Trolls against GA

murphey

murphey

Touchdown! Greaser!
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murphey
[Urp - divided when I shoulda multiplied. Corrected the numbers.]

There's a thread going on in the local Denver paper (fortunately, the article's been buried amidst everything else going on) and one of the topics is spam cans and GA in particular contributing to greenhouse gasses, pollution, etc.

Did a little research for an article I'm writing in a local rag, here's the summary of facts. Feel free to use in any argument you encounter.

From the US Dept of Energy, Energy Information Administration, Independent Statistics and Analysis (until someone shuts this website down, too) of CO2 emissions burning one gallon of these fuels:

18.36 pounds of CO2 per gallon Aviation Gasoline
19.60 pounds of CO2 per gallon of gasoline
21.10 pounds of CO2 per gallon of Jet Fuel
21.54 pounds of CO2 per gallon of Kerosene (most jet or commercial carriers)
22.40 pounds of CO2 per gallon of diesel fuel

Or converting this to numbers we can use, pounds of CO2 per distance:

upload_2017-6-12_15-7-36.png

More fun facts from the US Dept of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics:
There are fewer than 200,000 GA aircraft in the US.
There are more than 240 Million cars in the US.
There are more thean 24,000 commercial airline flights a day in the US.

Conclusion:
CO2 emissions from the spam can fleet and the GA fleet in general (small jets, twins, etc) are not just neglible but irrelevant.

Discuss among yourselves.
 
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The greenies will try to shut down everything they can. They have done a great job of shutting down much of the land out here in AZ for trail riding (dirt bikes, motor vehicles, etc). Amazing how much has changed in the past 10-15 years.

This is one topic that really ****es me off...environmentalists...yuck
 
"18.36 pounds of CO2 per gallon Aviation Gasoline"

This doesn't sound right in that 6 lbs of one thing shouldn't produce 18.36 lbs of another. Am I missing something?

Edit - Perhaps each molecule of carbon that comes from the carbon-based fuel combines with two molecules of oxygen during combustion such that the gaseous combustion product has roughly three times the mass? A chemist I am NOT.

Edits 2 - Never mind. Haha. https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/contentIncludes/co2_inc.htm
 
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Speaking of trolls (not you..) .... you're posting on PoA? :rolleyes: ;) :D

Perhaps they should have pounds of CO2 per passenger per KM or mile. In that case, the airline wins hands down.
 
wsuffa said:
Speaking of trolls (not you..) .... you're posting on PoA? :rolleyes: ;) :D

Perhaps they should have pounds of CO2 per passenger per KM or mile. In that case, the airline wins hands down.
Click to expand...
Actually, that calculation was done by someone else using the numbers on the DOE & DOT websites.
Delta, SAS and others have a Carbon Emissions Calculator. Delta's only works based on the confirmation number.

ICAO has one
https://www.icao.int/environmental-protection/CarbonOffset/Pages/default.aspx
Denver to O'Hare is 289 lbs of CO2 per pax.
 
TheGolfPilot said:
Until you start controlling population growth, you can be as green as you want and it isn't going to do much.
Click to expand...
Research and development of carbon-neutral energy sources might help.
 
Palmpilot said:
Research and development of carbon-neutral energy sources might help.
Click to expand...

Yes! The pace of research and development of clean energy must out pace the growth in population. The bigger that spread gets the more dangerous the situation becomes. The late solution is very scary. I drive electric vehicles and have solar on my roof, not because I think I'm saving the planet, but I am supporting further development and that is very important.
People that just complain with no reasonable solution or personal effort are just wasting their time. People complaining that airplanes emit CO2, are doing just that
 
TheGolfPilot said:
Until you start controlling population growth, you can be as green as you want and it isn't going to do much.
Click to expand...

The entire population of the world can fit in the state of Texas, with each individual person(not family) having roughly a quarter acre lot.
 
