[SOC] Oh give me a break...

[JMcAulay]

Mon Mar 18 at 12:04:41 2002, Rob, kc0bom wrote:

>The dishonerable Greyout Doofus, governor of California, has decided to
>stick with NTBE as a gasoline additive (which has been shown to pollute
>ground water horrifically), instead of switching to Ethanol, which is an
>additve made from corn.  It's basically 200 proof corn liquer :^)  Burns
>much cleaner than gas without it, plus cities that use it have gas
>prices lower than the national average.  The oil companies say they're
>all set to make gas with it.  
>
>He decided not to use ethanol because of (get this) he didn't want a
>"midwestern ethanol cartel holding the state of Californa hostage".  
>
>How dumb is this guy?


Dumb enough to do and say anything it takes to get himself re-elected.
Rah, rah, California,  home of the MTBE-contaminated groundwater.  Hey, who
wants to slug down a bit of plain old Ethanol in their drinking water when
they could have a wee taste of that really super Methyl TetraButyl
Ethylene?  Yum!  We can only hope the MTBE cartel doesn't go after us.

Up until a few years ago, there was a lot of ten-percent-Ethanol blended
gasoline sold in California (some called it "Gasohol").  It offers slightly
less energy than straight gasoline, but it burns cleaner.  Both of these
qualities are due to that one oxygen atom in each Ethanol molecule.  And,
of course, Ethanol is made from plant products, so it's renewable.  I used
a lot of it in my car and lived to tell about it, probably lived much
easier than with all the MTBE seeping into the earth.  And MTBE absolutely
is known to be doing exactly that.

But it isn't just our Governor.  In California, the legislature has decreed
that a percentage of each manufacturer's vehicles must yield "zero
pollution."  Just about every vehicle so far that meets that absurd
standard (electric, of course) uses batteries largely made of lead and
sulfuric acid, a far cry from environmentally-friendly stuff.  A few of the
newer ones use other batteries with hazardous characteristisa that don't
really come into play unless the batteries catch fire.  The fumes are *so*
toxic.  As far as I know firefighters are still not certain how best to
handle such an event.  And, of course, those toxic batteries are charged by
electricity that comes in the US mostly from coal-fired generating plants.
To find out how those things can pollute, check on some environments that
are being damaged by acid rain.  Zero pollution?  How naive.  But those
legislators can stand for re-election saying, "I voted for zero pollution!"
 Wow, doesn't that sound good? 

Ah, yes, yet another off-topic post.  How second class.

73
John WA6QPL  SOC 263