Suppose a Hard Carbon Crackdown

First off, I don't mean this to be a debate about whether man-made, or man-excellerated, global warming is happening or not.

For the purposes of this thread, let's all assume it is (whether we personally believe it or not).

Then, let us assume the governments of the world start crash programs to severely limit carbon-based fuel emissions.

How do you think this would effect the pleasure boating world?

Do you think sailboats would, with their limited speed performance and use inconveniences, make a comeback?

And if they did, would higher performance multihulls out number monohulls (as new boats)?

And what would happen to all those planing powerboat hulls?

Would a way be found to change some of them into displacement hulls?

 

The construction and premise of your query is flawed. First: why do you think that all planing powerboats are less carbon efficient than all displacement hulls? Second: do you include the carbon pollution required to make a new hull? and the follow on: do you include the carbon pollution required to scrap the existing hulls?

 

The redneck in me would turn the hulls into shed roofs and swimming pools or maybe fish ponds.

 

I have to second Hardiman which was my Rorshak and not a piggyback. The premise is flawed.

If the governments of the world require we stop using gasoline; then a suitable alternative fuel would be required.

Perhaps a plant derivative like alcohol, but modifed to behave more like gasoline. Sorry, I am no organic chemist.

The idea/notion/concept that global warming requires we stop using the internal combustion engine is also flawed.

And these things all take time, as in lifetimes. If the governments want to stop global warming; you have to go for the bigger fish first and design a way to change. If you stop producing gasoline to 'save the planet' tomorrow; the world will decend into chaos and ww3 as people struggle for power and the ability to get food for their family. When chaos occurs, the electric grid which charges Teslas will fail or become inconsistent. They are no panacea. We have one in the garage. I can't make it to Canada on a single charge if shtf, but my small gas powered Honda generator can charge it if I have enough gas!

And for a final point. I am not a naysayer to global warming. My brother works for nohrsc and carbon pollution is real. Dealing with it cannot be a hard stop.

 

Governments will do whatever keeps them in power. That is usually political correctness. Global warming/Climate change is the current bandwagon. They are no cracking down on carbon emissions as a whole now, but going through the motions. The economic plan, everywhere, is based on growth. The answer to the regulations would be to build longer boats to reach the same speed. They could comply with the regulation while increasing their carbon footprint.

 

Have any of you checked out how much we in Europe pay for fuel?If you believe in global warming,would you be willing to have a similar tax burden added to your fuel costs so that infrastructure could be put in place for less polluting transport?I suspect there would be lots of powerboats simply abandoned,but would be interested in the views of posters.

 

Most Americans would not accept funding fuels research via taxation because some person would produce the fuel later and make billions.

But it may happen.

 

I am not surprised by the comment.Nor do I believe that leisure boating is anywhere near the biggest contributor to global warming.On the other hand it ought not to consider itself as an activity that is immune to improving the world we live in.The hypothetical question posed here is most unlikely to occur in one fell swoop but with fossil fuels unlikely to last forever we may need an alternative in place.I don't see any really practical alternative for travelling more than about thirty miles at present.So in the short term I could see conversions to electric displacement boating.Longer term lots of cheap and inoperable liveaboards maybe.

 

Perhaps the most telling part of your comment is "if you believe in global warming". The belief you refer to is that it is caused exclusively by humans, which is in contradiction to geological data.

 

Has anyone powered an internal combustion engine using oil from whales or other mammals? Biodiesel not plant based maybe?

 

I can see a whaling ship powered by blubber oil.

 

During and after the ww2 scandinavian fishing fleets were running their semidiesels on whatever could be set on fire; there were canisters with hering fat (so thick that it could not be poured) strapped to the big exhaust stack to keep it floating enough to sip down to the fuel pump. So, with the right technology there is a lot of "carbon neutral" fuels available. If only politicians could restrain from subsidizing (is that an existing phrase??) one technology and not another, and letting the market do its job instead, we sure have the engineering capacity.

 

Carbon neutral is a political construct. Fossil fuels are the most efficient mode of storing solar energy. Plants, including plankton, use the carbon dioxide and turn it back into stored solar energy.

 

Yeah I know; thus the citation marks......

 

Sorry, but 'carbon neutral' just means something relatively young like wood versus something older like oil. Burning the older produces instantaneous large amounts of carbon dioxide stored many thousands of years ago. But a plant near the outputs of wood or oil does not care from which the co2 arrives.

Scientists made grave errors defining 'global warming' and 'carbon neutral'. Because that made the argument about rising CO2 political. It only became political when the constructs of either this or that entered.

No different than if a doctor suggests calling cancer by its outcome and names it death. Or, if a doctor says a cancer causing agent is less cancer causing. Less cancer causing is the same as carbon neutral.

The politics occur in absolutes. Like we absolutely must stop using fossil fuels or we absolutely have no reason to seek alternatives. Or burning fossil fuels is great and no reason to give a care about pollution, or pollution is all that matters; so go chew tree bark to survive.

But very little in life is absolute; save death.

The most ideal way to reduce the use of fossil fuels is to produce a better fuel. I predict it will happen or has. The best way to deal with carbon pollution is to grow plants that consume it.