Here's an interesting update from another group:

Another interesting factoid that I found when doing a presentation on electric vehicles, including aircraft:
GA burns about 198 million gallons of 100LL every year.
The big boys burn about 198 million gallons of Jet-A every 4 days
Motor vehicles burn about 198 million gallons of gas every 13 hours.
 
CO2 is the largest component of intestinal gas bubbles.
 
To the OP, please don't confuse the folks arguing and protesting aviation with people having sincere environmental concerns, most of these folks seem to be bothered by someone being able to afford an airplane, more than the emission issue. :eek:
 
Damn, those are some pretty disappointing numbers as the only reason I fly is to pollute and destroy the planet. I guess I need to buy a hummer instead.
 
BigBadLou said:
The numbers seem absolutely out of order. More CO2 per km than nm? Same with sm.
Also, car does not qualify as aircraft. Duh. Unless we're talking General Lee. :D
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Absolutely correct. I did the arithmetic backwards. The car is there for comparison. The general public understands "car" where few understand "airplane".
 
SkyDog58 said:
Damn, those are some pretty disappointing numbers as the only reason I fly is to pollute and destroy the planet. I guess I need to buy a hummer instead.
Click to expand...

Buy the biggest piston twin you can, then fly ROP at low altitude-we'll get those numbers up yet...
 
N747JB said:
To the OP, please don't confuse the folks arguing and protesting aviation with people having sincere environmental concerns, most of these folks seem to be bothered by someone being able to afford an airplane, more than the emission issue. :eek:
Click to expand...
Some of the problem may be that they are unaware of the need to apply the Pareto principle to hazard prioritization. As an example, this article shows how it's applied in the occupational health and safety field:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle#Occupational_health_and_safety
 
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murphey said:
Absolutely correct. I did the arithmetic backwards. The car is there for comparison. The general public understands "car" where few understand "airplane".
Click to expand...

Also - your car number seems wrong unless your car is getting 1 km/gallon...
 
Dwesson said:
The entire population of the world can fit in the state of Texas, with each individual person(not family) having roughly a quarter acre lot.
Click to expand...

Might want to check your math on that as I think you're off by an order of magnitude.
 
murphey said:
[Urp - divided when I shoulda multiplied. Corrected the numbers.]

There's a thread going on in the local Denver paper (fortunately, the article's been buried amidst everything else going on) and one of the topics is spam cans and GA in particular contributing to greenhouse gasses, pollution, etc.

Did a little research for an article I'm writing in a local rag, here's the summary of facts. Feel free to use in any argument you encounter.

From the US Dept of Energy, Energy Information Administration, Independent Statistics and Analysis (until someone shuts this website down, too) of CO2 emissions burning one gallon of these fuels:

18.36 pounds of CO2 per gallon Aviation Gasoline
19.60 pounds of CO2 per gallon of gasoline
21.10 pounds of CO2 per gallon of Jet Fuel
21.54 pounds of CO2 per gallon of Kerosene (most jet or commercial carriers)
22.40 pounds of CO2 per gallon of diesel fuel

Or converting this to numbers we can use, pounds of CO2 per distance:

View attachment 54270

More fun facts from the US Dept of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics:
There are fewer than 200,000 GA aircraft in the US.
There are more than 240 Million cars in the US.
There are more thean 24,000 commercial airline flights a day in the US.

Conclusion:
CO2 emissions from the spam can fleet and the GA fleet in general (small jets, twins, etc) are not just neglible but irrelevant.

Discuss among yourselves.
Click to expand...

Truth. The numbers done lie

But peasants be jelly
 
I hate arithmetic errors. I once came up with a cookie recipe that I calculated to be a good source of protein, as measured in grams of protein per hundred calories. I discovered later that I had slipped a decimal point, which made my numbers a factor of ten too optimistic! :redface:
 
James_Dean said:
Might want to check your math on that as I think you're off by an order of magnitude.
Click to expand...

I was bored and did the math... 0.022 Acre per human in Texas. That is almost 1000 Sq ft per person!

That is like 3x the space that most city of New Yorker's have!
 
