years. Normally we would make it last longer. The car needs to be big enough to transport the entire family. The only options meeting our ...
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When does using a car's start-stop system become more economical?
In this question it was asked how economic it is to turn your car's engine off when waiting for a traffic light. In the accepted answer it is said that it becomes more economical to turn it off if you ...
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Can chip tuning make a car more fuel-effective?
I'm considering to have my car engine chip tuned. I'd like to increase the fuel efficiency of the engine. Increasing the power of the engine would be only a secondary advantage of doing so. Most of ...
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Are electric cars more efficient than gas-powered car (when considering entire energy cycle)? [duplicate]
For the last couple weeks, I've been hearing a lot of talk surrounding Tesla and "the electric car". What I'm curious of is whether or not it is more efficient to actually power an electric car (the ...
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What is the sustainablity of working from home compared to the office
I'm looking for sources that can give some reasoned arguments about Telecommuting in sustainablity terms - how much of an energy costs in there to working at home compared with commuting X miles in Y ...
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How effective is turning a car's engine off while standing at a traffic light?
I know some countries enforce having cars automatically shut down the engine when stopping at a traffic light.
How much resources are really saved by this process?
Does the car need to be ...
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Most sustainable way to freshen air?
Looking for some alternatives for air fresheners. I have been looking at various alternatives such as coffee grounds (possibly in a muslin bag), and the like. What works here? I would rather get ...
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Are electric cars as environmentally friendly as we think they are?
Given the fact that the average lifetime for a car battery is 3 years and all of the batteries end up at a landfill at the end of their lifetime, how sustainable are electric cars in providing a ...
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What to do with an old vehicle?
I have a 1975 Ford F-350. It gets 6 miles per gallon. I don't use it any more.
If it was fuel-efficient, I think I should get it in to someone else's driveway, so it can reduce the demand on new ...
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How to drive to be the most fuel efficient
I saw a poster at a thruway rest stop once that said something along the lines of accelerating quickly is worse for fuel efficiency and carbon emission than idling for several hours (I don't remember ...
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