I'm not sure if crap diesel vehicles is more of an American thing, cause over here they were pretty well regarded from a driving standpoint in cheaper vehicles. Over here it isn't uncommon for the diesel model of a car to be just as fast (0-60 etc) and get better fuel economy (usually around 10mpg[Imperial]). Then due to how a Diesel delivers its power in the low end they can feel faster than Petrols do because of that pull. Outside of that to the average consumer there is no other real difference (they did also historically have lower tax due to government ineptitude). Equally I would have to add that a large quantity of vehicles in the UK are Diesels, however it is very rare that they emit visible smoke (outside of temperatures where all exhaust gasses are visible).
I once drove a Audi A3 tdi with a 105 hp and then a Skoda Rapid 105hp TSI althogh the audi was a diesel it was quite a bit slower and all they are both the same size the only diffrence was that the audi had better fuel economy 5l vs 5.7l but i personally dont see the point of getting the audi then. Also maybe it was heavier? or why was it slower
I would say it's less having crappy diesels, more having fewer options when it comes to diesels. For the most part they're only used in vehicles that haul stuff, so power and 0-60 times aren't a priority, just torque. Newer diesel vehicles are a little more suitable as gasser replacements, like the ecodiesel in the Ram 1500/Jeep Grand Cherokee or the mini "Duramax" in the Chevy Colorado. And diesels here don't smoke off the assembly line, except maybe some older trucks. That's something that people do either by adding a little more fuel and therefore a little more power (with some smoke before the turbo spools up) or some overfuel it a ton as a big F-you to environmentalists, which I think we can all agree is stupid.
As for smaller diesels they are not really for towing but waft ability really, you put your foot down and sometimes you can overtake only around 2500RPM and be pushed back in ur seat with the torque, with a gasoline engine of equivalent size you would have to go to at least 3500RPM. This is good for manuals as you don't have to shift as much and also good for automatics as they don't have to shift down when accelerating (smoother power delivery) and with lower RPM less noise too.
They won't ban them, just stop selling them. More and more of cities are banning diesel car, and some even petrol cars anyway. The government is shit, the guy at the top of the French ecology minister is a moron. What do you want? https://www.newscientist.com/articl...o-ban-all-new-petrol-and-diesel-cars-by-2040/
The things said by the environment guy in that article seem pretty sane in general. I think dropping from 75% to 50% nuclear power in an 8 year period is ambitious. But imo ambitious is far better than complacent.
Honestly, we should be investing more into nuclear power. The amount of power it produces is awesome, and it has no effect on the nearby environment.
Your statement makes me wonder, back in the 50s People were invested into the idea of Nuclear powered cars. How fast could a Atomic Car go? It would probably have boatloads of power.
Generally in life it is good to diversify. If 75% of your power is dependant on nuclear, and your supply chain breaks down for whatever reason, bad things happen. Which in the event of EV's could have fairly serious results. Renewable energy makes sense not only from an environmental point of view but also a military point of view, since there are no external dependencies (other than weather, which should be accounted for anyway), and it spreads energy production out minimising disruption caused by infrastructure damage and preventing a single attack from taking out large swaths of electricity. Thinking about it though, bringing things back to the topic of cars (sorta), with EV's its plausible that they could hit reduction of Nuclear from 75% to 50% entirely because of extra renewables + EV charging demands. --- Post updated --- It could probably travel in all directions at very high speeds, whether the occupants would make it in one piece though is another matter xD
Agreed, I don't know why they would want to get rid of nuclear so much. Until there are batteries good enough to account for the downfalls of solar/wind nuclear is a better option. Water is a good option too for mountainous areas, that's mostly what the PNW uses, but I don't know how many rivers France has and if they flow enough for that to be practical.
One of the biggest issues with nuclear is cost. Its not really profitable enough for anyone to build more of. For example: https://arstechnica.com/science/201...-nuclear-plans-for-solar-plans-cutting-rates/ Its cheaper to build renewable energy sources, they are less risky to manage (therefore less money to spend on health and safety etc) and at the end of the day don't need an expensive fuel source. Nuclear is a super cool technology though, Nuclear plants in general are absolutely fascinating especially in the safety system design that is built into them, its rather incredible.
Should also be noted, France have a massively excess production over what they need, they're the world's largest electricity exporter About 10%of French electricity production is hydro
If you could fit this onto the RV upfit, you can get 13000 Hp. Probably would Break the whole thing though...
Not with all the cooling etc you would need. You would need a much much smaller reactor than that. Plus the weight would be ridiculous. If the comments on that article are to be believed you would only get about 1/10th the power out of the reactor that the article claims. However I am not knowledgeable enough to come to a conclusion on that. But since its the daily mail I am inclined to trust the comments more than the article in this case
I'm not sure you know this but Wind and Solar energy have killed a lot of birds like more than a weekend with beer and shotguns can do.
That is true, however fossil fuels cause more bird deaths than wind turbines do per MW of power generated. You would save far far more birds by outlawing glass. As for Solar, only tower type solar power stations face issues with birds being killed. This is because they mount solar panels at the top of a tower, then use mirrors on the ground to concentrate light onto those solar panels. Standard solar installations where they mount panels to the ground do not pose this type of threat. Solar tower style stations are very rare. The cause of death for the birds is flying directly into the focused beams of light. Surprised they don't have McDonalds trucks waiting underneath to collect them