James_Dean said:
Might want to check your math on that as I think you're off by an order of magnitude.
Click to expand...

Yep, off by a factor of 10. That's what I get for posting at work!
 
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Dwesson said:
The entire population of the world can fit in the state of Texas, with each individual person(not family) having roughly a quarter acre lot.
Click to expand...

i think you're a "little" off... Texas is 268 sq miles=172,000,000 acres. the world contains 7,500,000,000 people... that's 43/acre, or 10 per 1/4 acre
 
N747JB said:
To the OP, please don't confuse the folks arguing and protesting aviation with people having sincere environmental concerns, most of these folks seem to be bothered by someone being able to afford an airplane, more than the emission issue. :eek:
Click to expand...
I wonder how many of those who claim we're rich and can afford user fees and ADSB and everything else because we have airplanes own an SUV and/or an RV that gets N mpg or better, N gpm....

One of the reasons I started looking into this was legit environmental wondering. Even if I flew the cherokee the same hours I drive the car, the airplane still produces less CO2 than my car with the California emissions system.
 
The CO2 locket.


images
 
Remember that there are folks that want to regulate cow flatulence. Wonder how aircraft CO2 compares...
 
They put pollution controls on lawn mowers for god sakes. I don't think these guys target things based on how much pollution they really contribute, I think they just push through anything they can whenever they can.
 
cowman said:
They put pollution controls on lawn mowers for god sakes. I don't think these guys target things based on how much pollution they really contribute, I think they just push through anything they can whenever they can.
Click to expand...
I think you're right.
 
genna said:
i think you're a "little" off... Texas is 268 sq miles=172,000,000 acres. the world contains 7,500,000,000 people... that's 43/acre, or 10 per 1/4 acre
Click to expand...

You forgot the rest of the number....Texas is 268,597 square miles. I remember that from 4th grade Texas history class.

268,579 square miles is 1,711,902,080 acres.
 
Zeldman said:
You forgot the rest of the number....Texas is 268,597 square miles. I remember that from 4th grade Texas history class.

268,579 square miles is 1,711,902,080 acres.
Click to expand...

Except it isn't. It's 2,674,847 square miles. Y'all are off by one order of magnitude. Or in lay parlance, 10 Texas. That's what I call: pilot math. :D
 
murphey said:
[Urp - divided when I shoulda multiplied. Corrected the numbers.]

There's a thread going on in the local Denver paper (fortunately, the article's been buried amidst everything else going on) and one of the topics is spam cans and GA in particular contributing to greenhouse gasses, pollution, etc.

Did a little research for an article I'm writing in a local rag, here's the summary of facts. Feel free to use in any argument you encounter.

From the US Dept of Energy, Energy Information Administration, Independent Statistics and Analysis (until someone shuts this website down, too) of CO2 emissions burning one gallon of these fuels:

18.36 pounds of CO2 per gallon Aviation Gasoline
19.60 pounds of CO2 per gallon of gasoline
21.10 pounds of CO2 per gallon of Jet Fuel
21.54 pounds of CO2 per gallon of Kerosene (most jet or commercial carriers)
22.40 pounds of CO2 per gallon of diesel fuel

Or converting this to numbers we can use, pounds of CO2 per distance:

View attachment 54270

More fun facts from the US Dept of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics:
There are fewer than 200,000 GA aircraft in the US.
There are more than 240 Million cars in the US.
There are more thean 24,000 commercial airline flights a day in the US.

Conclusion:
CO2 emissions from the spam can fleet and the GA fleet in general (small jets, twins, etc) are not just neglible but irrelevant.

Discuss among yourselves.
Click to expand...

I agree that the overall numbers from piston GA are negligible, but...your numbers are way, way off.

Back of the envelope calculation:

Typical Piston Plane: 12 gal/hr, 135 knots, 11.25 nmpg, 1.6 lbs/nm
Typical Car: 25 mpg, 21.8 nmpg, 0.90 lbs/nm

The math just doesn't work.

EDIT: Right. Math is hard.
 
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