What's wrong with the weather

[gross2004]

Just come back from my little joggette.... no hat, no gloves, no cold weather at all..... indeed temp gauge shows +9....... not a drop of snow or ice to be seen.... and here's me looking forward to the warmth of Portugal O Meet in 3 weeks:)

[Kitch]

it is apparently the fault of the Americans and their cars.

a quote from 'What would Jesus drive ?'
a program last night about the above.

poncy looking blond bronzed guy with quiff, whose idea of a good car was a Hummer
" We own Iraq, so why ain't gas cheaper ?"
(we were wondering whether he might perhaps be lacking in the trouser department)

[mharky]

I saw that.
Americans are so annoyinng.

[Meat Market]

Yeah imagine that american attitude x 50000 and then add about 30000 iraqis living in the same town and 20000 mexicans who neither of the above understand and thats where i was for 3 months this summer :S

[PorkyFatBoy]

Don't start me off about Americans..it's bad for my blood pressure.

Anyway are you all still there in Edinburgh, or have you been blown away to the O-ringen a few months too soon?

[Kitch]

we're all still here but the o-ringen will be getting a few extra trees

[Asian]

Hate to break up the anti-American party here but I have to give my pennies worth to this thread.

As much as the USA is a gas guzzling nation and all, they do have some pretty forward thinking policies and market driven ideas coming through and taking the country by storm when it comes to cars.

Americans have taken on board the Hybrid car (petrol and electric in one car which has reportedly got 100Km to 8 litres of fuel as an average whilst still in a Sports Utility Vehicle having a 3.3 litre V6 petrol engine that delivers 286 bhp, as well as two electric motors - one in front, one in the back) far better than antiquated Europe which is fixated with the pure internal combustion engine (with much of this antiquated thinking being spurred on by the twat himself Jeremy Clarkson and his fixation with petrol engines alone(media driven demands)). Although they are not as good as the small cars that europe is promoting (which are often so small they are pretty impractical). Hybrids are beasts and are kicking the arse off any of the new innovations in European marketed cars.

Also, as an small percentage of old cars pollute more than all the new cars put together and industry as a whole in LA, they have put into policy a set level of emmission targets that have to be maintained. In order for new industry to come in they must be either non polluting or abate pollution from existing sources whether static sources or mobile. Thus the law has set that new industy can either help old industy clean their emmission sources or rid the city of the old polluting cars, so new industry can buy the old polluting cars and gain emmission credits from that.

Pretty forward thinking in an area that needs to continue to develop and produce employment whilst still controlling pollution. For sure they have a along way to go and policy and law has to be changed but they are staring to think outside the box and adopt new ideas better than some European countries are.

And on a final point, most of the Environmental legislation that exists in Europe today stems from policies introduced in the US in the past.

Their still crap and slow in their env policies but we still have a lot of problems in the uK in Europe which we need to reslove. So not just the US boys, it's everyone. China's the big worry, they are catching up very very fast and are probably soon to be the biggest Oil user country. China's where it's at today, keep an eye out.

[Kitch]

The programme in question was not purely about yank bashing. In fact the title was a slogan being used by one Church centred US pressure groups trying to increase the rate of change - There are many many pressure groups and the programme was really about theur activities - the Hummer guy was used as an example of what they are up against.
They know their oil dependancy is a problem

One thing that I wondered about though was the vested interests that the public may be up against.
Oil companies make money from selling petrol - the more they sell, the more they make. We all know what happens when petrol prices rise - governments back domwn in the face of public outcry.

but unless driving a car becomes a financial problem no-one is going to stop it.

its a tricky business.
One dark thought occurred to me - one day the oil will run out and when it is the US vs Europe vs Asia (1984) that will make the war in Iraq look like a Sunday School outing

[Meat Market]

they do have some pretty forward thinking policies and market driven ideas coming through and taking the country by storm when it comes to cars

I agree. I did see that in America that there a lot of very well informed people who know a lot about the environment and I was amazed about how much some of Joe Public knew about my field of chemical physics.

What I found worrying were the other 75% of the 1000s of people i met who were fairly typical over the whole of San Diego as i understood from my friends who were working in adjacent towns. Most families with 3 teenage kids of say ages 16,18 and 21 would have 5 cars in use all the time and not just sports cars at that. Now it doesnt matter how energy efficient the cars are thats gonna guzzle a lot of fuel. This is a symptom of low gas and car prices- if it was like that here then i reckon more kids would get cars as presents from their parents too.

There were initiatives like car pool lanes for cars for more than 2 people, we were the only ones ever on them. Public transport is extremely rare in San Diego because noone uses it and people think that pushbikes are for homeless people!

They do have smog tests for cars that I believe would be a useful initiative over here. But regardless of how little nitrogen oxides, sulphurs and lead are in emissions, its the co2 levels that have been see to rise over the last 100 years.

There are environmental bins that people in California get but noone uses them. In fact I saw a number of homeless people scrounging through waste bins, not looking for food but collecting bottles to sell for recycling.

I didnt like the film or book that Michael Moore brought out slagging off George Bush, in fact noone asked if John Kerry had good credentials. And there are a lot of revelations i learnt in america, like I reckon Arnold Swartzenegger is a much better politician than us sneering Britons give him credit for. But the evidence is there that the average American is less environmentally aware than all other nationalities I have seen. I also reckon that Asian is right that China is probably a potentially larger polluter of the not too distant future.

[Asian]

One thing that I wondered about though was the vested interests that the public may be up against.
Oil companies make money from selling petrol - the more they sell, the more they make. We all know what happens when petrol prices rise - governments back domwn in the face of public outcry.

but unless driving a car becomes a financial problem no-one is going to stop it.

Not to take the banter out of the banter page or ought, thought I'd have another wee pennies worth.

This is infact a really interesting point and one which i may take up as my thesis topic, which i am more and more looking into and that is taking what I know as the CNN effect (which is more looking at how media influence public opinion which inturn influences government international policy, the main first case of which was CNN highlighting the plight of Somalia in 1991 which caused the US to intervene (which the film Black Hawk Down dipicts)) I'm thinking of looking at how the media portray Environmental Issues which inturn influences public perception thus influencing government policy.

If the media did not show gas guzzling cars in such a good light (as one example of many issues) and instead put more effort into highlighting new technologies and other means of transport etc. then would the oil giants have such a strong hold on society as a whole and thus would we be so dependent on oil? This is an issue on the sideline of other bigger media attentions which i'd like to look at but still a valid issue.

We are fairly lucky in the UK with the BBC being public owned to an extent where as in the US all but I think 2 media "Giants" are republican so how they influence the public is a bit different from the UK but still the same effect at the end of the day and raises the issue of how governement could use the media to more effect (to get their way maybe in the US (which might be detremental in some instances if they have bad policy) but in the UK the media could take the initiative and influence the public to be more environmentaly aware.

All interesting stuff like.

[the duncan]

i saw that too kitch, wasn't sure i heard right, but i now noping hate americans (well some of them just really get up my nose, how up there own arses are they? do they actually realise there is habitation beyond there lands?!?

[PorkyFatBoy]

do they actually realise there is habitation beyond there lands?!?

No. When you're in Manhattan, "Overseas News" is a car crash in New Jersey.

I'm aware that global warming is not just caused by the Americans, but in the letters pages of National Geographic magazine after an issue on Global Warming, I was shocked by their belief that it is "just a theory concocted by Europe to reduce the growth of the US economy". No, it's not just global warming -I hate them anyway.

[pyrat]

sorry for the 2 brainless comments :

1. Top gear is one of my favourite tv shows.
2. Oil is going to run out eventually so why not just keep living the high life and put effort into finding alternative energy sources. The car is an amazing invention and everyone should have one. It should be very cheap and pollution free. So many people would benefit from inreased mobility.

but yeah what you say is true asian as your an expert in the subject boyo!

[J.Tullster]

Got to agree with Pyrat. Top Gear is a quality show. Also when oil run's out there isn't goin to be an choice but to use alternative energy sources. Surely if companys/governments put time and money into developing superior alternative fuel technology, they could make a packet when oil runs out. Also on the subject of alternative fuel sources, I don't understand the fuss that people make about wind farms. I don't think they're that much of an eyesore in appropriate places. Much better than some great big chimney poring out smoke.

[bendover]

bulsh, top gear were very positive/promotive about a hydrogen car that they looked at. and clarkson may be a twat, buts hes a very entertaining one.

is repeatedly driving a 4WD jeep into a centuries old tree entertaining?